Projectinfo:

Keywords:
Live Dance Performance, Motion Capture, Realtime Image & Sound/Music Rendering, Interactive 3D Environment

Date/Period:
October 2002 (3 week period)

Extra Credits:

Dancer: Shirley
Music Production: Boris Kousemaker

Performed at:

Stubnitz.NL (Multidisciplinairy Media Performance Art Festival), Amsterdam (October 3rd, 2002). www.stubnitz.nl

Madrettor 2002 (Festival for [media]_Art, NET_culture and technology), Rotterdam (2002). www.madrettor.org


Video:

There is a short compilation video containing parts of the performance at Stubnitz:

Quicktime Movie (9,4MB)
Windows Media (9,9MB)

Quick Project Listing:

Click on one of the projects from the list below to learn more about some of our other work.

- Swarm
- Wixel Cloud
- Wixel Play
- Wixels
- TouchMe
- Robotract
- Demor: location-based 3d audiogame
- Jalaani
- MoCap Performance

Mocap Performance

This performance was the product of experimentation with the possibilities of live motion capture. Movements of a capoeira dancer were used to generate and control both the sounds/music and visuals in real-time. Several different parameters, like acceleration, location and speed where taken of points of her body and connected to properties of media elements like size, colour and tone. This approach resulted in a live performance where dance, projected animations, sound and music were all merged together in real-time.

The dancer, who was dressed in a full body motion capture suit, didn't get to prepare a particular choreography, but only got some simple instructions and was then given the freedom to experiment. The audience could see the dancer move around a big projection surface in the centre of the space, while seeing a virtual representation of her movement projected on the surface at the same time.

The performance was split up into two, ten minute acts, each looking for a different kind of synergy between dance and media.

During the first of the two acts, the projected imagery started out as a simple single cube that represented a single point on the dancer's body. If this point moved the cube grew in size, if the point stopped the cubed disappeared. The acceleration of the point influenced the colour of the cube. Slowly a more complex image was created as more cubes where added. As the collection of geometric shapes changed under the influence of the dancer's movement the representation seemed to fluctuate between recognizably human and completely abstract.

The second act focussed more on the possibilities of an interactive soundscape. The dancer was given control over different sound elements. The intensity of her movement was linked to the rhythm and different moves gave her control over different elements in the music. This gave her the ability to create the music that she danced to while dancing.

MoCap Performance was performed at both the Stubnitz.NL Multidisciplinairy Media Performance Art Festival, Amsterdam (2002) and Madrettor Festival for [media]_Art, NET_culture and technology, Rotterdam (2002).

MoCap Performance Live @ Stubnitz.NL (Multidisciplinary Media Performance Art Festival) October 3rd, 2002

MoCap Performance Screengrab from the second act.