6pm – 9pm Thurs 13 and Fri 14 October 2011

Openlab Workshops and SPACE Studios invite everyone to an exhibition of the Life Project, an ongoing series of weekly making sessions where we build a digital ecosystem of aftificial creatures.  Part art project, part communal crafting excercise, it could be described as both a conceptual work of art and a colelction of “Tamagotchis on steriods.”  Come see for youself, talk to the participants, and even participate in future sessions!

SPACE STUDIOS (in the Medialab)
129—131 MARE STREET
LONDON E8 3RH
020 8525 4330

Week 1 Evan gave a lecture in cellular automata (via a long wiki page on http://wiki.openlabworkshops.org), generative art, “biological” creatures rendered in digital-mechanical form, and went over the original proposal for the project.  Then, we introduced ourselves to each other and had a getting-to-know-you session which eventually ended in a small session at the local pub, the Cat and Mutton at the top of Broadway Market.  Before that, we expressed our preferences for the 4 “teams” we’d vow loyalty towards over the course of these 8 weeks – an “embedded systems” team responsible for microcrontrollers and hardware, including sensors; a “design” team responsible for overall design including sketches, user scenarios, storyboards, etc.; a “materials” team composed of hands-on artists with practical experience responsible for the actual physical building of the devices, and choosing the materials to build it out of; and a “web” team to take charge of communication with the greater world outside the project team, including coordinating Twitter, the project blog, and .

Week 2 we got down to discussions, via our brand-new forum at http://forums.openlabworkshops.org.  After a brief re-introduction of the project concept, that of “digital husbandry” and cellular automata writ large in a physical installation using smart cultures that communicate, love, live, and potentially die, we started working out the details of what we’d do over the next 7 weeks.

The original plan was to divide up into 3 teams – design, embedded systems (lets call it “hardware” for now) and materials, then have each brainstorm independently, bringing everything together at the end in a mass discussion form different points of view.  What made more sense, as we looked at people’s strengths and expertise, was to divide up into 2 teams that could tackle the problem from two different (and possibly opposing) perspectives – a “conceptual design” team working on a high conceptual level, working out issues of artistic intention, human interaction, as well as the conceptual relationship between the different parts;  on the other “side” sits a more practical-minded hardware-focused team responsible for looking at the problem of communication, interaction, and ecosystems from the view of what is possible with sensors, microcontrollers, and related techniques.

As the facilitator / project manager, I flitted between both groups to get them started and keep discussions on track.  Both teams, start out sprouting a dense forest of ideas and concepts and discussion from our original conceptual seed.

The design team looked carefully at the relationship between the creatures and humans, and between the creatures and their environment.  To sum up from their notes, they first started out simply with “robots that talk to each other” and looking at the interaction between them: feeding, sleeping, procreating, being lonely, loving each other, even boredom.  Without care, they die; left to themselves, they cooperate with one another; overstimulated, they grow apathetic and, bored, even to the point of dying.   This follows closely the basic concept of Conway’s simple cellular automata, his “Game of Life.”

A theme arose about anthropology vs. husbandry – watching these creatures and trying to figure them out from a distance without disturbing them, versus taking a hands-on, directly intentional approach to guiding their evolution.  Captivity versus “The Wild.”  Nature versus Nurture.  Ecology or Evolution.  Here is where the discussion entered moral territory, where we could explore our ideas on which one was, for lack of a better term, “better” in our minds, and whether or not that was a fair, or even defensible, point of view.   Is it a questions of “purity” and “contamination?”

“Please don’t feed the machine” writes Elvia in her notes.

“Robots should communicate with one another foremost and then how the audience interacts with them can be considered the emergent behaviour of the system” writes Gustavo.

Either way, the “cellular” machines could have their own behaviour when people were not around, as well as their own language for communicating with one another.  Soon the creatures would organize themselves into neighborhoods of those nearby, following the age-old urban pattern.

There was some discussion as to whether this light-and-sound-based language would be understandable to humans at all. Either way, the creature would use Twitter and possibly other Internet mediums to broadcast out thoughts and desires whenever they felt necessary.   “Language as virus” – our language or interaction can spread amongst them, and they can contaminate us right back.

The hardware team started on similar conceptual territory, of course wanting to tackle the main issues first, but I gently prodded them towards more of a hardware-design focus as the discussion wound on.  We looked at what sensors were available (and affordable) and what experience we’d had between the group of us with using them.

We came up with a laundry list of techniques and hardware, some of which would make interesting experiments:

Wireless
Photocells
RFID
Infrared
Twitter
Color sensors
Part of a system
Compass
Tilt switch
Solar powered water pumps
Temp sensors
Capacitive sensors
Microwave motion detector – how much movement
Sound impact sensor – clap patterns

vibrating motors for when held
Tricolor LEDs

What’s more, we expanded on the idea of simple single creatures to look at “tribes” and mother/child relationships:

Motherships and babies? Reproduction? Could “babies” be sensors? Would “mothers” protect them?

Are there tribes that emit different sounds, different colors?

Many questions that will need some discussion/resolution at the next session.

Some tasks for next week:
- Nominate forum moderators
- Customize forum
- Choose WordPress template, install, customize

Call for Participants!

A 6 week immersion into making art in a digital age.  Through hands-on workshops, talks, lively discussions, and local gallery and studio trips we explore the current state of digital art and gain some hands-on skills.  We will use free, open source tools such as Processing and Arduino, look into digital color theory, interactive hardware and sensors, and discuss techniques and ideas, with the goal of creating an interactive work of art by the end.

Schedule: Wednesday nights at SPACE Studios in Hackney from 7-9PM starting Oct. 13.

Cost: £120 for 6 weeks (does not include materials such as Arduinos)

Please register at: http://digitalartanalogueworld.eventbrite.com or email us.

Concessions available – please email reserve@openlabworkshops.org for details.

We’re happy to announce another Introductory Processing workshops plus two shiny new workshops running at the lovely and well-outfitted SPACE Studios, this April to June: one aimed at creating interactive lighting installations using Arduino, LEDs, and DMX, and another where we explore using Processing to visualize data, learning some techniques of data sorting and visualization along the way.

Interactive Lighting With Arduino

First, we’re offering a new workshop from Arduino and interactive design guru Daniel Hirschmann:

With the ubiquity of LED lighting installations, artists and designers are looking at ways of introducing interactive elements to light based works. This class is intended to demonstrate methods and technologies to interface and create one’s own responsive light art works. Using the open source Arduino as our platform, over the course of 5 weeks, participants will learn how to use sensor information to effect their light pieces. By using various electronic components and techniques we will demonstrate how to expand the outputs of the Arduino. We will cover the DMX lighting control standard in depth – offering strategies for building responsive lighting systems with off the shelf DMX controllable fixtures. By the end of the class, participants will produce their own interactive lighting project.

Taking place on 4 consecutive Monday nights from 6:30-9:30PM at SPACE from April 26 to May 17 inclusive, with a final open workshop session on June 7.  The cost will be £160, paid upfront, unless you make other arrangements with us.  The cost includes a custom circuit board and electronic components necessary for the workshop.
[more details]

Intermediate Processing: Visualizing Data

Dry as the title may sound, this workshop will be an inspiring tour of projects using data in art and design, and the techniques behind them.  Visualizing data is a great way to learn more about Processing and what’s possible with software and visuals, because let’s face it, most of what we do in the digital world is taking data from one source (e.g. temperature, twitter messages, the daily length of your toenails) and converting it to another form (e.g. a bar graph).  In a scant 4 weeks, you will learn:

1. How to use data to create interesting visual imagery
2. What XML is and why it is useful
3. How to load and save data files (in a variety of formats)
4. How to represent data as code (object-oriented programming)
5. Basic math skills for dealing with data (mean, mode, median, etc)

Taking place on 3 consecutive Thursday nights from 7:15-9:15PM at SPACE from April 29 to May 20.  For those who have taken the introductory Processing course, or with basic exposure to programming (loops, variables, arrays).  You will need to bring a laptop, preferably with Processing installed (free download).   The cost will be £75, paid upfront, unless you make other arrangements with us.

Introductory Processing for Everyone

The course itself will be a relaxed but project-focused introduction to Processing and interactive art and design in general.  We will spend the bulk of the first three sessions on basic methods of working with code, general workflow, and feeling your way around the Processing environment, along the way building some small projects and gaining inspiration from art, design, and technologies such as Wii remotes, RFID, OSC, video, and more.  The material is flexible, based on the needs and wishes of the people attending.

Taking place on 5 consecutive Thursday nights from 7:15 – 9:15PM at SPACE from May 27 until June 24.

This will be a small workshop, so please reserve soon!   The cost will be £125 for the entire 5-week course, paid upfront, unless you make other arrangements with us.

Finally…

Please email reserve@openlabworkshops.org to reserve spot in any workshop!

All workshops take place at SPACE Studios, in Hackney, at 129 – 131 Mare St, Hackney E8 3RH

Nearest transport: London Fields (5 mins by rail from Liverpool St.), Bethnal Green (tube), various buses – please see http://www.spacestudios.org.uk/contact/SPACE/ for full details

~=~=~=~Workshop #4~=~=~=~

When: Thursday 17 September, from 6pm-10:30pm

Where: Space Studios, 129 – 131 Mare St, Hackney E8 3RH

Nearest transport: Bethnal Green (tube), London Fields (Overground), Buses – see http://www.spacestudios.org.uk/contact/SPACE/

Cost: £12 for the entire night, or per workshop (see below).
How to pay: At the door, or via Paypal to be guaranteed a space (limited to 30 people per workshop).  Please email reserve@openlabworkshops.org to reserve a space in any workshop.

1) Markup for Mortals: HTML and Web Design with
Jake Rayson – £8

For beginners who are interested in learning about how to write content for blogs and web sites but who aren’t very techie. Understand what makes a web page by using the easy-to-learn and easy-to-read Markdown markup language. If you can write an email, then you can write HTML!

2) Processing for Visual Artists: Sonic Visuals with Evan Raskob – £8
For beginners to intermediates with basic experience using Processing or Java.  In this session we look at the Minim library and how to make visuals that respond to sound.  The session will cover installing a Processing library (Minim comes with Processing!), a quick overview of Minim, what the heck is an FFT, and various techniques that pixelist PixelPusher uses to make things flash on screen to various types of music & noise.

~=~=~=~For More Information~=~=~=~

See our entire Fall / Winter schedule here.

Follow us on twitter: http://twitter.com/openlabworkshop

You can also keep up with all Openlab events, performances, workshops, etc. on our low-traffic email list: http://lists.pawfal.org/listinfo.cgi/openlab-announce-pawfal.org