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multiple devices and elements
in remote locations in 3D space via infrared technology. The
question posed at the beginning of this essay, "In what
ways can telepresence be enhanced by motion tracking technology
in performance?," now elicits this response: with increased
control of data objects like images, video, sound, and light
as well as hardware and equipment such as computers, robotic
lights, and projectors, by multiple users across vast distances,
almost simultaneouslyand potentially without
mediating devices, like trackers or wearable technology, and
with the human body, through movement and voice.
Such enhanced telepresence offers
much for collaborations involving digital media projects where
hardware, software, and peripherals must be controlled in real-time
by teams working together at-a-distance or where physical computing
research is undertaken. Thus, this paper concludes with a discussion
of two collaborative projects undertaken with the GAMS system:
the production of Gibson and Grigar's When Ghosts Will Die
project and their preparation for the networked version of Virtual
DJ.
3.1 The Production of When Ghosts Will Die
Inspired by the play, Copenhagen,
by Michael Frayn, tells the story about the dangers of
nuclear proliferation and is historically centered at the development
of nuclear weapons at the height of Cold War paranoia (Gibson
and Grigar). A narrative performance-installation that utilizes
multi-sensory media elements such as sound, music, voice, video,
light, and images, and text controlled by motion-tracking technology,
it unfolds in three levelsdivisions comparable to those
associated with games. (Fig. 6) As mentioned previously, the
piece constituted the first iteration of the GAMS system that
allowed for users to: 1) create behaviors for the control of
media elements like video, animation, and images via software
and the Control Centre; 2) send positional information from Flash
Track to the Control Centre and, then, onto a third computer
running Macromedia Director; and 3) allow the user to match locations
in the room with videos and images in Director and to manipulate
these images files with user movement.
Figure 6. Steve Gibson and Dene
Grigar's When Ghosts Will Die
Thus, working at-a-distance from
their spaces in Victoria and Denton, Gibson and Grigar conceptualized,
researched, wrote, produced media elements, programmed, fine
tuned, and rehearsed the piece starting December 2004 until its
debut in Dallas, TX as a one-performer "work-in-progress"
in April 2005. They continued to expand the work to its current,
finished iteration as a two-performer piece that premiered in
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Victoria, BC, September 2005.
In less than a year and with only one brief face-to-face meeting
in Dallas for a performance, Gibson and Grigar were able to stage
a piece 25 minutes longcomprised of three levels, with
50 different room maps divided into numerous zones, and six different
media elements programmed in those zonesthat entailed
multiple computers, sensors, projectors, robotic lights, and
other peripherals.
An obvious discussion of collaboration,
then, could focus on the methods used for any one of these steps
in developing the piece; however, a more salient one relating
to this paper's topic is one that emerged during the development
of the third levelthe final part of the piece relating
to the aftermath of nuclear destructionfocusing on
the theme of the work. As mentioned, When Ghosts Will Die
was inspired by Copenhagen, and a refrain in that play
is the statement that the destruction caused by nuclear bombs
would be so complete that "even the ghosts will die"
(Frayn 79). This ghost theme was able to be represented in the
work via the GAMS technology. In brief, Grigar appears in Gibson's
space as a ghostlike figure represented only as light and sound
that he interacts with, and Gibson appears in hers in the same
way. Utilized as such, embodied telepresence can result in such
a collaboration and be incorporated thematically, becoming a
narrative element as well as a methodology.
3.2 Preparation for Virtual DJ
was originally a non-networked piece created by Gibson to explore
motion-tracking technology as an expressive tool for interaction
with sound and lights (Gibson). Later, after the development
of the GAMS system that made it possible for multiple users to
interact with one another at-a-distance, the piece was expanded
for networked performances. Gibson and Grigar staged a networked
performance of Virtual DJ in the summer 2005. Gibson,
working from his studio in Victoria, BC, moved robotic lights
and produced sound in Grigar's lab in Denton, Texas while she
simultaneously did the same in his from her space. (Fig. 7)
Figure 7. Steve Gibson's Networked
Virtual DJ
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