Ashley

in stereo

Open mic, no. 1

For open mic session number one, I choose to take a look at a couple of projects produced by the Labyrinth Project, a branch of the Institute for Multimedia Literacy.

The Dawn at My Back DVD-ROM
Memoir of a Black Texas Upbringing, An Interactive Cultural History
By Carroll Parrott Blue and The Labyrinth Project

I really liked this piece, which explores the filmmakers’ relationship with her mother during their years together in Houston, Texas.

The interactive documentary gives the audience a chance to experience the segregated south through contemporary interviews, still photos and moving image archive.

Of particular interest the documentary includes two highly memorable sequences: one dealing with the KKK; the other a lynching. It’s also worth noting that the use of panorama images was a great way to bury hidden treasures for additional archival and interview bits.

Finally, just wanted to mention that much of the design of this project was done by Kristy Kang, who is certainly a talented graphic and interactive designer who truly makes this experience a fantastic one.

Norman Klein: Bleeding Through--Layers of Los Angeles, 1920-1986 DVD-ROM
By Rosemary Comella, Andreas Kratky, Norman M. Klein

This interactive narrative combines a database detective story with a digital city symphony and a meta-narrative reflection on storytelling in this new medium. Set in a three-mile radius near downtown Los Angeles, this DVD-ROM explores Boyle Heights, Bunker Hill, Chavez Ravine, Chinatown, Echo Park, Little Tokyo and other contested locations that helped shape the city’s cultural history.

These ethnically complex neighborhoods are documented through archival photographs and films and through contemporary images that either reproduce or evoke them.

While I also found this to be an eloquent piece of work, and I absolutely loved the incorporation of various silent films, I found myself being troubled by many elements of the design.

Of particular note was the way the interviews were incorporated. In fact, I only remember seeing one interview and it was crammed at the top of the screen. Because the rest of the DVD was arranged to beautifully, it was truly a disservice that the interviewees seemed so out of place.

I thought the piece was highly informative, provocative and fresh, though I wish that it could be more cinematic in terms of the way the information was relayed. Something also left me wanting the piece to have a more traditional documentary feel, particularly with respect to incorporating multiple points of view.

Getting interactive at the airport

Airports would certainly be a wonderful public space for fun interactive media. Anything to deter from the boredom of waiting and hassles of airport security.

This photography exhibit features the work of Claudine Marrotte and presents a close up view of nature. While it’s not exactly interactive, I thought it is a potential way to begin thinking about the possibilities for interactive media in an airport.

Claudine Marrotte’s Photography Exhibit at Melbourne International Airport
Runs during business hours from October through February.

Presented by the Brevard Cultural Alliance at the Melbourne Greyhound Terminal at Melbourne Airport in Melbourne, Fla. Phone: 321-690-6817

Also of interest, I ran across this event: Delicious Demise – an interactive murder mystery with audience participation in solving "who done it."

The Playhouse doesn’t have any information on the event as of yet, but it is likely to be in April.

Titusville Playhouse, Inc., located at 301 Julia St., in Titusville, Fla.

Cityscaping

Assignment: Create an immersive city/street-scape that represents or communicates an impression of downtown Los Angeles.

It is most always the case that any assignment I take on becomes one focusing more on the cultural and political significance of an area or topic rather than an exploration in the possibilities of the technology creating it.

With a relatively abstract idea about the end product in this assignment, I chose to explore various areas of Los Angeles: MacArthur Park, Skid Row and downtown. At all three locations, I, along with Brian Bell, a wonderful photographer and friend of mine, hit the streets of downtown and began photographing the streets, passersby and people.

While it isn’t difficult to imagine that the locations looked as if they always do in traditional Hollywood films, it was intriguing to me to consider the possibilities about how many visual variations there are for each given space. Furthermore, I began thinking about how the visual design could affect the user's experience in terms of the political, social and cultural meaning he or she would take away.

The photos that I chose to develop for presentation purposes were those of the downtown streets and skylines. I have always considered downtown areas to be somewhat lame — a collection of buildings for banks, insurance companies, and basically everyone that we pay our monthly incomes to.

But when I got in the environment and started thinking about it in a different way, I was thinking about how great it would be if I could run up and down the buildings. What if I could drive my car up the side of a building or take the buildings and streets apart, piece by piece?

Inevitably, there are many great and imaginative things that can result from having a map of all the streets in the world — from allowing individuals who would not ordinarily explore these spaces the opportunity to do so and/or contributing to a more efficient 911 system.

The possibilities are truly endless for any area, whether it be considered a concrete jungle, like downtown; dangerous, like MacArthur Park; or hopelessly indescribable, like Skid Row. My perception proved positive considering that this being my first journey to MacArthur Park, I walked away and would now label it a relaxing place to go on a Sunday afternoon.

My perception of MacArthur Park is much different than that of those who have created scene after scene in books, film and music. Based on what those folks have written and photographed, I would have thought that I wouldn’t have come out of there alive.

Negative representations of communities like MacArthur illustrate the problematic nature of having these areas mapped by one single individual. While I truly believe that no matter how many renditions can be done of one area, the vision will inevitably be limited in that it could never possibly represent the experience of our world wide audience.

by women for women

a little thought of mine to make the world more practical.

Mediamatic/IDFA workshop New Media Documentaries

don't know that anyone will be able to make this, since it's in amsterdam, but it looks like an amazing opportunity to explore new media documentaries with folks who have similar interests. i am certainly going to make an attempt to get there. it's happening nov. 22-26.

some of the topics the workshop will explore are new ways of concieving, producing and publishing documentary film projects and how to deliver stories interactively.

projects will be designed using korsakow system, which i know nothing about but am eager to learn as it is described as an "elegant and powerful tool" for making interactive film projects.

more information can be found at www.mediamatic.net/cwolk/view/19590.

ocean's 12

THEME red and white and hot and familiar and celebrity

STYLE steven soderbergh and mysterious and certainly sexy

CONCEPT ocean's 11 plus catherine zeta-jones & julia roberts

TARGET a sequel, but sure to be fun

exercise no. 2

an interactive experience
by ashley york

exploring life is an installation that invites the patrons of a funeral ceremony to explore the life of the deceased in a non-traditional way.

through an extensible collection of stories and visual imagery about the individual, the audience will be able to contribute to the narrative by volunteering his or her personal collections relating to that person’s life.

contributions to the story can be a personal story, photographs, home video in addition to any other collectibles that define this unique individual.

ultimately, the experience will represent the rich and varied life of the individual and will offer a diverse perspective of her as a result of the various material submitted by friends and family.

inevitably, an overwhelming emotional response will result given the oddity of hearing and seeing the deceased individual.

but of course, the most intriguing aspect to this experience is that it is controlled by the audience.