AW: [syndicate] Trans.: [thingist] IAM SPEAKER SERIES: SarahRobbins, March 12, 2007

[Alan Sondheim]

Well, people like Patrick Lichty and Ian Murray are online which is a 
benefit. One thing that interests me is the sophistication of the software 
- if I have a video running and I change position in relation to the 
screen, the keystoning is perfect, i.e. no artifacts. I also shoot from 
the screen (with PAL which is pretty clean) - it helps with my videowork 
and experiments with motion-capture body materials. It's also interesting 
- the extent to which offline desires, conversations, communication, etc. 
can be projected into the space. And finally I think it's only a beginning 
in a sense - sooner or later virtual life onscreen will be fairly complete 
and usable for everything from teaching to real-time performance of all 
sort - the coming of voice to SL is part of that. I don't like the 
gimmicky nature of a lot of the things in the space, and I tend to remain 
aloof from the real economy (I've spent $4 in real money and have used 
about 50 cents of that so far), so I'm in an odd situation; I have no 
desire to 'build' anything, just to work on the 'avatar body' and see what 
sorts of modes I can use with it. That costs almost nothing, just 
uploading files from time to time.

The software is also sophisticated in other ways - there are water 
ripples, clouds move, etc. I'm curious how all of this is achieved with 
what seems to be a relatively 'lean' profile - I have no idea.

I may turn my students loose in SL just to see what they come up with in 
terms of cinematopgrahy, shooting from the screen or recording with the 
built-in video software (which is crude and buggy). It reminds me of 
Machinima that way without the gaming and side-effects.

- Alan


On Wed, 7 Mar 2007, fmadre at free.fr wrote:

>> first, second life and myspace are entirely different in function and
>> phenomenology - and second, there are a lot of artists etc. in sl who
>> aren't the slightest bit inclined to newageism.
>
> no, of course, those not into newageism are into business culture
> sorry
>
>> video work is shown there at times and it gains new audience. and w/
>
> what do you get from this new audience alan ?
>
>> the bvh / mocap stuff i'm doing i get to explore dancework i couldn't
>> otherwise; sooner or later i hope to work w/ foofwa there. maybe.
>
> yes
> maybe
>


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