Capstone Week 1

1.) Shadow Follow-Shadow Disobey (working title......)

2.) A interactive installation piece using the Xbox360 Kinect that will project shadows.

3.) In this project I want to create an interactive installation piece using the Xbox360 Kinect. When people walk up to the piece they will see 4 shadows in the "kinect will calibrate me now" pose. (which resembles a "freeze, put your hands up pose") At some point the shadows will get a mind of their own and do what they what. They may murder another shadow, make out with another, flip the viewer off or just sit down. The relation between the viewer, the psychology of shadows and the disconnect I'm most interested in.

4.) I've been working on this project since last winter 2011. I think to have a history of from start to where I'm at now is a perfect description.

• This is a project I re-created in Spring term 2011 that was created by Trent Brooks (noiseink) and the Kinect Libraries by Daniel Shiffman. I presented this in SOAR and it was widely accepted and many people were intriged by this interactive piece.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qyPnbx45Fyk

• Summer 2011 was a lot of frustration. Not having the tools to get the kinect to work on my PC was a struggle. I waited on technology.....waited and waited. Until late summer Microsoft released their own software for the kinect PC users. I got it to work but unfortunately I'm not a programmer and could do very little with the extensive program
• David Bithell worked with me and helped me through SO many hurdles. Through our hard work we got this to work.... http://vimeo.com/20473750 This uses 4 programs that intertwine and work with one another to function with Animata. (Animata is a free 2-d animating/modeling program that's really simple but effective)
• From here....I hit the most massive road block in this entire process. A few days before my BFA review I realized I wasn't sure if I wanted to continue my 3-D monster mirror idea or if I wanted to stick to 2-D. Was 3-D even possible with the technology at this point? What am I doing? What's my vision? AHHHH!!!!! Many weeks I spent pondering and just writing out the "WHYS" in this project. It was many sad weeks.....
• FINALLY!!!!!!! Through dumb luck and just looking at interactive pieces I found an answer! I knew all along I wanted the viewer to connect to my piece. These two pieces http://fantomatico.org/artworks/

http://fantomatico.org/artworks/

I was fully inspired by and then I looked up the psychology of shadows and found this, ""SHADOW: The Deficient or Negative Ego. The shadow represents all our disowned, despised, and repressed traits. It lives buried in the closets of our subconscious minds safe from our judgments. The shadow is our "dark side." It acts out for us all those denied emotions and urges we wish we didn't have. " FINALLY!!!

• The next step was to make my own shadow...Here's the result! I have to figure out how to change the background color in Animata...Otherwise you can't see the black shadow.

Kinect with Shadow from Tawnka on Vimeo.

• I want to have at least 4 shadows which means 4 people interacting at once and the disconnect I mentioned above. Also work on the animation/programming the disconnect aka the shadows own mind. Those are my goals.

5.) I want to have all of my shadows up and running and completed for this term. That's my goal. My show is in late Spring.

6.) http://vimeo.com/20473750 (this is the closest thing I've found)

7.) http://vimeo.com/32461930 (it's laggy.....I know.... not like that before I uploaded it)

8.) I've already had a slew of technical issues.....I'm sure there's more to come. As in can I get 4 shadows to run and work at the same time? Will I use Studio Max 5 or some other programming tool? I've gotten over some major hurdles...Now were going over the bumps.

9.) TIMELINE!!!!

Week 2: Tuesday-Work on getting first shadow 100% completed

Thursday-Finish shadow 1 and start shadow 2

Week 3:

• Tuesday: Work on Shadow 2
• Thursday: Finish shadow 2 and start 3

Week 4:

• Tues: Work on shadow 3
• Thurs: Finish shadow 3 and start 4

Week 5:

• Tues: Work on Shadow 4
• Thurs: If all shadows are done then move onto animating/programming if not finish shadows

Week 6:

• Tues: Work on animating/programming
• Thurs: Work on animating/programming

Week 7:

• Tues: Work on animating/programming
• Thurs: Work on animating/programming

Week 8:

• Tues: Work on animating/programming and start setting it up
• Thurs: Set up and work out bugs

Week 9:

• Tues: Finish up any loose ends
• Thurs: Finish up loose ends

Week 10:

• FINAL