Maya Churi

Since a towel wrapped around my feet and legs evoked such a sense of stability I thought that extending that stability to the entire torso would enhance the sensation but actually it had the opposite affect. I took a large cardboard box, scored it on the outside and wrapped around myself and a few others. The box wasn't snug so it didn't feel secure (one of my testers even fell over - like a tree falls). Even if it was snug I don't think it would have the same sensation unless our feet were grounded to the middle of the shins - making sure we wouldn't tip. But even then, it might not be necessary at all.

...and what I saw there.

There are spider webs all over the tree.
Webbing from leaves to branches - maybe moths?
Nest. A bird flew out when I touched the tree.
Outside of tree is green and lush. From underneath the leaves aren't so bright. Droopy. You can see a lot more detail of the branches.
The parrots in the tree next to this one make a lot of noise. They come in packs, eat the fruit from the tree, drop the shells to the ground and leave. The hummingbird also comes and sits and rests.
The tree provides a lot of shade.
The sun shines through the leaves.
There are eyes on the tree from where branches were cut or broken.
The fruit the tree provides for the birds and other animals. When the fruit gets too heavy because it isn't picked off, it weighs the tree down. It becomes droopy. As soon as the fruit is picked the tree perks up.
Dead leaves that fall to the ground.
The sound of the leaf falling and hitting the ground.
What if something fell from tree and could be collected? Could many leaves be made - each with some sort of interactive componant to the leaf? What would we do with it? What would we want to do with it? What if people could take them home? Would people bring them back and if so what would the significance be of bringing them back be?

While under the tree I started thinking about the mythology of trees. Their significance in story and the historical purposes they have served. I'd like to start a resource of when and where trees have appeared in story and in historical context. If you remember any, share them. And if you have any personal stories - let me know.

Have you ever been to the Treaty Oak in Austin? You can read about its history.

A few days ago I asked a couple of kids to come over and show me what they would look like if they were a tree. I didn't give them much instruction. More than anything I wanted to see what they would come up with on their own. The results were interesting: one did a yoga tree pose and another looked up at me and said, "Why would I be a tree?" After a little prodding and discussion of what a tree looks like they loosened up and made some tree-like gestures. For the first round, the kids were free to do what they wanted with their arms and their legs. But given this freedom I found that they were constantly trying to balance their top half with their bottom half. I then wrapped a towel around their legs and everything changed. They became more experimental with their arms, suddenly, the top half of their bodies seemed free. The limitations put upon their bottom half, liberated their top.

After the kids left I did the experiment with myself and when I wrapped the towel around my legs I felt completely different. It felt as though I was standing in a foundation that provided me with stability that allowed me more flexibility with the rest of my body. If the legs are stable and feel well supported it seems to allow one to let go of that part of the body and no longer think about it, which frees up the senses to focus elsewhere.

Here are some notes on my thesis - the idea and the experience. Special thanks to Mike, Ethan and Al for their creative input...

The goal of my thesis is to create a multi-sensory experience in which the participant can understand/percieve/feel what it is to be another living thing. Essentially becoming/transforming into the other.

Through the Storied Experience participants can learn, sense and eventually come to understand what it feels like to perceive the world from the other’s perspective. In the simplest terms, I would like to explore how we can use advanced technology as well as simple science to create a layered experience that gives us the impression that we, as well as our senses, have changed.

The participant will be given visual, auditory and tactile cues based on the cognitive understanding and instinct of the chosen entity. Perhaps gesture can play a part as well. (Scope - TBD).

Thoughts...we can't change our mass but we do have materials at our disposal that can give the perception that our mass has changed. Oobleck, for example, can easily give the perception of walking on water - much like the Basilisk Lizard can.

How does story work its way into this understanding?
How can story enhance perception? And, when working in tandem can story and perception create a uniquely rich and profound experience.

In the case of this thesis the perspective will be of either a crow or a tree. Why a crow and why a tree? They are both characters in the children's story I am writing - which is an integral part of the project. But, my goal is to create a format or structure by which the methods used to create the experience could be used for any living thing.

Some questions:
How does affordance work its way into this?
How do I articulate the affordances of a crow or a tree?
How do I differentiate between anthropomorphism and science in this context?
Do I have to differentiate?
Does the integration of story lend itself solely to anthropomorphism?

American Heritage Dictionary – Anthropomorphism – Attribution of human motivation, charactersitcs, or behavior to inanimate objects, animals or natural phenomena.

Does the project have to be untainted by anthropmorphism…can anthropmorphism be attributed on some level to human instinct – why is it given so little voice?

A bird ascribed human charactersitcs or a human ascribed bird characteristics…maybe we just have similar characteristics.

Inspired by the Chinese proverb “If you hear you forget, if you see you remember, if you do you understand.”

I AM DESIGNING storied experiences that immerse the doer into a world from which they will walk away with the resonant feeling that they were part of something bigger than themselves…

BECAUSE I want to explore the extent to which these experiences can be appropriated and applied to life…

IN ORDER TO enhance human understanding
AND
DEVELOP a lexicon for the methods, mechanisms and approaches to creating effective storied experiences.

Part 1: Pick 3 objects
a) Something significant from your childhood, something important to you - a toy, a talisman a memento.

Noah’s Arc wooden toy.

b) An inspiration - a quote, a song, a book, a lyric, a piece of art, an experience, a philosopher, a scientist, just ONE.

Jeanne d' Arc painting and transcripts of her trial.

c) Something you've done or pursued on your own initiative (scholarly or otherwise) that is deeply interesting/satisfying to you.

My Changing Planet

Continue reading "CTIN 548 - Assignment 1" »

Today we met with Perry and he offered us the immersive lab (photo below) to use as the staging ground for the Empty Space project. This is great news since the space already has projector mounts and a screen.

In our discussions with Perry he recommended doing a "live" rapid prototype. For this we need to recruit classmates to play the digital dwellers in the prototype (any takers?). We might have to conduct the rapid prototype experiment in the ZML since there isn't much space in the immersive lab.

What resources will we need?
Hardware:
Projector
Microphone and cables
Mic stand
Speakers
Computer

Software:
MAX/MSP
+Database of movie fragments
+Pitch tracking
+Voice recognition

What research will make this project better?
Prior Art - Don Ritter
Books: Bill Buxton Sketching and a book on body language and meaning

What will your deliverables be?
A scaled-down (3 objects w/ dozens of movies) version of the project. Ultimately, we'd like to have 10's of digital dwellers appear and disappear on the screen. For this semester we'd like to get everything working with at least 3 digital dwellers.

Written documentation.

Nowhere: an unknown, remote, or nonexistent place or region.*

A secret place so secluded no one even knows it exists. It isn't on any maps and doesn't have a zip code. It stands at the intersection of three counties and therefore isn't in any government records and doesn't receive mail. The address is next to the llama farm, at the end of the overgrown dirt road, on top of the hill.

Nowhere is the world I will build in this class.

It is also the fictional location of a children's book I am writing.

*Random House Unabridged Dictionary

The Promise of an Empty Space

Take the promise of an empty space and an empty screen then fill the space with your own story.

All of the digital storytelling mediums take place on a screen. The promise of the blank screen or the empty space is that a story will unfold before our eyes. We may interact with that screen but for the most part we are being told a story - guided through an alternate space.

What if we flipped the unspoken arrangement between digital storyteller and viewer?

What if the viewer was given an empty room and a blank screen? What if when the viewer began to tell their story the screen(s) would slowly become filled with people (or digital dwellers from familiar stories) listening to the viewer. When the viewer stops talking, or disappears, the digital dwellers would disappear - retreating back to the space just beyond the edges of the screen.

Timline/Production Schedule

Articulate a collective participation strategy (i.e., how will you take advantage of being part of a participatory culture?)

Wikipedia defines Participatory Culture as “a reference to the sum of the customs or ways of life that lead consumers to create and circulate new content on a medium.” If the words of this sentence are rearranged it could read, “a reference to content created by consumers to circulate new customs or ways of life.”

I am interested in exploring that deep ravine that lies between learning about something and actually taking action to change it. Recently a seed of pessimism was planted in my brain. It has just begun to sprout even though I have been trying to starve it into submission. This past weekend I realized that the seed had grown when, after a 3-hour drive along the central coast, the mustard colored hills (Joan Didion called them this), made me think of the parched landscape of a planet whose inhabitants are slowing burning it up. I kept having to remind myself that we live in a desert, the hills are supposed to look like that.

No matter. It got me thinking about taking action and how does one encourage…no, demand…no, subtly COERCE people to willingly make change in culture - to participate and understand all of the consequences. That brings me back to the rearranged Wikipedia sentence, “a reference to content created by consumers to circulate new customs or ways of life.” Is this a challenge?

Decide on and articulate your own strategy for creating a productive tension between theory and practice in your work.

In thinking of a strategy I have to first answer the question of whether theory or practice comes first. For me, theory is going to come before practice. In the past the practice of my work has always come before theory. I would like to switch it around.

That said, my first step is to read.

Define proficiency and an economy of value for the realm in which you intend to work (i.e., how do you want your work to be judged?)

I would like for my work to be perceived as one of a group of works that helped change the way a generation (or two) understood the world they lived in. And also…encouraged…no, demanded…no, COERCED people to willingly make change.

3 things you do really well
Manage
Produce
Motivate

3 things you want to learn
To draw
To tell a story
To garden

3 things you want to be great at
Articulating ideas
Remembering (people, places, things)
Balancing home/work, life/love, theory/practice

Post a few links, names or readings that you are interested in exploring as part of the research for these projects.

Coming soon.