WE ARE REVEALED IN OUR GESTURES. (Algorithms as metaphors, we are metaphors of time.)

http://cargocollective.com/ofyou

Description

Fear inhibits change, but curiosity inhibits fear. Therefore curiosity yields change.
How does learning an experience changes who we are?
How can we measure what we cannot see?
We are fundamental things plus accidents, everything that exists is just fundamental things plus accidents.

Classes

Rest of You

A make-believe playground in virtual reality, say what you want and it will appear!

https://journey.barakchamo.com/conjure-vr

Description

Conjure VR is a3d creation and authoring environment that provides users with an intuitive voice and controller interface to create the VR environments of their dreams.

Using Daydream, Poly, Street View, Voice recognition and generation APIs, Conjure listens to your requests, transforms and creates virtual environments and looks up 3d models to load them into your scene. The intuitive interface translates across mobile devices, computer screens and VR headsets for ease of use and maximum accessibility. Want an elephant in Times Square or buses floating in space? Say “go to Times Square. Elephant please” and you got it!

Classes

Open Source Cinema, Synthetic Architectures

A voice-controlled web VR experience invites you to sing along with the robotic choir

https://wp.nyu.edu/maxhorwich/2018/04/30/join/

Description

Join is an interactive musical experience for web VR. A choir of synthesized voices sings from all sides in algorithmically-generated four-part harmony, while the user changes the environment by raising their own voice in harmony.

Inspired by the Sacred Harp singing tradition, the music is generated in real time, based on Markov chains derived from the original Sacred Harp songbook. Each of the four vocal melodies are played from the four corners of the virtual space toward the center, where the listener experiences the harmony in head-tracking 3D audio. A microphone input allows the listener to change the VR landscape with sound, transporting them as they join in song.

While the choir is currently programmed to sing only in solfege (as all songs in the Sacred Harp tradition are usually sung for the first verse), I am in the process of teaching the choir to improvise lyrics as well as melodies. Using text also drawn from the Sacred Harp songbook, I am training a similar set of probability algorithms on words as notes. From there, I will use a sawtooth oscillator playing the MIDI Markov chain as the carrier, and a synthesized voice reading the text as the modulator, combining them into one signal to create a quadrophonic vocoder that synthesizes hymns in real time.

For this show, I present to show Join in a custom VR headset — a long, quilted veil affixed to a Google Cardboard. Rather than strapping across the user’s face, this headset will be draped over the head and hang down, completely obscuring their face and much of their body. After experiencing the virtual environment, participants are invited to decorate inscribe the exterior of the headset with patches, fabric pens, or in any other way they see fit — leaving their own mark on a piece that hopefully left some mark on them.

Classes

Algorithmic Composition, Electronic Rituals, Oracles and Fortune-Telling, Expressive Interfaces: Introduction to Fashion Technology, Interactive Music, Open Source Cinema

MaiSpace invites you to wander through a virtual place that is accessible to a global community on the VRChat platform, and to explore future possibilities of fostering personal connections in a fully digital universe.

https://

Description

VR has so far largely been treated as an extension of film – a solitary experience offered up at exclusive festivals by acclaimed directors with a point of view. A new wave of platforms blend VR with Gaming and Social Media, creating a virtual community that can teleport to connect with one another, and conjure up real-world tools, impossible spaces, and even bodies to enhabit.

MaiSpace is my personal home within VRChat, one of the leading social VR platforms. Users can choose their avatars and traverse the world through portals and rides, experiencing pieces of my identity in the process. The space includes a 360 video shot at the Dead Sea, a dance floor of swaying palm trees, and a giant bubble structure that encompasses a birdseye view of the environments within it. Other users will be able to join remotely and roam this little corner of the virtual multiverse.

As spaces are shaped by the activity of those who occupy it, and in turn, spaces shape people’s experiences, MaiSpace aims to provide a positive atmosphere for its new virtual community. It is imperative that we participate and help set the tone for our public virtual spaces to enable genuine interaction and connection. This project explores the potential for VR to provide fluidity and freedom of identity, as well as agency and representation through the sensations of embodiment and telepresence.

Classes

Open Source Cinema, Synthetic Architectures, The Poetics of Space