May 25th, 2010 - The Project
My interests in the relationship between hand and computer drawing led me to code and an investigation into how and if I could program the computer to make stick figures like the ones I draw with my pen. Using Processing I was able to plot points to create stick-like figures. These figures were then programmed to move across the screen according to steering behaviors –algorithms that followed specific rule sets with respect to properties like velocity, attraction and cohesion. The motivation for this project came from my own urban wanderings. From the experience of bumping into people as I walk down crowded streets, I began to think about the paths people travel when they walk through the city. After experimenting with different incarnations of a fixed number of figures, I began to search for relevant data sets that could be continually updated from the internet in order to map actual statistics to the number of figures on the screen. Struck by the growing number of unemployed I was reading about in the daily newspaper, I decided to turn the project not only into a visualization of world wide unemployment, but also into an interactive installation mapping the number of unemployed onto silhouettes captured by a camera and turning that silhouette into a shadowy presence that follows the movements of people in the gallery space.
Here are some links to the processing sketches I made and the installation I created.
I can post a link soon to the processing app if anyone wants to take a look and help me with the code.
Processing sketches—http://jodyzellen.com/unemployment_project/unemployed.html
“The Unemployed” as presented October 2009—http://jodyzellen.com/cerritos/index.html
Pau (June 8th, 2010 at 8:02 am)
Congratulations for this project, I really like the combination of statistical data and the stick figures, which incorporate a human side to the abstract numbers. The interaction with the visitor as presented in Cerritos is engaging, but there I think the project risks losing its initial meaning, as the figures are presented in an environment that apparently lacks any reference to its original context (unemployment rates), and as the video shows the visitor may be more interested in pursuing a narcissistic dialogue with his own shadow.
I see that you have another post with several questions, I will try to present some ideas in case that helps.
Best,
Pau
Ali (July 9th, 2010 at 5:47 am)
Looks promising. Is this going to be presented in a gallery
setting as in the previous version? Since your motivation came
from urban wanderings, crowded streets, I can’t help questioning
how the piece would change as an installation in a public space,
maybe a place where there could be mixture of employed and
unemployed people who can interact with the piece. This could
maybe lead to more natural ways of interacting with the piece as
they were encountered by random viewers as opposed to a gallery
settings where viewers intentionally chose to go there and
maybe feel like they should act and play with the piece.
Just something to consider…