C3 showcase at DU

LED globes

I was unexpectedly invited to a new media showcase at the new Digital Media Studies and Electronic Arts, Media, and Design center at the University of Denver.  These are two degrees the university offers.  Their new center "C3" (Center for Creation and Collaboration) had just recently been finished and this was the inaugural gallery event.  I didn't know exactly what kind of work I'd be seeing, other than the work of students and instructors of the various programs.  I was invited by Synthia Payne who might possibly be teaching a Digital Audio and Telematic Music course next semester (if you're intrested, email her).


Once we arrived, I felt right at home.  I immediately recognized Darwin Grosse, the 'Executive of Education' at Cycling '74 and fellow member of blOrk.  He is now teaching and doing the program at DU.  No sooner did I turn around, but did I see Cory Metcalf from NoiseFold.  This was a complete shock for me, as we had only briefly met in the Spring at Communikey 09.  He too is teaching and completing a degree with the program.  I met a lot of interesting people that have similar interests at this show... many, students of either or both of the programs.  I was excited to see a beginners soldiering station with a vibrator bug kit (made from the same vibrating motors featured in this post) and many people trying out soldiering for the first time.  There were also many fascinating projects and programs to see.

Globe in Action

Chris Coleman is a professor of Digital Media Studies and had a number of his projects on display.  The first is particularly interesting for me because I have a fascination with lightbulbs and globes.  Seriously, check out my flickr page about lightbulbs.  Chris' project featured clear globes with strings of LEDs in them.  These LEDs would not activate until a tilt sensor sent voltage through them.  In other words, you had to move the clear plastic ball to make it light up.  Where these were hung, plastic shapes in the profile Colorado mountains would move on a conveyor belt towards the globes.  When they collided with the mountains, the bulbs randomly lit up based on how much they tilted.  Very simple concept, excellent execution, and fascinatingly interactive.  (The mountains could be repositioned as to change the experience each time.)  [See photo at top]

C3 Printed Keychain

Chris was furiously operating the Makerbot Cupcake CNC all night as well.  (For those of you who don't know, this is a 'printer' that prints 3D objects with plastic.)  Not only is the Makerbot a fully functional tool for the studio, there are already parts for a Thing-O-Matic that just needs to be built!  This was very cool to see as I have read all about these 3D printers on the internet and seen plenty of videos, but never one in person.  Chris was printing C3 keychains all night.  Each took about 13 minutes to print and is a 1" x 1" x 1/4" black ABS plastic.

Cupcake CNC

Of course Darwin and Corey brought some very interesting programs to the table, as did Trace Reddell, Professor and director of the Digital Media Studies program.  Darwin created an interactive video generator/mixer for users to manipulate, as did Corey.  Corey's featured a beautifully designed, interactive line drawing of the camera output from a MacBook.  This let users interact with the depth and rotation of the image as well as number of other features like delay and saturation.  This created unique and interesting drawings of the people interacting with it.  Trace also created a very nice video piece that is based on data acquired from natural sources.  This particular project featured information from the DNA of extinct species for example.  Trace and Darwin also collaborated on a "clock" written in Jitter that utilized found sounds and slitscans of the FFT analysis as well as other digital events symbolizing the passage of time.

Trace (left), Darwin (right)

I think my favorite exhibit was  Andrew Blanton's meandering audio documentator "Sonic Memory".  This ingeniously simple Processing patch responded to the noise level in the room and output a slowly generating string of circles.  Each was randomly cycled on a grayscale and the diameter of each circle was determined by the intensity of the level the microphone picked up.  Circles would draw over each other and slowly meander around the screen based on a random algorithm.

Andrew Blanton - Sonic Memory

I find this piece to be particularly fascinating because it reconnects our senses to our memory.  What I mean is that while watching the piece operate, you associate what you hear with what you see being generated.  Then, when you come back later, the sections you remember almost bring back the moment you have experienced.  However, since the movement of the line is random, some of these memories might get erased.  Deep shit, right?..  plus it looks really nice.


All in all, this is an excellent space.  There are more labs than you can shake a stick at, great resources, and a very interesting space that is both performance and education oriented... its kind of hard to explain.  Either way, there are excellent resources at the facility and a faculty that bring a tremendous amount of knowledge to the programs.  Plus, since I'm looking into media centered graduate programs...
This was a really great experience.