DGC Blog

God help me because I can’t understand this WEB 2.0 gibberish! Oh wait Wayne MacPhail to the rescue. Problem solved. Wayne MacPhail is a producer of content more specifically online content. I didn’t actually get what his actual title was but you could say he’s on the good side of mankind. Social media was today’s topic which spilled over into concepts like tagging, bookmarking, RSS, and embedded code.

Whenever you think of something and a word jumps out let’s say bumble bee, you think yellow and black, fuzzy, stinger those words alone are tags which help identify itself. Bookmarking or social bookmarking as Wayne likes to put it and RSS allows a collective (you and I) to share information sort of like an Inbox for the web. Finally embedded code is quite simply the code equivalent to fast food. You pick it up and use it however you please but you can’t really have code fights unless you print them off and start throwing it at people. Think of all those paper cuts. Ouch!

Before I go completely off topic Wayne emphasized the importance of online social rules the key ones being awareness, education and involvement. Examples of this would be that users shouldn’t use social communities just to make a quick buck but to participate and help it grow. Another good one was that social media is a conversation and not a broadcast. You mainly want people interacting almost on the verge of personal involvement rather than being shot a clever marketing campaign claiming to be “with the times”.

The whole take away from Wayne was that real content is first created by the user and shared among friends and then it spreads like wild fire. Here are some links to get the revolution started:

http://www.mogulus.com/ (so cool I tried it myself)

http://www.facebook.com/ (horribly satisfying)

http://www.utterz.com/ (mobile future???)

http://www.flickr.com/ (for all you photo prostitutesJ)

http://wordpress.org/ (how could I not include this)

So on February 8^th New Media Director, Brain Porter, took our class through many exhibitions, upcoming attractions, and gave us a brief history of how the ROM is utilizing technology to engage its visitors. The first point of interest was the digital gallery where we had a chance to view ancient artifacts through a touch screen. The concept makes total sense when you want to preserve these historic items while having the ability to have infinite number interactions with the audience but it does take away from the total experience of being in the presence of the actual artifact, nonetheless quite impressive. Brian then discussed the obstacles and achievements that the ROM had integrating a digital feel and value to visiting the ROM.

What I found interesting about the ROM, made possible through Brain’s walk through was that the ROM itself is quite large in what it contains, far beyond (5million items if I remember correctly) what I expected but also it has multiple projects running but requires massive funding from the government and the public. It makes you really appreciate the value of having the ROM in the first place otherwise people would just assume it will always be there. Choosing this institution as a charity and donating money towards it would really make a difference now the only dilemma for me would be to pick this over my favorite jazz station (91.1 Jazz FM) as the recipient. Tough call.

We then moved onto the Dinosaurs exhibit where touch screens were used again but with audio to boot, nice. I had an enjoyable time walking around the exhibit and taking a few pictures of the fossils. Being inside the new part of the ROM , the Lee-Chin Crystal was very satisfying partly because I’ve spent a couple of hours before its launch on Bloor street in bumper to bumper traffic due to construction.

All in all the tour was refreshing and humbling which all Ontarians should at least experience once.

I arrived at 8:45am, 15 minutes before class and saw that no one was there. Went for a casual walk and came back and then realized a presentation was being setup about mobile applications. A Mr. James Eberhardt was ready to give his spiel on mobile devices and how great they are. SMS and thumbing the device were at the forefront of his presentation because let’s face it how else are people supposed to interact with the small gadget. This made me think about usability and how it applies to taking control of what information is sent or received. Strangely enough I thought of good old Jakob Nielson, the Flash bashing writer who now works for Adobe, I think, to help improve overall usability and dug up this nice tidbit on the “Sidekick”, another PDA but much older. Most mobile users rely on a 5-way navigation system and how it substitutes the traditional mouse when compared to the desktop. That being said if cellular devices are on the verge of becoming more like computers or media centers than this article entitled “Personalizing the Mobile Phone: Easier Said Than Done” would be fitting for users who tried downloading and navigating towards the content that they want and failed.

After listening to James and doing my own research on how well the mobile market is doing and what obstacles it has yet to overcome I wanted to know what the future was for mobile and sure enough the word “multimedia” popped up and I was off reading this article from Business week.

It might have not told me anything new but at least I can be confident that designing for mobile does seem like an alternative job path for a “Interactive Multimedia” student.

The third blog entry goes to Simon Conlin, co-founder of FITC and most recently involve in Pixel Gallery. Contrary to most speakers he wanted to know more about us and how we perceive or envision ourselves in the intermediate future. I’d like to think that I’ll be working for a small to medium size company, I can’t see myself in a huge company where I can’t remember a single name out of the whole bunch but rather a part of a family and in a way more likely to stick it out till the end. Our time with Simon Conlin was unexpectedly more inspirational than past speaker sessions. It could have been that the deadlines of this semester where rapidly approaching and I had been completely drained over the past days or that I have already been overly stimulated with the “how-to” and “brand-new” features new media had to offer. But taking the time to sit back, relax, and watch some examples of other people’s work can actually work to inspire. I’m not saying that doing this would guarantee someone the ability to come up with a magical idea no one has done before nor would I encourage it when the topic of deadlines is on hand but I took this opportunity to learn what people did before they got into Flash or what inspired them to create. Simon Conlin gave praise to Zach Booth Simpson and to much delight I would give him props as well despite the fact I never and probably will never met the guy but I can see the value in his works and somewhat find how he portrays his works very inspirational.

Thinking back to how many different interests, hobbies, backgrounds, and agendas each classmate possesses can really be the starting point for something refreshing to come out of interactive multimedia. Simon Conlin had shown use many short videos via youtube, and its funny that youtube could be a case where simple video has captured the majority of people’s attention by placing it in an online interactive environment but only now has just caught on.

It’s weird that good ideas only get noticed when it invades our personal space through our conversations or email inboxes telling us to “click on this link”. That is how it was passed onto me and that’s exactly how I’m going to pass it on to you, the reader. I don’t have to tell you to pass it on because I know it’s going to happen anyway. I’m a victim, a happy and inspired one and so will you.

Enjoy the links.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Xj6_GlqEI8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mc_-QRc1fmk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0awjPUkBXOU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6u5v0OKq-Q&feature=related

http://www.i-bar.ch/info/

Now this is interactive pioneering at its best! GestureTek one of the leaders in computer vision technology and gesture controlled systems was kind enough to give us a demonstration of what had made them an industry leader.

Although I had seen this technology before I hadn’t really thought about how it worked or how innovative it was. Beforehand I was a simple spectator gawking at the “interface” and shooting out comments like “Wow, that’s neat!” but now with the knowledge I gained at IMM (insert product placement here; P) I’ve gained a new appreciation in technological advancements geared towards interactivity. In the year 1984 to this very day GestureTek had been and is still developing an alternative to the monitor and mouse and interactivity.

At the very core of their technology was a camera. And with so many products (GestPoint, Holopoint, Illuminate, etc) reliant on one, two, three or more cameras it was clear the major investments had gone into the R&D of such technology. IR cameras had also shown its presence, the majority of them hidden and placed high nearing the ceiling where the projectors were, which I might add range from your regular projector you pay $300+ at BestBuy to industrial strength costing upwards in the thousands. A Java based system along side a “Dazzler” engine; must have been developed in-house, was used to track the user’s movements of one of their technologies (Holopoint) which used two intersecting cameras to create a matrix. To my understanding the matrix used an X-axis, Y-axis and a Z-axis for depth. As I jabbed/poked my finger in the air it would translate into an area being clicked. The whole interactive event would best be described as a “seeing is believing” experience. It was so much fun I forgot to take notes but here I am able to write about it.

The client list of GestureTek ranged from big ticket companies like Sony and Microsoft who had collaborated with GestureTek to bring the EyeToy and Xbox Live Vision into the home. Japanese telecom (unnamed), weather stations for presenting your local weather reports, TV stations (game shows), museum interactive displays, and anything else needing an interactive feel beyond the ordinary had GestureTek written all over it. Could this lead to a monopoly? I think not as they’re others just like GestureTek. Just not within close proximity for an up-close tour, once again how lucky am I.

So what’s next for GestureTek? It looks like the mobile market or better yet mobile gaming is the next big thing. It would be a waste of time to describe this in words so I implore you to click on this final link, sit back and enjoy the awe that is gesture based technology.

On October 4, 2007 we were invited to see pioneering take place and interact with some environment with the help of cameras, tablets, and various hardware. Mr. Song Ho Ahn a Visualization Developer at Visual Design Institute showed us many resources to create interactive environments. An acronym API was passed around which I interpreted as some engine used to develop and render graphics or whole environments.

An open source game engine called OGRE had been the engine of choice which had me to come up with a few questions:

1. Do developers always favor the free (namely open source)?
2. What trade offs are there from open source rather than paying a license for something more fancy.
3. Besides the development of games what major industry needs this type of technology? Medical practices perhaps?
4. What other engines exist and how do they differ?

Of course for me to completely get an answer for all of the preceding questions I would need to do my research and gather some opinions from for industry experts. To my surprise there are many free game engines at a developer’s disposal.

As we moved on we got to interact with some facial recognition applications which Song had built from scratch mentioning some others along the way. FACE (Facial Animation Communication Engine) was really remarkable. You could sit anyone in from of the camera and the program would process their facial features and then an animated face would mimic what was captured in real time. Real neat stuff I might add. Of course lighting would be an issue as some sat in place with a hat.

The final portion of the tour literally immersed us into an interactive experience via projectors, panoramic screens, sound systems, and tablets for interactivity. Immersion Studios had made its audience participate via tablets in a life or death situation held in outer space rendered using 3ds Max aka 3D Studio Max.

In order to continue with the story the audience would have to make choices (i.e. scanning the heart, lungs or brain). The idea of choices and the consequences attached to them would be effectively illustrated using this platform namely warfare training, surgical procedures, etc.