Medium practices

In this essay I develop a topic addressed in my book, Film Art Phenomena: the question of medium specificity. Rosalind Krauss's essay 'Art In the Age of the Post-Medium Condition' has catalysed a move away from medium specificity to hybridity. I propose that questions of medium cannot be ignored, since they carry their own history and give rise to specific formal traits and possibilities. The research involves close critical analysis of four moving image works that have not previously been written about: two made with film, and one each with computer and mobile phone. The analyses are conducted by reference to my ideas about how technological peculiarities inform and inflect practice: I see the work's material composition, its form and final meaning as intricately bound up with each other. Film, video and the computer give rise to specific forms of moving image, partly because artists exploit a medium’s peculiarities, and because certain media lend themselves to some methodologies and not others. I do not seek hard distinctions between these media, but discuss them in terms of predispositions. For example, I discuss a 16mm cine film in which the shifting visibility of grain raises ideas around movement and stillness. The aim is to develop a definition of medium specificity, in relation to the moving image, that is not essentialist in the way previous versions were criticised for being, that is, based on ideas of "material substrate" (Wollen). I argue that film is a medium of stages, in contrast to the modern tapeless camcorder, in which all functions of recording, storage, playback and even editing are contained in a single device. Supported by a travel grant, I presented a version of this essay at the International Conference of Experimental Media Congress, Toronto, in April 2011, along with a selection of works: http://www.experimentalcongress.org/full-schedule

SPATIAL SWARM GRANULATION

This paper presents an implementation for dynamic two or three dimensional spatial distribution of granulated sound (or granular synthesis) over an arbitrary loudspeaker system

A Planning-based Approach for Music Composition

. Automatic music composition is a fascinating field within computational creativity. While different Artificial Intelligence techniques have been used for tackling this task, Planning – an approach for solving complex combinatorial problems which can count on a large number of high-performance systems and an expressive language for describing problems – has never been exploited. In this paper, we propose two different techniques that rely on automated planning for generating musical structures. The structures are then filled from the bottom with “raw” musical materials, and turned into melodies. Music experts evaluated the creative output of the system, acknowledging an overall human-enjoyable trait of the melodies produced, which showed a solid hierarchical structure and a strong musical directionality. The techniques proposed not only have high relevance for the musical domain, but also suggest unexplored ways of using planning for dealing with non-deterministic creative domains

Re-imaging the Environment

This paper represents a study of selected visualisation and investigative methods that facilitate the exploration and expression of human emotions and perceptions within real world environments during the design development stages of a project, repositioning exploration and visualisation in spatial design education. It puts forward an outline for an iterative enquiry around human experiences in order to assess the value of alternative cognitive tools for spatial design students in higher education. Established tools such as orthographic drawings, axonometric projections or scale models equip spatial designers with the consistency they need to investigate and represent physical attributes of space but don't always constitute the best methods to explore the perceived environment, even though it is a key contributing factor to the way we experience our surroundings. It is therefore in the interest of design educators to investigate complementary interpretations that enable students to consciously explore less tangible aspects of design such as emotions and multi-sensorial modalities. Projects developed using tools and techniques ranging from digital 2D and 3D image making, photography, film, animation and performance provide an insight into the possibilities offered by exisiting visual technologies as dynamic study devices of human experiences and contribute to the generation of alternative processes in spatial design education

A Framework for Designing 3d Virtual Environments

The process of design and development of virtual environments can be supported by tools and frameworks, to save time in technical aspects and focusing on the content. In this paper we present an academic framework which provides several levels of abstraction to ease this work. It includes state-of-the-art components we devised or integrated adopting open-source solutions in order to face specific problems. Its architecture is modular and customizable, the code is open-source.\u

Forrest Gump: comic representations of the recent American past

Mestrado em Línguas, Literaturas e Culturas - Estudos InglesesO presente trabalho propõe-se pesquisar a abordagem histórica das décadas de 50, 60 e 70 nas comédias americanas contemporâneas. Deste modo espero destacar os acontecimentos da história americana no passado recente que se prestaram a uma abordagem cinematográfica e foram retratados em comédias. As reacções a esses filmes permitem ainda reflectir sobre os valores culturais transmitidos nos filmes de comédia. Esta dissertação também aborda as características e funções da comédia enquanto género cinematográfico. Na fundamentação teórica também são abordadas algumas questões ligadas à adaptação cinematográfica. A vertente prática da dissertação centra-se no filme Forrest Gump, explorando a sua relevância histórica, e a adaptação ao cinema. ABSTRACT: This dissertation is intended to research historical approaches to the fifties, sixties and seventies in contemporary comedy films. Doing so, I expect to cast some light on recent American events that have proved to be cinematic and likely to be explored in a comic perspective. Viewers´ response to these films is also to be analysed so as to reflect on the cultural values rendered in comedy forms. Moreover, this dissertation includes some thought on the narrative and generic features of comedy as a film genre. The theoretical section also covers some issues raised by film adaptation. The practical research section focuses on the film Forrest Gump, exploring both its historical significance, and the precise nature of this adaptation

Spatial prioritisation of revegetation sites for dryland salinity management: an analytical framework using GIS

[Abstract]: To address the lack of analytical and modelling techniques in prioritising revegetation sites for dryland salinity management, a case study of the Hodgson Creek catchment in Queensland, Australia, was conducted. An analytical framework was developed, incorporating the use of spatial datasets (Landsat 7 image, DEM, soil map, and salinity map) which were processed using image processing techniques and a geographic information system (GIS). Revegetation sites were mapped and their priority determined based on recharge area, land use/cover and sub-catchment salinity. The analytical framework presented here enhances the systematic use of land information, widens the scope for scenario testing, and improves the testing of alternative revegetation options. The spatial patterns of revegetation sites could provide an additional set of information relevant in the design of revegetation strategies

Parallelized Rigid Body Dynamics

Physics engines are collections of API-like software designed for video games, movies and scientific simulations. While physics engines often come in many shapes and designs, all engines can benefit from an increase in speed via parallelization. However, despite this need for increased speed, it is uncommon to encounter a parallelized physics engine today. Many engines are long-standing projects and changing them to support parallelization is too costly to consider as a practical matter. Parallelization needs to be considered from the design stages through completion to ensure adequate implementation. In this project we develop a realistic approach to simulate physics in a parallel environment. Utilizing many techniques we establish a practical approach to significantly reduce the run-time on a standard physics engine

New Waves, New Spaces: Estonian Experimental Cinema of the 1970s

Using the label of “new wave” in the context of Estonian cinema is highly problematic and controversial because, unlike in France or, to take a more similar socio-political framework, in Czechoslovakia, the (Soviet) Estonian filmic arena did not see a creative outburst synchronous with and comparable to, both in scope of innovative production and international acclaim, the cinematic practices adorned with the adjective “new” elsewhere in Europe. While the heyday of various new waves, both in Western Europe and in the Soviet bloc, is normally limited to the period between the mid-1950s and the ruptures of 1968, in Estonia, as the local literary critic Mart Velsker (1999: 1211) has accurately argued, the essence of the innovative 1960s “is manifested in its most vivid form some time between 1968 and 1972, that is, at the end of the decade and partly even beyond it.” Compared to other artistic genres, however, Estonian cinema was severely lagging behind, both in achievement and in reputation. The true “Estonian New Wave” has been defined by local critics as born and burgeoning in the end of the 1970s and the beginning of the 1980s (Orav 2003: 54ff; Kärk 1995: 117; Kirt 1980: 33-4), when a new generation of young filmmakers entered the stagnated cinematic stage with bravado, finally inverting the low ebb that had lasted nearly a decade. Yet, in the midst of the ebbing waters of the early 1970s, a dark horse emerged, whose artistic contribution to Estonian cinematic heritage deserves to be identified as a new wave in miniature, a veritable diamond, albeit perhaps rough-cut. This author was Jaan Tooming, an actor and a theatre director, whose films constitute a fundamentally unprecedented phenomenon in Estonian cinema. His controversial, stylistically and semantically rich output, composed of unceasingly intriguing visual utterances, provides a fascinating order of spatial representations, which reconfigure Estonian cinematic territories in several respects and, at the same time, re-evaluate and criticize quite provocatively the historical and conceptual framework of imagining national, social and personal identities. The following investigation of Tooming’s films will concentrate chiefly on the spatial representations and practices, with digressions into the domain of re/constructing identities, both personal and collective