February 28, 2005
Vectors launch party at MoCA Thursday March 3
Please join us on Thursday, March 3, 7-10 pm at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art (250 S. Grand Ave.) for the launch of Vectors, USC's new electronic journal of culture and technology. Thursday night's party features multi-player mobile gaming led by Julian Bleecker and Jane McGonigal, large-screen projections, live music and free food and drink. Vectors editor Tara McPherson will facilitate a discussion of a new era in digital publishing featuring work by Erik Loyer, Raegan Kelly, N. Katherine Hayles, and Alice Gambrell. Free and open to the public.
RSVP
More info
IM Forum Speakers for 3/2/05: Jonah Brucker-Cohen and Katherine Moriwaki
Our speakers this week will be Jonah Brucker-Cohen and Katherine Moriwaki.
Location: USC Zemeckis Center, Room 201
Time: 6:00pm-8pm, 3/2/2005
Jonah will discuss his work in the theme of "Deconstructing Networks" in both physical and online instantiations. He will discuss his projects that attempt to challenge accepted notions of network interaction from software manipulation and rule-based systems to translating virtual processes and conventions into the physical world. Projects he will discuss are BumpList, an email community for the determined, Alerting Infrastructure!, a website hit counter that destroys a building, PoliceState a fleet of radio controlled policecars who's movements are dictated by keywords sniffed on a local network, and SimpleTEXT a performance that is controlled by participants through texting messages from their mobile phones.
Personal URLs:
Projects and Work: http://www.coin-operated.com/projects
Personal site and Blog: http://www.coin-operated.com/
______________________________________________________________
Katherine will discuss her work on "socially fashioned" networks, utilizing a combination of wearable technologies, varying degrees of network infrastructure, and social behavior for deployment and propagation. Unlike fixed networks, spontaneous ad-hoc networks rely upon mobile and flexible infrastructure which can dynamically reconfigure based on necessity and circumstance. As these communication devices are integrated into intimate personal objects, into accessories and clothing, the statement that "the people are the network" becomes increasingly resonant. This presentation focuses on the project "RECOIL", "Inside/Outside", "Oscillating Windows" and "Umbrella.net." These projects serve as examples of "socially fashioned" networks.
Personal URL:
Projects and Work: http://www.kakirine.com
February 25, 2005
Surrealist Games Experiment II - Come Play with USC Game Design Community
Join the USC Game Design Community as we explore what the Surrealists' games have to offer us as players and designers and how can we apply these experiments in chance to our own designs.
From "A Book of Surrealist Games":
"Playful procedures and systematic stratagems provided keys to unlock the door to the unconscious and to release the visual and verbal poetry of collective creativity . . . They borrowed children's games and invented techniques to exploit the unpredictable outcomes of chance and accident."
From the Surrealist Manifesto:
"Surrealism leads to the permanent destruction of all other psychic mechanisms and to its substituion for them in the solution of the principal problems of life."
Where: USC Annenberg Institute for Multimedia Literacy
When: This Friday, Feb 26 3-5pm
February 24, 2005
3dsmax + combustion
Discreet is going to be demoing combustion 4 and 3dsmax 7 on April 13, in the LA area.
http://www4.discreet.com/events/eventdetail.php?evt_id=146
This is a free event. It's on a Wed. afternoon, but it should be done around 4pm. Even if you're already proficient in either/both packages, Discreet usually sends out pros to do these demos, so chances are you'll learn a trick or two.
February 23, 2005
EIN Oscar Party - 5:00 PM this Sunday
Looking for a place to watch the Oscars? Look no further!! Join the EIN at Birds on Franklin St in on the Hollywood/Los Feliz border. Hang out with fellow usc-ers and fill out a ballot before-hand! Birds is a really great bar and they've got two large flat screen TV's. The small lounge area is reserved, but the earlier you get there, the more space we can claim!
This and all EIN social events for the semester will have a Tsunami Relief donation option. SO, for this event, they are asking for a 3-5 dollar donation per ballot. EIN will take $1 per ballot and donate it toward the "pot" for the winner and the rest will go in toward the donation. TO RECIEVE A BALLOT RSVP TO USCEINRSVP@YAHOO.COM by this Saturnday noon.
Birds: 5925 Franklin Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90028-5515
Phone: (323) 465-0175
Casual Game Evolution Challenge Co-Sponsored by Shockwave.com
From the press release: "Open to any and all game developers, the contest seeks to identify the best single-player Shockwave game concepts for online, tournament, and download play. The contest is designed to help developers successfully release their games and to help the casual game market evolve with innovative new game concepts. Five finalists will be awarded Game Trust licensing contracts with a revenue share and guaranteed distribution to millions of casual game players worldwide including an exclusive premiere on Shockwave.com. The Grand Prize winner will also receive a specially modified, high end Vespa."
More info at: http://www.gametrust.com/solutions_developers_contest.php?pid=solutions
February 21, 2005
IM Forum Speaker for 2/23/05: Scott Kim
Title: THE ART OF PUZZLE DESIGN: PRINCIPLES, CASE STUDIES AND DESIGN PROCESS
Location: USC Zemeckis Center, Room 201
Time: 6:00pm-8pm, 2/23/2005
Abstract: From casual web games to 3d action games, puzzles are an important part of many electronic games. Whether you are designing or producing games for the web, mobile phones, computer, arcade, or console games, you need to know how to create good puzzles. In this talk, veteran puzzle designer Scott Kim explains the principles of puzzle design, shows a wide range of examples from both electronic and nonelectronic games, and describes the design process behind puzzle design.
ALSO: Scott will also do a PUZZLE DESIGN WORKSHOP for IMD students on Thursday, 2/24 from 6-9pm:
After a brief overview of the theory behind puzzles, veteran puzzle designer Scott Kim takes you through a series of design exercises that teach you how to invent and refine puzzles for games. All design exercises will be on paper. Topics include: Stealing ideas from physical puzzles. Ripping puzzles out of today's headlines. Level design for puzzle games. Translating a puzzle from one medium to another.
Scott's website
The line blurs... Film/Game
Talk about experience. I can't belive with this school and my networking @ E3 last year I got into WBIE and gave me the chance to work in a studio on the edge of convergane, WB.
While there I was able to work on Constantine the Video game as well as sit in on some film shoots.
While the reviews havn't been as good as it might deserve, I think Constantine still holds up as a great crossover between, Comicbook, Game, and Film.
My father tipped me off on the NY Times Article
Altered States: transformations of perception, place, and performance
CALL FOR PAPERS
Altered States: transformations of perception, place, and performance
A Transdisciplinary Conference
23/24 July 2005
Portland Square, University of Plymouth, UK
Papers are invited which will contribute to the development of transdisciplinary discourse between artists, scholars, scientists and technologists interested in issues of heightened or paranormal perception; cognitive science; virtual, transformable or esoteric architectures; psychic studies; ritual; shamanism; pharmacology and ethnobotany; quantum consciousness; technoetics; telepresence; new media arts; electronic literature; performance; digital music; net art; interactive
technologies.
Chair: Professor Roy Ascott
DEADLINE : 11th March 2005
More here
February 17, 2005
Bloggers in Solitary Confinement (and worse)
PRI's The World The World Online ran a story this afternoon on two jailed Iranian Bloggers.
They refer to the Committee to Protect Bloggers who have designated February 22 as Free Mojtaba and Arash Day and suggest methods of bloggy activism.
Blur+Sharpen Feb. 22 at 7:00PM
This month's Blur + Sharpen showcases an international mix of short films and music videos that return to the physical world via low-tech aesthetics and garage video remixing.
Screenings include classic music videos by Michel Gondry for the Chemical Brothers and Steriogram, Olivier "Twist" Gondry's latest video Bricoleur for the French jazz group Les Fils de Teuhpu, Tsujikawa Koichiro's Drop (do it again) for the Japanese electronica group Cornelius, LA design firm Logan's Information Contraband for DJ Money Mark, Austrian filmmaker Virgil Widrich's award-winning Fast Film, Peter Tscherkassky's digital analogue horror film Outer Space, Mike Nourse's satirical State of the Union remix Terror Iraq Weapons, and the notorious Grey Video by Ramon+Pedro. Plus a special bonus screening of Gary Beydler's Pasadena Freeway Stills, the film that started it all!
Blur + Sharpen is a theme-driven monthly screening series for recent digital media. All screenings are free and open to the public on Tuesdays at 7:00 PM in the Ron Howard Theater at USC's Robert Zemeckis Center for the Digital Arts. The series is sponsored by the Institute for Multimedia and co-curated by Steve Anderson, Peter Oleksik and Holly Willis.
February 16, 2005
VersionFest 05
Version>05: Invincible Desire
April 22- May 1 2005
Chicago, Illinois
DEADLINE: February 28, 2005.
SEND US YOUR IDEAS AND PROPOSALS FOR:
papers, workshops, films, street art (stickers, cut-outs, xeroxable pages, stencils), anti-corporate actions, tactical media projects, culture jamming activities, public art interventions, micro actions, billboard modifications, DIY urbanism, office pranks, social and technology hacking ideas, agit prop posters, how-to guides, creative disturbances in public space, profiles of space invaders and hijackers, lists of tactics and strategies, and psychogeographic adventures.
more
IM Forum Speakers for 2/16/05: Smith, Caudell, Paniotis
IM Forum Speakers for 2/16/05:
Steve Smith, Los Alamos National Labs, Lawrence Berkeley Labs
Tom Caudell, University New Mexico, EE, CE, CS
Paniotis, University New Mexico, EE, Music
Title: Immersive Perceptualization for Exploration, Discovery and Analysis of Extreme Dataspace
Location: USC Zemeckis Center, Room 201
Time: 6:00pm-8pm, 2/16/2005
Abstract:
Los Alamos National Laboratory, in collaboration with University of New Mexico and George Mason University have been building tool sets and frameworks with the general intention of supporting information visualization (perceptualization) solutions.
Immersion
We believe that a "sense of presence" and an identification with the data being explored and analyzed is important.
Perceptualization
We believe that "Visualization" is the correct archetype for the larger, more encompassing and useful concept of "Perceptualization".
Reification
This term means "to make the abstract real". In this case, we refer to the act of binding perceptual/representational elements (location, layout, color, shape, time, sounds, etc) to abstract data in a way that gives it a "reality".
References:
Position Paper from the Workshop on "Information Visualizaiton Software Infrastructures" at IEEE 2004 Visualization
Scientific Visualization and the Homunculus Project webpage.
Immersive Information Visualization, Supercomputing 2004 LBNL Visualization Group Demos/Projects/Presentations
February 15, 2005
SIGGRAPH 2005 - Position Papers
There are a couple of panels seeking Position Papers for discussion at SIGGRAPH 2005 that would be perfect for the work many of us are doing here. The panels have titles like: Rethinking The Narrative Thread: Where Do Movies End And Videogames Begin? Discussing The New Storytelling Paradigm, and Networked Performance: How Does Art Affect Technology and Vice Versa?, State Of The Art In Game Research: Games on the Horizon and Beyond, and Ubiquitous Music: How Are Sharing, Copyright, and Really Cool Technology Changing the Roles of the Artist and the Audience?
Deadlines are approaching!
First Amendment Protection for Bloggers
NY Times Article about the Valerie Plame case:
Jailing of Reporters in C.I.A. Leak Case Is Upheld by Judges By ADAM LIPTAK February 16, 2005
Two reporters who have refused to name their sources to a grand jury investigating the disclosure of the identity of a covert C.I.A. officer should be jailed for contempt, a unanimous three-judge panel of the federal appeals court in Washington ruled yesterday....
....In the decision, the judges debated whether some sort of legal protection of reporters is even feasible in the Internet era.
"Does the privilege also protect the proprietor of a Web log: the stereotypical 'blogger' sitting his pajamas at his personal computer posting on the World Wide Web his best product to inform whoever happens to browse his way?" Judge Sentelle asked.
Judge Tatel responded that resolving the "definitional conundrums" that "unconventional forms of journalism" raise could wait for cases actually involving those issues.
February 14, 2005
IM Forum Speaker for 2/16/05: Bob Stein [POSTPONED]
IM Forum Speaker for 2/16/05: Bob Stein (in conversation with Michael Naimark, Peggy Weil, and Scott Fisher).
Title: Discursions
Location: USC Zemeckis Center, Room 201
Time: 6:00pm-8pm, 2/16/2005
From a recent post by Bob on Future of the Book:
"Some of the most important early work in interactive media took place at the Architecture Machine Group Laboratory at MIT (now the Media Lab). twenty years ago the lab made a videodisc, Discursions, containing videos of several key experiments. this early work at MIT was crucial in terms of fueling and defining my ideas about interactive media (see books unbound article).
Yesterday i met with a group of freshman in the interactive media honors program at the University of Southern California who signed up to work with the institute on presenting the Discursions material in some as-yet-to-be-decided form. the response was fantastic. (remember, these are young kids — none of whom were even born when Discursions was made). i know "awesome" is an overused word today, but that's a good description of what the students thought of what they saw. many of the experiments seemed as if they could have been done yesterday and they grasped the importance of making the work available to young people working in the field now. any fears i had that my interest in the Discursions material was merely an oppty. to walk down memory lane disappeared immediately.
We're planning to interview as many of the original researchers as possible, hoping that they can contextualize the work in terms of both its origin and its trajectory over the past twenty years".
BIO: Bob is Director of the Institute for Future of the Book, co-located at Columbia University and The University of Southern California. He was the founder of The Voyager Company. For 13 years he led the development of over 300 titles in 'The Criterion Collection', a series of definitive films on videodisc, and more than 75 CD ROM titles including the CD Companion to Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, 'Who Built America', and the Voyager edition of 'Macbeth'. Previous to Voyager, Stein worked with Alan Kay in the Research Group at Atari on a variety of electronic publishing projects. Seven years ago, Stein started 'Night Kitchen' to develop authoring tools for the next generation of electronic publishing. That work will be continued at the Institute for the Future of the Book.
February 12, 2005
Interactivity and immersive enviornments
Workers unfurl fabric, lower left, at "The Gates" project in New York's Central Park, Saturday Feb. 12, 2005. With flowing fabric the color of a sunrise, "The Gates," a massive public art installation in Central Park, was unfurled Saturday for the start of a 16-day stay transforming miles of footpaths in Central Park.
February 11, 2005
EA early creative process demo/discussion, Feb 15 at 7 pm
On Tuesday evening an EALA Exec Producer, Chris Plummer, will be demoing an extensive paper prototype he and is team are making for a brand new videogame.
The paper prototype is the first thing they are making. This will be a chance to see and discuss the early early creative process on an EA game franchise.
Time: 7 pm (during CTIN 488)
Location: Lucas IML
All are invited but please RSVP to me via e-mail so Chris knows how much playable prototype material to bring.
LokiTorrent
A Dallas court agreed that Hollywood lawyers would be allowed access to LokiTorrent's server records which could let them single out those who were sharing files illegally.In October 2004, the site had provided links to more than 30,000 files.
The action came after the operators of LokiTorrent agreed a settlement with the MPAA. A stark message has appeared on the site from the MPAA warning...
February 10, 2005
Real ID ACt
The measure, called the Real ID Act, says that driver's licenses and other ID cards must include a digital photograph, anticounterfeiting features and undefined "machine-readable technology, with defined minimum data elements" that could include a magnetic strip or RFID tag. The Department of Homeland Security would be charged with drafting the details of the regulation.
A Situationist Critique of Computer Games
Author of Computers as Theatre, Brenda Laurel weighs in with a critique of the trends in video games from a Situationist perspective. It ought to resonate deeply with those of us frustrated with the sort of cultural engagement that is typical in todays games. Laurel challenges us as game designers to use the powerful medium of interactive entertainment to challenge the Spectacle rather than submit to it and support it. Detournemont gaming!!!
Piercing the Spectacle: A Situationist Critique of Computer Games
Interesting to note that this essay will be published in the forthcoming Rules of Play Reader on MIT Press.
Barcodes get some style
Here's the coolest thing I've seen in a while -- barcodes with style meta-data! :)
Check out the Japanese version of the site - and then imagine the possibilities of what a cameraphone-wielding kid could do with these little icons. Suddenly, barcode-scanning becomes much more interesting...
February 9, 2005
E3 vs GDC
Just wanted to create this post for some healthy debate. I (and it seems to me most people?) found GDC to be a really engaging and educational experience, while E3 was more of a commercial promotional event. It seems like if EA devoted some of the $8 million to sending all or some of us to GDC, it would really benefit us as game developers (much more so than E3).
US Zipcode Spatial Map
This may be old for some of you, but this morning when I arrived at EA, there was this cool link circulating for a MIT project. Check it out:
http://acg.media.mit.edu/people/fry/zipdecode/
February 8, 2005
Christie's "Origins of Cyberspace" Auction
The Origins of Cyberspace: A Library on the History of Computing, Networking & Telecommunications
23 February 2005, 10:00 am
Christie's, 20 Rockefeller Plaza, New York
The catalog is an amazing browse, even if you don't have extra cash lying around.
Karel Capek, R.U.R. Rossum's universal robots, Prague: Vydalo Aventinum, 1920
Estimate: $15,000-20,000
Highlights include:
- Edmund C. Berkeley's Giant brains or machines that think
- Karel Capek's R.U.R. Rossum's universal robots
- Joseph Marie Jacquard's manuscript on the Jacquard loom
- Claude E. Shannon's "A symbolic analysis of relay and switching circuits"
- Alan Mathison Turing's "On computable numbers with an application to the Entscheidungsproblem"
- Norbert Wiener's Cybernetics or control and communication in the animal and the machine
- The UNIVAC Short Code
- J. Presper and John Mauchly's "Outline of plans for development of electronic computers"
It's Official!
Read it here!
(Registration required to read Gamasutra articles. It's free and they don't spam!)
Here's an excerpt:
"Electronic Arts co-founder, executive vice president and chief creative officer Bing Gordon has been named as the first holder of the Electronic Arts Endowed Faculty Chair at the USC School of Cinema-Television.
Resident in the School's Division of Interactive Media, the Electronic Arts Endowed Faculty Chair is a rotating position that will be held for one to two years by leading figures in interactive entertainment that will join the school's faculty as visiting professors." (courtesy David Jenkins, Gamasutra)
February 7, 2005
ACE 2005
ACM SIGCHI International Conference on Advances in Computer Entertainment Technology
The field of computer entertainment technology has aroused great interest recently amongst researchers and developers in both academic and industrial / business fields as it is duly recognized as showing high promise of bringing on exciting new forms of human computer interaction. Now deemed deserving of both serious academic research, as well as major industry and business uptake, techniques used in computer entertainment are also seen to translate into advances in research work ranging from industrial training, collaborative work, novel interfaces, novel multimedia, network computing and ubiquitous computing.
The purpose of this conference is to bring together academic and industry researchers, as well as computer entertainment developers and practitioners, to address and advance the research and development issues related to computer entertainment.
Prospective authors are now invited to submit Papers/Posters/Demos electronically via the conference website:
http://www.ace2005.org by 15th February 2005
IM Forum Speaker for 2/9/05: Larry Gertz
Title: Beyond Home Games: Interactivity in location based entertainment and museums.
Location: USC Zemeckis Center, Room 201
Time: 6:00pm-8pm, 2/9/2005
Abstract: With the exploding popularity of home computer games and the introduction and immediate success of massively networked internet games, a less well known and divergent interactive market continues to develop somewhat behind the scenes. More and more, location based entertainment venues like themeparks and sports bars are developing unique interactive experiences in an attempt to capture both the youth market and adults in search of more personalized, engaging entertainment. In addition, many museums and other public institutions are realizing that they must not only compete with entertainment venues for their visitor’s, but that by inviting participation in the exhibits, visitors have a more compelling and memorable museum experience, often translating into repeat visitation. This presentation will focus on these less well known interactive markets, how they differ from more traditional interactive venues, what works and doesn’t work in location based interactives, and an overview of successful economic models.
Bio: Larry spent twenty years at Walt Disney Imagineering during which time he was a Producer and Creative Vice President of Epcot, as well as heading major interactive initiatives for the Walt Disney Company. During his tenure at Disney, Gertz creatively directed the development of DisneyQuest, a 100,000 sq. ft. indoor, interactive themepark in Florida and Chicago. His most recent museum work includes The Science fiction Museum and Hall of Fame in Seattle.
USC 1, Carnegie Mellon 4
The Intercollegiate Game Challenge: USC vs Carnegie Mellon held last Friday was terrific fun and a successful event. Unfortunately, however, we lost the competition.
Here are the results:
Burnout 3 - CMU
Carcassonne - CMU
Literati - CMU
Halo 2 - USC
Set - CMU
Overall winner - CMU
We had a good turnout from USC undergrads and engineering students. Unfortunately only three MFA students from our division attended - this compared to about 25 MFA students from CMU's ETC program.
CMU has already requested another online event with us. They also asked if we'd like to have some kind of get together at GDC next month. Let me know if you guys have ideas for / interest in either.
The Daily Trojan did a nice story about the event here.
More info about upcoming Game Design Community events here.
Communist Video Game Reviews
Over at the Maoist International Movement page, they've got a number of video game reviews from a perspective that most of us aren't used to hearing. While its kind of funny that one author is frustrated that you aren't able to nationalize factories in Sim City 3000, some of the insights into the ideology in military games are pretty interesting.
CTIN 541b - Mobile Module
CTIN 541B - Mobile Module Syllabus
I've received a couple of requests for the module syllabus and reading list. Below is the overview, and the syllabus is attached. Briefly, the readings are largely conference papers or short excerpts from books. The one book I would recommend purchasing is the Rheingold. The other essays are Google'able. If you have trouble locating them, I'll help you find them once the class begins.
See you next Monday!
Overview
The proliferation of mobile devices with built-in networking capabilities offers a unique opportunity for designing compelling entertainment, productivity and information experiences.
The objective of this module is to introduce students to the design challenges and opportunities presented by mobile technologies. Through readings, presentations of existing mobile projects, discussions, and short projects students will develop pragmatic insights into designing mobile experiences and technology. Students will form design teams to execute a mobile project design using the principles from readings and class discussions.
February 6, 2005
Happy 60th B-Day to BOB
"We should really love each other
In peace and harmony
Instead, instead, we're fussing and fighting
Like we ain't supposed to be, tell me why"
I love Bob. I think the greatest lesson he has is that the media machine can be used to spread a message of unity, love, and rebellion. He is one of the few artists I know of that can speak of God and keep everybody nodding and smiling.
praise.
May our interactive works be as Bobs' music, a tool for the good, for the soul, for humanity.
Blog migration complete
We're back up and running on a newer, faster, sweeter server. Please report problems asap. Thank for your patience.
February 4, 2005
February 3, 2005
EPIC
You've probably all seen this already, but just got home to find this video in my mbox(~8 min.):
"In the year 2014, the New York Times has gone offline..."
http://www.broom.org/epic/
thanks jacki
Raph Koster speaking at USC -- Monday Feb 7th
This coming Monday, Raph Koster will be the featured guest speaker in CTIN 482 -- Designing Online Multiplayer Game Environments. Raph is a longtime colleague of mine - he was the lead designer on Ultima Online & Star Wars Galaxies, and he's now the Chief Creative Officer at Sony Online Entertainment. Raph is a fascinating individual with deep experience in MMP game design, and he's a stimulating and provocative speaker as well. He's just published a new book called "A Theory of Fun for Games" which we're reading in class.
All students and faculty who'd like to hear Raph speak (and ask him questions) are welcome to attend this class session. We meet in the Interactive Media Lab, G142 Main Room (below the Carson Stage), from 1-3 PM on Monday Feb 7th.
If you think you'll be joining us, please post a comment here so we can get a rough headcount. Thanks!
