Ideas come from Ideas

Practice Development : Final Major Project

MA in Photography, Falmouth University, Module 5

Figure 1

I work two days a week at an organisation in the centre of Birmingham, here I had a discussion about the future and the plans for the Commonwealth Games, 2022.  In a little under 4 years and much of the world’s eyes will be on the city I have been part of for a long time.  As I am considering as an integral element of my practice light, projection, surfaces and architecture I came up with an idea that has sprung from my projection experiments.  A whole street projection.  The idea being that projectors are mounted within the first floor of buildings along a street and images are projected onto the opposing facades.  This would be installed on both sides of the street.  The images could be historic, abstract, or something else.  I this created a sketch, fig 1, to demonstrate the two streets that I currently judge to be potential candidates as they are historic and thus spatially complete and both lead to the principal square in the city which is likely to be a focal point for the duration of the Games.

Figure 2

I held a conversation with a firm in Scrofland called Double Take Projections, (fig 2 shows a still from a demo video) which is intereted in talking about developing up the first stage technical approach and budget.  I was pelased to hear that their primary software tool is Madmapper, as this to the tool I am using.  The intention is to develop this further from a curatorial angle.

Notes

Double Take Projections http://doubletakeprojections.com/

 

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Notes on a Tutorial

Installation : Final Major Project

MA in Photography, Falmouth University, Module 5

Figure 1

On 18th April I had a further tutorial with Wendy McMurdo.  These are my summary notes and actions;

Ensure I evidence the installation projection testing – the equivalent of a maquette.

Look at Cornelia Parker’s suspended fragment installations.  Light and objects.

Dust as fragments – the theme – think at the level of particulate matter.

Look up the book Nonhuman Photography Joanna Zylinska.  23-page abstract link 

Response to Madmapper dual move stream; images selected are transient, about light and work as projections.  The transitions set halting – need to work on that.  The abstract images are perhaps the best.  There is a management of the viewer as they tend to be rooted to the spot, observing whilst the stream rooms (in my case 4 mins 55 seconds currently).

Look at Kara Walker’s work, fig 1, on projection 

and Douglas Gordon – the 24 hour cycle, 

plus Fiona Banner 

Noted that I am ‘embodying imagery’ – there is a shift in perception and an ‘opposition’ between projection and concrete.

Discussed the projection of archival images that I plan with the shards of concrete as a frame to project though. Mentioned the John Madin documentary from BBC (1960’s)  – able to view at BBC offices and New Art West Midlands in 2019.

I could look at quad overlay in Madmapper.

Notes

Image screenshot from this website, accessed 18.4.2018 https://art21.org/read/kara-walker-projecting-fictions-insurrection-our-tools-were-rudimentary-yet-we-pressed-on/

 

Projection – Developing a Technique

Practice Development : Final Major Project

MA in Photography, Falmouth University, Module 5

In preparation for greater endeavours I have started using a demonstration version of Madmapper version 3.2.3 by GarageCube & 1024 Architecture along with a borrowed Optoma HD67 projector; this furthers my initial exploration.

figure 1

I am fascinated by the concept of light entering the camera, then being emitted to create a new image that is impacted by the form, texture and angle of the imposed surface.  Taking this further I will be searching out precedents and techniques in a wider forum.

The imposition of an image onto planes and details was the first task I set myself, applying it at home in my principal domestic space (figs 2,3); I intended the outcome to be familiarisation with the software and how it interfaced with the projector.  I had already spent several hours watching and applying learning from Madmapper tutorials and those provided by Wesley Buskirk on YouTube.

 

figures 2,3

Day One

These are the results from my first ‘after dark’ trial on 9th March 2018.  I was pleased with the clarity and brightness, that is to say, the image reproduction; there is an obvious ‘lining’ effect on the images when viewed close up (e.g. fig 4).  I used my Roundhouse (2017) image of an ‘heroically shot’ plastic chair (fig 4), as it had high contrast and very clear structure.  What fascinated was the visual intersect of the ribbed image and the slatted form of the wooden shutters, illustrating the marriage of imagery and form. Figure 5 shows an internal corner projection with the shadow of objects and the reflection from both walls of the image from the glass frames. 

figure 4

Figure 5

Day Two

Here are the 10th March 2018 trial images.  This evening was primarily focused on manipulating the dimensional forms of paired images onto walls at home with the projector deliberately aimed at an angle, to emulate the potential to show dual images in the gallery installation onto internal or external corners. This involved positioning the images on the screen (fig 6) and then manipulating the frame in real time to accord with the eye’s view of the projected image (fig 7).  I learned how to create plural images that appeared dimensionally ‘correct’.

Figures 6, 7

 

Figures 7, 8

I also tested an abstract image shot in Amsterdam (2017) onto a corner to deliberately distort and further disrupt the image, figs 7, 8.  I created a ‘virtual’ 3D cube in the software and pasted 3 images onto the surfaces then projected these, figs 9,10.

 

Figures 9, 10

The potential for creating a video within the projection stream is initally tested here, fig 11.

Figure 11

Next Steps

1 I will purchase the full version of Madmapper software with a view to buying a MiniMad hardware companion.

2 I need to understand how I transfer an edited stream of images onto MiniMad, to then connect into and drive a projector.

3 Test the equipment at Argentea Gallery with a view to going the final piece.

4 Search out a building in which I can run a parallel projection project at larger scale, to test the transformational concept.

Spatial Image Mapping

Installation Development : Final Major Project

MA in Photography, Falmouth University, Module 5

figure 1

On 27th February I undertook my first tutorial in the use of Madmapper software on a Mac laptop. If all goes to plan, this will allow me to create projection solutions into complex geometries which will be appropriate for my multimedia show.  I expect to be able to review the potential for using a screen to project onto but, as an alternative, directly onto the gallery walls.  The latter was the format for experimenting in this tutorial by pasting into the software a photograph of the gallery space and creating quadrants to the extent of each plane of wall either side of a 90-degree corner.  Once ‘mapped’ I was then able to drop into the software a series of my recent images and project them (within the Madmapper software window) as if onto the walls, fig 1.  A series of images were inserted into a stream to emulate how a flow of images would be experienced by a gallery viewer, see fig 2 (noting the café noise in the background).

My motivation is to parallel the concrete image work and deliberately subvert and transform the image making experience beyond the convention and tradition of a simple image projection onto a screen, and thus challenge the perception of space via whole wall projections typically of other walls and materials, that can also be ‘interrupted’ by the viewer moving bewteen the image and projector.

figure 2

Review of ‘art’ projection techniques.  The following are samples I have researched which use projection, though notably, they all use and sound.  Fig 3 shows the use of Madmapper set-up to create an experiential show. From from http://madmapper.com/11-jacques-andre-dupon/  accessed 3.2.2018

figure 3

Figs 4 & 5 I have selected as a form of precedent, as they illustrate the use of mapping and light projection externally at dusk or after dark to demonstrate the light manipulation of facades, to distort perception, colour, features, and sound again is used to aid the dramatic impact.  These are not directly comparable to my plans, yet they conceptually illustrate the shift and transformation that can be created by projection.

To apply this within the Pause Project I intend taking the desktop practice into architectural space as the experimentation evolves.

figure 4

figure 5

Practice Development : Sound & Vision

MA in Photography, Falmouth University, Module 4, Sustainable Prospects.  Week 8

figure 1

This account centres on work in progress towards my final project.  This involves applying the talent of Leon Trimble, an innovative sound and vision artist who has built a reputation on producing and delivering amazing sets.  From the Birmingham Open Media (BoM) web site, where Leon is a fellow, he is described thus “Leon is currently developing ideas inspired by astrophysics, gravitational waves and data visualisation/sonification with researchers from the University of Birmingham, to see how Interferometers (used for measuring gravitational waves) could be connected to audio visual synthesisers of his own making”.  An example of his work can be found here.

figure 2

Leon (seen here in his studio, figure 2) and I have been talking for 5 months about the spatial mapping and virtual representing spaces as a collaborative proposition in my Pause Project.  He invited be back to BoM (see figure 1) this week to see his latest hardware, software and thoughts.

figure 3

Firstly, a newly imported second hand headset, the Occipital Bridge, which uses an iPhone 6 (in this case) as the processor, camera and screen, but a Structure Sensor and controller allows a space to be mapped by swivelling through 360 degrees and recording a space and all its features, then, on mounting the headset, you can move around the space as it uses depth sensors and, by movement of your head and triggering the handheld controller you experience a mixed reality blend of the real and the virtual, in other words the space is explored both visually via the model created as well as ‘really’ as you can see your hands and other people in the space.  You can trigger onto the scene a toy-like robot that then moves around to your command.  A mixture of excitement and nausea pervaded me and we then chatted about how this could be used to experience a space; a challenge for the Pause Project as that is a documentation of inaccessible pause spaces (for the general public), however it could be an adjunct to the space I hope to find to host my final exhibition installation.

Figures 4, 5

On a slightly more applied, but equally enticing experiment, we created an imaginary photographic exhibition and began to programme using Madmapper software (figure 4) a multiple series of images onto a matrix concrete wall.  The file from that set up would, once perfected, be transferred via a micro-SD card placed inside the Raspberry Pi based Madmapper projector controller (figure 5), which in turn can be resident in an exhibition alongside and connected to an HD projector.  This would allow me the facility to create a two sided wall as a final project with a series of unique hand-made concrete images to one side, conventionally lit and a rolling series of images from the wider body of work on the other with the possible inclusion of sound and moving images.  I have already begun to delve into archives of the architect John Madin to find film footage that could be used as part of the memoriam I plan using imagery and concrete.

References

BoM website http://www.bom.org.uk/bom-fellows/leon-trimble/ accessed 18.11.2017

Occipital https://bridge.occipital.com accessed 18.11.2017

Software link http://madmapper.com accessed 18.11.2017

All images Philip Singleton (shot with an iPhone)