Kurosh ValaNejad

Then you're not going to want to miss this: Arias with a Twist

The Night Journey and Flower are included in the exhibit
VIDEO GAMES: Tales of Play, Adventures of the Unexpected
Centro Fundación Telefónica, Lima, Peru; July 23rd - October 4th, 2009

Continue reading ""The Night Journey" and "Flower" are in Peru" »

My computer animation, When Summer Falls, will be screened
at the Fly with the Cage Art show, July 10 – 26, 2009

If you can’t fly out of the cage, just fly with the cage. – Sufi Proverb

Phantom Galleries LA, Miracle Mile, 5412 Wilshire Blvd, Los Angeles, CA

Continue reading ""Fly with the Cage" Art Exhibit" »

"The package starts with Peter Brinson's documentary videogame about U.S.-Iran relations; art director Kurosh ValaNejad, a Spacialist in the virtual sciences, discusses a game design that takes on psychology, history, conservatorship, and orthogonal math." Carrie Paterson, Worlds of Science, Artillery magazine, May/June 2009

Moving Forward by Looking Back:
Documentary Videogame Illuminated by Persian Miniatures
by Kurosh ValaNejad

The Cat and the Coup embraces the nature of videogames as participatory media to tell a dramatic biographical story of Dr. Mohammed Mossadegh, Prime Minister of Iran. Mossadegh was democratically elected in 1951 and overthrown the night of August 19, 1953 by a U.S.-engineered coup d’état. The documentary game focuses on an aspect of warfare that has little presence in videogame history - covert military interventions carried out by the Central Intelligence Agency - while implicating its players in the result.

Continue reading ""The Cat and the Coup" in Artillery Magazine" »

Why did Al Jazeera obscure the face of Baitullah Mehsud, Waziristan’s Taliban commander, with a white glow rather than the conventional pixilation or black box approach?

From FRONTLINE’s The War Briefing

Certainly they are aware that this veiling method is historically used in Persian miniatures to obscure the face of the Prophet Mohammad.

From, The Ascension of Muhammad, from Haft Awrang by Jami, 1556-65, Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.. One of the many versions of the veiled Prophet’s mystical journey.

Performance within the Uncanny Valley only seems believable on virtual characters with creepy body-language, like zombies in horror flicks.

But there is another set of mannerisms that may prove as successful on hyper-realistic models and that is the chaotic jerks associated with seizure disorders, like epilepsy, and tic disorders, like Tourrette syndrome.

The difference being that this class of expressions can generate sympathy in the audience, rather than revulsion which is typically associated with this phenomenon.

Judge for yourself by making the trek to the Orange County Museum of Art in Newport Beach to see Call Me Ishmael by Daniel Joseph Martinez. This sculpture that looks just like its creator, uses hydraulics to mimic everything from small spasms to violent seizures, and includes an eye-roll that gave me a strong urge to hold him so he would stop hurting himself.

Continue reading "Butte Discovered in the Uncanny Valley" »

... contemplating Nature to divine its Spirit.

An Ancient Persian Device of Wonder

These pictures were grabbed from a short clip about Iran's Film Museum.

And to learn more about Iran's film history check out: Iran, A Cinematic Revolution.

Continue reading "Shahre Farang" »

Instructors: Kurosh ValaNejad (CTIN) and Ann Page (FA)

Day and Time: Friday, Nov. 7th, 2008, 1-4:00p.m

As part of the workshop, we will be printing up to 8 small (3"x3"x3") models (4 from Fine Art and 4 from the Cinema school.) Let me know if you have something you would like printed (especially if it's for a class project) . I will work with you to prepare your models for the printer. I may also use your models in the workshop, to describe the process for preparing virtual models for the 3D printer.

Continue reading "Rapid Prototyping Workshop" »

Truth Invaders is a new game by Jeremy Bernstein

Some of you may remember Jeremy from his work with Chris Swain at the Game Innovation Lab. He worked on both Immune Attack v1.0 and The Redistricting Game.