Immodesty // Multicamera
Created at the Interactivos?08
at Medialab-Prado
in collaborataion with:
Sofy Yuditskaya, Emanuel Andel, Gwenn Joyaux, Tais Biels Rey, Laura Gabriela Olalde Verdes and with help from many others. Thanks everyone!
| This system is a prototype for a portable image recording system
based on multiple cameras positioned along a path. The cameras will
be controlled by a microcontroller, which can assign a time delay
to each camera independently. The rig is modular and reconfigurable
allowing for arranging it in any shapes. Based on cheap digital disposable
cameras, this aparatus will lend itself to all kinds of temporal-spatial
experimentation. In this first demonstration we explore it to re-conceive or visualize a spatial perception which expands the body's point of view in space. We recorded multiple sequences with cameras arranged on quarter of a circle arch. For the interactive display we projected an image on the wall. As a person walks by her position is tracked and the picture displayed changes perspective (scrolling through our sequence) corresponding to the angle at which the person is viewing the picture. In effect the viewer can see a 'moment' from many points of view, physically moving around it to explore it. Once the viewer scrolled through the entire 'moment', the sequence of another moment will be loaded, so that the viewer can walk through the story moment by moment. |
A basic illustration
of the interaction:
as a person walks her position is tracked and the picture changes perspective
scrolling through our sequence. Once the viewer scrolled through the entire
'moment', the sequence of the consecutive moment is loaded.
The quicktimes show the series of 'moments' that the viewer would 'walk
through' to see the story.
We shot them at Mataderos, an old slaughterhouse now being converted to
a cultural center. We did our best to align the cameras so they're all
centered on exactly the same point and at the same angle, but with no
good visual reference the cameras were pointing at slightly differnt angles
and the pictures had to be re-aligned in post. Even though I'd rather
it wasn't a result of the lack of control, I like the resulting visibilty
of that imperfection.
The narratives we shot were very abbreviated, since we didn't have time for any real production. In this sequence the tourists are getting their pocket cameras stolen as they point their SLRs at some attraction. The story is unfolding in both time (in consecutive moments) and space (as some information is only visible from one angle not another).
