I spent three early mornings last week capturing three times, in its entirety (a full 43 minutes) CARPs inventive and emotionally driven version of Pink Floyd’s 1980’s album, The Wall. It was a truly international group that spent many hours developing and performing a Virtual Show to music that reaches a new audience every few years. Thanks to NMC as usual for hosting this and other cutting edge Second Life events!I will be editing down the full show in the next few days, in sequence as performed, but this upload is my personal expression of what I experienced.

A well known track from the album was wisely left off by Director Debbie Trilling due to it’s popularity but while I was putting together this ‘mash-up’ compilation I tried a recording of the reunion performance of the Comfortably Numb at Live 8 a few years ago and was entranced by the synergy of visual and song. Hope you do too. Credits after the embed of my film below.

Medium quality (90MB MP4) download available here. Worth playing full screen with the volume up and the lights down

SECOND LIFE - THE WALL V-2 FILM

A special long form promo edit of the Live Virtual Show…Machinimatography & Editing: GARY HAZLITT

SECOND LIFE - THE WALL V-2
Creative Director: DEBBIE TRILLING Producer: VELAZQUEZ BONETTO

Special thanks for valuable contributions from: Haven Colville, Scio Kamanchi, Gypsy Paz, Lyddyn Tzara, Celeste Moonlight, DJ Jenns, windyy Lane, NMC Campus and George W Bush and, of course, Pink Floyd’s incredible album ‘The Wall’

Song selected for this compilation by Gary Hazlitt, The ‘Live 8′ Version COMFORTABLY NUMB (please note: not featured in the live show)

Creative Director: DEBBIE TRILLING
Producer: VELAZQUEZ BONETTO
Wall Design and Build: ELFOD NEMETH
Animated Puppets: DUGGY BING
Animations: CARAVAGGIO BONETTO
Original Music: JUNIVERS STOCKHOLM & JOSINA BURGESS
Stills Photography: ADEC ALEXANDRIA
Dancing & Joyfulness: KLUTE CUPPLOA & SOUTHERN RIPTID

Filmed & Edited: GARY HAZLITT © JustVirtual.com 2008

SECOND LIFE - THE WALL V-2 FILM “Mother Should I  Trust the Government” Full 43 Minute Version Available Soon

Categories: Creative Collaboration, Digital Art, Events, Machinima, Music, Performance, Second Life, Sound Design
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As official documenter/machinimatographer for the SkyDancers I was lucky to have been at the dress rehearsal and premier of this groundbreaking new show by DanCoyote’s troupe and created this trailer to help get those virtual bums on seats.

You can download a 15MB medium rez MP4 here. It was fantastic to experience this next generation performance and witness a new layer, a narrative across the three musical movements in addition to what has been visually more abstract in the past. Other exciting elements included the movement by the dancers around the volumous space triggering elements of the soundscape and the long prim cascades they are wearing integrating seamlessly with the more static set elements. A show well worth going to (if you can get tickets) and yes, I know, my little trailer and previous well received captures of the shows only gets half way there in terms of capturing the essence (see bottom of post)…but you who are not in this world are watching/reading this

75 still photos on flickr here. Here is the official blurb

New Media Consortium (NMC) proudly presents:
DanCoyote’s ZeroG SkyDancers Third Production:
“Second Spring”.

Second Spring is a completely LIVE story performance. SkyDancers perform in-flight choreography without the benefit of animations or gestures of any kind following cues given in REAL TIME on a private IM channel. DanCoyote “calls” the show to keep time with the score written and performed by ZeroOne Paz.

DanCoyote and Technical Director ZenMondo Wormser have pulled out all the stops this time and created the most dynamic stage set ever. Set pieces will evolve, vanish and change position as the story plays out.

Production Designer Queue Marlowe has created an incredible array of SkyDancer costumes called “cascades” that are change many times over the hour long show.

Set pieces have been created by venerable Second Life artists Jopsy Pendragon and Nand Nerd. Expect the unexpected!

To be our guest at this performance please send a message to DanCoyote Antonelli. DanCoyote will invite you to join the tickets group. Seating is very limited so only members of the tickets group will be admitted to the performance space.

Please contribute generously to the donation kiosk. A production of this quality and depth takes many hundreds of hours to prepare as well as tens of thousands of Linden dollars to produce. Suggested donation is $3000 Lindens with a sliding scale from $1000 up.

Cheers!

DanCoyote Antonelli, Producer Director, ZeroG SkyDancers

=========Press Release=========
For Immediate Release

New Media Consortium Presents
ZeroG SkyDancers III - Virtual Flight Choreography

Pioneering Performing Arts Soar in the Metaverse - Again - Under the Direction of DanCoyote Antonelli

January 1, 2008, (Second Life) - Avatar DanCoyote Antonelli is accustomed to breaking new ground. Even in virtual worlds he is considered avant guarde. The real man controlling that avatar, DC Spensley, has been wowing virtual audiences since 2006 with art installations that would not be possible in real life, but perhaps the most coveted ticket in all of Second Life is one to a performance by his ZeroG SkyDancers. On January 6, 2008, the premiere of the highly anticipated, third, completely redesigned production of ZeroG SkyDancers will debut.

Second Life’s history making, critically acclaimed world performance group, the ZeroG SkyDancers is a new form of ensemble performance that uses the airspace of this virtual world, resulting in a cross between water ballet and aerial acrobatics, in ways that would not be possible in the physical world. Wearing spectacular, flowing costumes called cascades - that are many times larger than their avatars - the SkyDancers move through space, and become part of the stage themselves. Altering and evolving, their flight triggers audio samples, which provide a unique layer to the original musical score commissioned for the production.††

The production, sponsored by the New Media Consortium (NMC), will introduce an all-new reactive-interactive stage set that is repeatedly and dramatically transformed over the hour long performance. The ZeroG SkyDancers III will formally debut at 9PM Pacific Standard Time, Sunday, January 6, 2008 in the virtual world of Second Life. Seating is limited, but the show will run every week during the first 90 days of 2008, to accommodate the most guests possible. Tickets will cost $10 US ($3000 Lindens) a piece. For ticket information, please contact Spensley directly at dc@spensley.com.

Those with tickets will need to complete a 5 minute registration process with Second Life, http://www.secondlife.com , in order to access the ZeroG SkyDancers III performance.† A basic account is absolutely free, includes unlimited access to Second Life’s tools, events and communities.†Spensley recommends that audience members spend a minimum of 15 minutes learning the basic skills of the Second Life world prior to attending the performance. “Familiarizing yourself with basic navigation of Second Life will add even more enjoyment to the show,” said Spensley.

Gary Hazlitt’s video’s of two previous ZeroG SkyDancers II performances are available at YouTube and have received nearly 15 thousand views. “It’s difficult to convey the dramatic and immersive effects of the Second Life virtual world in a 2-D web environment, however the videos do convey the overall concept of the performance,” said Spensley.

Categories: Creative Collaboration, Dance, Digital Art, Environments, Events, Exhibition, Experimental, Identity, Machinima, Music, Music Experiments, Performance, Second Life, SkyDancers, Sound Design, Spiritual, Virtual Worlds
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Still playing catch-up on blog posts. Busy, busy as always creating big builds in this world for entertainment properties, real world companies, learning and some just for pleasure - but I still have time to make delightful machinima This one is of mine and a friends (Benjo Zabelin) build of a little ‘piece-of-a-place’ called Melbourne, Australia (still not sure where that is!).

Another Gary, a bio one ;-), managed to take over four hundred images plus hours and hours of sound so I could recreate what it is like to be out there, with you folk in one of your most popular cities. Umm very cramped I must say. Anyway as you can see below it generated lots of Second Life press interest and it was fun creating a few token, Second Life not possible in real life elements.

Here’s a SLURL too. and a load of links…

SL News - Australian city Melbourne Laneways comes alive in SL

Australia SL News Source SLOZ - Virtual Melbourne has arrived

Shhhhhhhh - melbourne laneways in second life. NOOOOOOOO

Second Life Insider - Melbourne Laneways comes to life at ABC Island

Victorian Government - Victoria - Would your Business benefit from a Second Life?

TheProjectFactory - Melbourne Laneways Come to Life for Multimedia Victoria

Boxxet Second Life - Melbourne Laneways comes to Life

Multimedia Victoria - Virtual Worlds (Melbourne Laneways Case Study)

GDay World - Melbourne Laneways in SL

Mal Burns Annex - Melbourne Laneways Comes to Life

Posted by Gary Hazlitt from inworld © 2007

Listening to unforgiven (RealPlayer Windows LiveWriter WordPress Plugin)

Categories: Architecture, Bio World, Building, Creative Collaboration, Environment Design, Events, Machinima, Second Life, Sent In-World, Sound Design, Virtual Tourism, Virtual Worlds
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The virtual stars aligned and I was compelled to make this kind of sad, but moving machinima. The story grew from a combination of 1) a great song, 2) some private sims I am developing, with a new terraform, 3) a space navigator and most importantly 4) a couple of new places I visited. Less than 5 hours later a new machinima was born, you can see the results here.

Also available medium rez 70MB WMV download

The story grew rather organically. I was playing with one of my new Space Navigator joysticks, which gives me unlimited camera control and is great for flying across mountains - I had just terraformed three sims with some ‘placeholder’ vertical interest. So I got Kylie Wollongong to join me on a private sim to do some walking, talking, romantic shots.

About half way through we went shopping to get a new skin. Next to the sims only store was a rather bizarre ‘camping’ area - around 50 avies all sitting around. Not a normal one, it looked positively like a wake, no one chatted, they just sat rather miserably. Gong. Mountain walking plus wake, a story was born.

“A couple in love. It starts with her funeral then flashes back to their recent life, ‘climbing together’. At the funeral again he sits with their friends. Flashback to the decision to be together and then reaching ‘the top’. She walks off by herself and tragedy. Just before she ‘ascends’ they recall a happy moment in Venice, tinged with sadness at the end when she has a premonition of her own short future…”

So I shot some sequences of just me and the crowds quickly and then went back and added some extra elements to the mountain journey - which obviously extended the narrative. I also wanted a few flashbacks of earlier romantic times, so Kylie and I visited Venice for three simple shots.

When I added the music during the edit the whole piece took on extra power and poignency - the emotional quality forcibly reminded me of past lost loves. It became a metaphor for the spirits of love. As it says on my YouTube decription “The story of a couple very much in love whose upward journey ends in tragedy. Flashbacks from the wake and their favourite time in Venice”

Some production stills on flickr here.

Avatanimation, Machinimatography, Editing, Story Written, Directed and Produced by Gary Hazlitt - Copyright 2007

Posted by Gary Hazlitt from inside Second Life ©2007

Categories: Creative Collaboration, Environment Design, Environments, Inworld relationships, Machinima, Music, Role Playing, Second Life, Sent In-World, Songs, Sound Design
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or a quick case study of my role as SL designer, producer and builder in moving a film/book/stage ‘idea’, Thursday’s Fictions into the metaverse of Second Life. First, to give you a taste, a short video of my friend Kylie (who has gone a bit goth) walking through the environment. (note: An important thing missing on the video is Richard James Allen’s meditative texts that appear all around as you explore and of course visitations are usually at a much more relaxed pace.)

I have noticed that this blog is turning into mostly things I have created in Second Life or close friends, not a bad thing I suppose as long as those creations are worth singing about. I believe this one certainly is. I was lucky to work with Richard James Allen and Karen Pearlman (of Physical TV) who are the drivers behind an ‘idea’ called Thursday’s Fictions. This idea has been manifest in film, book, theatre and my task was to be the designer, producer, builder etc: in Second Life. It was only a small project compared with many of the multi sim creations I have done and are currently working on, but it excelled in being a worthy, experimental, artistic and aesthetic statement. It fell strongly into something I call Story Environments - spaces that have narrative embedded in them at varying degrees, more on that later.

The basic premise of the story is a woman who lives for one day only is trying to take her most valued creative possession (her dancers in a trunk she carries with her) between various reincarnations. There is more to it than that of course and the themes of death, love, life, mind, body, spirit all intermingle to create a fascinating pot pourii of philosophy, psychology and self awareness.

My challenge was to find appropriateness in Second Life which is itself an allegory of the themes of the piece from the outset. In other words, as I mentioned in this panel interview on SLCN.tv, (yes I talk!), SL is a space that is already routed in parallel existance, new incarnation and so on. It was about trying to find something that was different enough from quite a few existing ’spiritual’ areas in SL but also providing links back to ‘real world’ perceptions of spiritual architecture.

I haven’t time in this blog post to go into vast detail but to say the build was done very rapidly and I worked iteratively with the writers (that included script consultant Rock Sonic - SL name) who are all relatively new to the true creative potential of this world. Some of the techniques used to deliver the narrative elements included invisible sensors that talked to you randomly, spirit ’spheres’ that whisper as they pass through you, moving and still texts of various forms on the walls, objects and nature that chats residual and direct thoughts, sound and embedded gate-keeper questions.

There are effectively two longer form experiences at the moment. Purgatory, a series of halls and alcoves exploring a range of ideas mostly routed in one word ‘choice’. What life to go to next, what to take, decide what happened in the previous one, choose a state of mind and so on. The second experience is one life you inhabit, the ‘fractured’ mind of one of the characters. For the latter I created something that was slightly unnerving and disorientating yet also welcoming and familiar. It was loosely based on the sets of the film but I injected some play and elements of confusion. Go see and you will understand. The first main area purgatory is populated by Richard’s a range of texts, my favourite being the ’self-destructive’ lines (in the floating spirits in the main hall) from his book Kamikaze Mind. I also wanted Purgatory to show how music, sound and visual effects, text, signs, places to explore and architecture create a new kind of experience in SL that becomes very cinematic. There were many compromises that had to be taken but happily they are all easily overcome in future experiences I will create in this and many other properties. I/we also wanted this experience to be as social as possible. In a full 3D social space anything that doesn’t allow a shared user journey through it is doomed so it has been great watching couples and small groups exploring.

There are many more elements planned for this ‘idea’ of Richards and these will include another 6 or 7 more life journeys that will attempt to cover a broader spectrum of the ‘human drama’. To go to this experience now here is a link to the starting grove - SLURL.

Posted by © Gary Hazlitt from inside Second Life

Categories: Architecture, Bio World, Communication, Creative Collaboration, Environment Design, Environments, Experimental, Game Design, Identity, Machinima, Second Life, Social Experiment, Sound Design, Virtual Worlds
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Well it has been such a long time since I last posted that your probably wondering if I am still alive, well yes very much so. I have been caught up in building sims for companies and lots of other bigger picture things that my daily exploits are too dense to find time to blog about them! Still I will try to do a catch up and talk about some of the fun activities I have been doing. For the moment here is a video of the making of one of the sims I built The Pond.

Categories: Building, Environment Design, Environments, Scripting, Sound Design, Virtual Worlds
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or sounding-out the Metamatic Neighbours

It’s been over a month now since myself, Jjason Jedburgh, Adam Ramona and Mashup Islander bought a sim together. It is called Marni and is attached to the south of Esperance and is now growing to be a great hive of artistic, business and social activity. I terraformed the island to give the four of us a great environment and some privacy for our various expoilts.

I have talked before about Jjason and his splendid architectural visions so now I wanted to interview Adam and Mashup (whose quarter sim plots are visible above) about their work and passion, real-time spatialised sound sculptures. I have been watching with glee as both of them get used to the possibilities in this world being relatively new to Second Life and create what I regard already as major, innovative pieces. Firstly a little about the Metamatic Collective piece.

Cantata Park 1 by Metamatic is an interactive, spatialised sound sculpture built in Second Life. The sculpture is made from 256 individual nodes in a 16 x 16 grid. Each node is embedded with a single word, triggered by a participant’s movement through the work. Each participant creates a random narrative, assembled on-the-fly, and in real-time. The work explores the possibilities of metaverse art, limitations of Second Life’s construction tools and scripting language, and the ability to appreciate conceptual art by proxy of an avatar. Cantata Park was produced in December 2006 Copyright 2006, Metamatic Collective

Adam and Mashup collaborated on this piece which is the first part of the interview below and then I met with Adam seperately to discuss five of his other works. We were also joined by Lisa Dapto, who is a close colleague of both of them. We met firstly at the site and then inside Adam’s self made garden retreat.

You: Who is the collective and what brought them together

Mashup Islander: The collective is Adam and myself for the moment. Adam was doing some funky 3D art on his land and I was inspired by this. I guess we found (Adam and I) a similar liking for abstract real-time art and decided to work on a project together

You: You mentioned that there are limitations to achieve what you want to in this world could you explain what these are in more detail for the readers

Adam Ramona: The technical limitations of Second Life are significant but this makes it a challenge, and often the best work is done in restrictive environments

Mashup Islander: It helps define boundaries for the work too

Adam Ramona: Relatively speaking the scripting language is an impressive achievement

You: And what are the benefits of this world for contemporary expressive 3D art?

Adam Ramona: Given the environment, collaboration is also a major plus of this space

Mashup Islander: Also the audience is large and open to new forms of expression

You: Yes I was going to ask about the methodology of collaboration how did it work for you both on the Cantata Park piece for example

Mashup Islander: It was really easy actually. Adam and I seem to think the same thing at the same time.

Adam Ramona: There are the usual teething problems getting used to the process but its a joy to be able to work collaboratively *within* the environment that the work will be consumed in.

Adam (left) and Mashup pose inside Cantata Park 1.

The work is now permanently installed on Mashup’s land and there are already many word-of-mouth visitors coming along to try the piece. I list some direct SLURLs at the end of both interviews for you to pop along yourself. I asked more about the background to the work.

You: What actually inspired the creation?
Mashup Islander: I was fooling around with basic prim sculptures and getting off on the whole ordered nature of basic 3D design. After a visit to an early version of Adam’s Bell Park, I saw a possibility to incorporate spoken words into the architecture. The randomness of each participant’s experience excited me and we explored some possible narrative structures before settling on a Burroughs piece, which was appropriate given the subject matter.

You: The 256 spoken fragments triggered by motion through them? What is the intention behind that and what experience is it meant to invoke?

Mashup Islander: Its a fractured narrative inspired by the Beat poets of old the actual passage is a Burroughs piece appropriate given the context

You: Each person has a different route through the piece of course - do you think there will be any shared experience?

Mashup Islander: Yes, the participant makes their own narrative and it was interesting just then with four users simultaneously that a layered narrative with many intersections can result. In specific answer to your question, I can’t put feelings into other people’s experience. Its up to each person to explore and take away their own assumptions

Above Lisa Dapto flys above Cantata Park 1 while Adam and Mashup introduce Pix (a visitor) to the piece. We talk more about the narrative, semantic elements of the work.

Adam Ramona: people make their own narrative always, and probably people who have similar outlooks will create similar experiences?

You: But presumably given that it is Burroughs excerpts there must be a common narrative that everyone can take away? Not completely random fragments

Mashup Islander: Burroughs believed all narrative had hidden meaning, each iteration of disassembly can provoke further insight and messages

Lisa Dapto: He and tristan Tzara before him were the lightning rods for the cut-up technique

Adam Ramona: Tzara was definitely about disassembling the dominant narrative

Mashup Islander: From paper, to tape recorder and now real-time 3D

You: I wonder if you see a kind of art renaissance developing in this world?

Adam Ramona: The art itself is thoroughly contemporary for me, it is a matter of using the medium for its strengths, and not trying to have it imitate some other medium. A new technology is always used first to do something that can already be done. Going with the native strengths of the medium as the basis for the formal decisions which makes it very simple to process. It’s the same thing with Hyperformalism if i understand DanCoyote Antonelli’s work correctly, it is using the ‘native’ qualities of the medium to make the formal decisions

Lisa Dapto: the involvement of the “audience” as co-authors of the work makes Adam’s and Mashup’s work fascinating and challenging, it reflects the ultimate potential for users in this world to generate their own scenarios

Adam Ramona: One of these “native qualities” of which i spoke is indeed the interactive nature of the audience/residents and this art is ‘for’ those people

You: Are you going to allow people to come and explore the work/s at this stage? If so can we publish the SLURLs?

Mashup Islander: Absolutely. The work is open for public viewing, with more on the way. Metamatic as an experimental playground for our artworks and we’ll be cycling new installations across both Adam’s and my land as they unfold.

So just for readers of JustVirtual a world exclusive a direct link to Cantata Park 1. Marni 205,53,25

Adam’s Place

I went back the next day to Adam’s quarter sim (which is actual adjoining mine), to talk to him in more depth about some of his latest pieces. I am particularly fascinated by the strong primary colours developing ‘over the hedge’ and the strange, exotic sounds floating on the wind across to my place. Adam has a rather unique appearance that I will save until another post, but below you can see him posed by his latest and greatest creation Anahat, The Mute Swan. You actually enter all these pieces by either teleporting in or just walking through and The Mute Swan is interesting in that it morphs from being attactive sculpture into a full surround sound and phantom prim experience. But I will let Adam explain.

Adam Ramona: The four pieces completed here are: The Bell Garden, Pure Absence, Anahata the Mute Swan, and the Blue one. (there is also a white one recently finished)

You: What would you say are the common elements between them all?

Adam Ramona: As we talked about yesterday, I would say their commonality is that they use the ‘native’ qualities of the medium to suggest the formal considerations of each piece.

You: As these are more sound and music orientated than Cantata Park 1, are there any common elements in the way you use sound in the pieces

Adam Ramona: Generally, I try to approach the work as an ‘audiovisual’ piece, and wherever possible apply the same formal rules to the sounds as to the visuals. It is not always possible, so sometimes the sonic formalities are decided through real life (ed: bio world for regular readers) considerations of a ‘music’ or ’sound’ basis. For example, the Bell Garden is in the key of E flat Major, just because I think that is an excellent key for a bell sound Once I’d decided that, then the manipulation of the sounds was the same as the visuals - no textures, just the geometry so to speak, which in sonic terms means a very dry synthesised, unadorned sound. I think it works well in the Bell Garden (ed: night pic below)

You: One of the remarkable things about all the pieces is the synergy between the visual and the sound - in that they are inextricably linked and reinforce each other. Could you talk a little about that process?

Adam Ramona: Yes, well I have always (since 1996 when I was first introduced to real-time 3D art) thought of this medium as a “composition” medium - in that previously when I was “writing” “music” I would have a very similar sort of thing happening inside my mind as a real-time 3D scene. I would have particular shapes with particular colours making particular sounds which were animating around in the space and when I saw VRML, i thought “yay, this is the medium for me!”

You: I notice that the five pieces here are all based around subtle variations of the same colour or tone - based on primaries like blue, red, white. Because you have graduations of that one tone is this because you don’t want the visual to overpower the sound?

Adam Ramona: Yes, this is the way I work. I think of each piece as a “song” if you like and just as you don’t put every note or chord into a song, similarly, the sounds suggest the colours (and vice versa) and they always end up being like this - graduations.

You: You have your pieces on show in a wonderful zen like garden and the works are indeed very powerful but meditative and tranquil to a great extent. Would you say you are about the balance between visual and sound so they are both, equally important.

Adam Ramona: Yes indeed, I would go further and say that I don’t really recognise any distinction between sound and vision

You: Ah very interesting and that would include I suppose the amount of authorship you give the participant in your pieces so they travel the sound and visual journey on their own path?

Adam Ramona: Yes, that is definitely part of the rationale of the work - these things exist almost independently of their consumption, a little like theoretical physics or something, and therefore, any mode of consumption, temporal visual sonic is valid.

You: We talked earlier also about many of these pieces being 4 or 5 art forms in one piece - sculpture, surround installation, performance piece, interactive and even architectural. Is this intended or a by-product or the medium?

Adam Ramona: That is this medium (RT3D) - these distinctions are valid in the real physical (bio) world, but not so in RT3D, so in that sense, I guess it is a by-product, but it is also an anticipated, welcomed, part of this medium in fact. That is one of the very main reasons why I like to work in this medium.

You: To discuss a level of detail. What is the difference in your mind between a piece that is triggered by the audience or one that they just move through picking up variations in sound level and direction, without triggering the various components within?

Adam Ramona: Not really any difference, other than a pedantic one in fact, you could say that a piece that is constantly sounding is actually only sounding when an avatar moves near it and in that way it’s always triggered by an avatar, but that is true of this entire medium.

You: If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around, does it make a sound?

Adam Ramona: You are right when you call it LOD, it’s the ultimate practical existentialism, because it literally doesn’t exist (for you) when you are not looking at it, unless the LOD has been coded badly

You: Very true! I always ask this next question and it is difficult to answer but are there any specific emotional responses that a viewer may get from some of these works. I noticed for example in the Mute Swan I felt much more relaxed and quite passive after a while whereas Pure Absence with it’s strong reds and high pitched sounds quite confrontational.

Adam Ramona: Good, interesting, difficult question. I definitely aim for an emotional response because I am emotionally engaged with all of my works and that is what leads me to create them. But as for audience response, I think it is tricky to second guess, but there are probably certain things you can aim for. For example, I am glad that you felt that about Anahata, the Mute Swan, because that is what I was aiming for, emotionally, an attempt to invite the audience to reflect on the nature of silence. In fact that piece specifically asks the question “If there is a sound playing when you are born and after you die, would you hear it?”

You: I was particularly struck by the combination of words and sound in that piece and it had more impact perhaps than the Cantata in the Park work because the words were more subtle, enigmatic and mysterious?

Adam Ramona: I’m very happy to hear that. I always try to keep them impressionistic, or as you say “equal to sound”, so that they represent more the signifier of meaning rather than meaning itself, and then the listener will more than likely provide their own meaning

You: One thing that you haven’t yet incorporated into your pieces and in this world it is a significant layer of course is our beloved ‘chat/IM text’ - is there a reason for that?

Adam Ramona: Yes, I did that in a bio piece, Scorched Happiness (2004), which was a multi-user VRML piece, where the chat text was typed live by the performers based on excerpts from the work by Julia Kristeva that formed the basis of the work. So, I am definitely interested in it, since it is a part of the medium but I would rather work out a way to make it similar to the way I use words that we discussed before, IE, without actual meaning, which is harder to do in text of course. But, now you’ve mentioned it I’ll get onto it straight away

You: Finally Do you think it easy to explain or recreate these works outside our environment or is that the basic point of formalism, that they are rooted here and here only.

Adam Ramona: Absolutely the latter in, of and for this medium. However, it doesn’t mean SL specifically, it means multi-user real-time 3D, of which SL is a very, very good example and one that is very popular and therefore provides and audience.

You: Finally, finally. If you had 3 ’sound feature’ wishes from Linden Lab (our creator!) what would they be?

Adam Ramona: Ah, yes, the first one is easy and obvious: generative sound synthesis in the SL engine should be simple to do, since they’ve already using Havok for physics. Second would be 5.1 out (as we mentioned before). Third would be increase the sample time limit to *at least* 60 seconds.

You: Totally agree with all of those and maybe much more control over sound spread. Adam, for now thank you, and as we are neighbours I don’t really need to say goodbye, rather look forward to hearing from you again very soon.

Adam is also happy for visitors to come and explore and discuss his works. This SLURL drops you in the middle of the Zen sculpture interactive garden and next to some teleport points to take you to the skybox creations. Adam’s place can be found at Marni 220,199,23

Posted by Gary Hazlitt from inside Second Life

Categories: Creative Collaboration, Digital Art, Environment Design, Exhibition, Experimental, Friends, Neighbourhood, Residential, Second Life, Sent In-World, Sound Design, Virtual Worlds
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UPDATE: Video embed and brief interview with DC in article below

ZeroG SkyDancers - ZeroG VIII. Wednesday, November 29th, 2006. Created, Produced and Directed by DanCoyote Antonelli

I was lucky to be one of the select few that were invited to DanCoyote Antonelli’s SkyDancer performance on Weds evening this week- seating is limited to 30 seats per show, SkyDancer shows are always sold-out, reservation-only events. Also very privileged to have my photo taken (above) with the taltented troupe of dancers, musician and creator. DC has become synonymous in this world with large scale live performance works that combine sublime evocative music, acrobatic aerial dance and incredible organic art. I have been in contact with Dan ever since I asked him to temporarily install a large piece on Esperance several months ago for some design students to investigate (and to whom he gave an impromptu lecture). Also I did a visitor report immediately after his first set of performances in August and about his installation works at New West Exhibit and the Sixth finger installations close to Esperance. It is great to see his work going from strength to strength and his vision become more refined. I attended the middle of three performances a couple of eves ago and although the piece only lasted around thirty or so minutes I managed to take some stills and capture (in one take and without any rehearsal of course) a short six minute film that hopefully gives you a feel of what it was like to be there.

Four (sometimes five) talented avies, Anhinga Chaika, Deborah Strangelove, Callipygian Christensen, Tatiana Kurri, Queue Marlowe, sky danced in a massive 400 meter cubic volume performance space, 600 meters above the Learning Sim part of the NMC campus! The musical score by ZeroOne Paz was a perfect accompaniment to the spectacle in that it was ethereal, minimalist yet had just enough variation and rhythm to move the performance forward. I particularly loved the harp-like sounds employed, being an avid harpist (naturally - just like all black angels) and the long sustained string sounds and pulsing rhythm that melded perfectly with the swooping flying loops by the dancers.

Visually the event was stupendous. To be sat inside a living, moving piece of gigantic art (that at times felt generative or self evolving) we felt like we were the first and last ones to see these combinations of organic shapes and colours, spontaneous and unique - of course with DC at the controls. It was difficult to decide which way to look at times, especially as many of the ‘organisms’ actually passed through us, the audience at times and the dancers were always drawing our attention too. (Of course I was also busy taking pictures and filming!). The wonder of these pieces is the sense of awe that you get seeing the avie embodiment dwarfed by miraculous, before unseen forms and the shared experience with thirty or so friends all who understand and appreciate the emotional statement being made. It is very experiential, poignant and escapist without being ’space cadet’, meaning it never feels like gratuitous eye candy, for eye candy sake, DC strikes a fine balance.

The audience awaits with bated breath as the intro music reaches a crescendo.

Switching our time to midnight enhances the experience.

As regards context here is some hyperformalist background info from DC (which are partly echoes from my earlier posts) that provide some background to the images and video embedded in this page.

“Hyperformalism is derived from the combination of the words Hyper and Formalism and is being used here to describe aesthetic self expression without anthropomorphic, or representative context. Hyperformalism is an aesthetic philosphical construct that may be employed by to describe a late 20th century, early 21st century mass art phenomena consisting of scores of users generating abstract, often spacially unique artworks. Hyperformalist are creates a unique continuum of reference; a rearrangement of photons to illuminate alternate worlds of form, shape, color and space. At times hyperformal art may resemble natural formations or even employ naturalistic algorithms.”

I had a brief chat with Dancoyote a few days after the performance. He was already secretly preparing another performance for December 15th of which I had a sneak mini preview, but I tried to keep the interview brief…

Gary Hazlitt: What are you learning from the performances you put on the other day and could you tell us a little about the production process?
Dancoyote Antonelli: It is the second season so naturally it includes the research from observing the first show. We flew about two dozen shows for the 2006 season. I learned many things such as the tendencies for this world, Second Life, to under load. For starters I try to find the edge of the technical capabilities and work the edge and not to be too radical.
Gary Hazlitt: Which of course means limiting guest numbers?
Dancoyote Antonelli: Not really. At this sim there is no other load so it is ideal. But even an ideal situation can only have about 40 guests since my crew is nearly a dozen
Gary Hazlitt: How did you respond or adapt these new performances in regard to audiences reaction to the first ones? In particular ‘how do you want them to feel’ or react to your work. At an emotional level or is it more about your own self expression?
Dancoyote Antonelli: Not directly but I didn’t change certain mood intentions. There is an intent to set a mood of affirmation of wonder and immersion. It is the job of the contemporary artist
Gary Hazlitt: In terms of hyperformalism are you evolving it at the rate you would like to in here?
Dancoyote Antonelli: I would like to lose the limitations of audience. Three hundred people would be nicer. The audience at the moment is too small
Gary Hazlitt: Is sharding is an option? Having a parallel, duplicate mirrored performance such as the NBC XMas event a few days ago across 18 sims reaching say 500 avies at once?
Dancoyote Antonelli: But SkyDancers are not mass marketed yet
Gary Hazlitt: They should be! I have read that hyperformalism is rooted in organic paradigms. But organic surely refers to the biological world? How do you deal with that paradox being in a digital world?
Dancoyote Antonelli: The organic is rooted in the inorganic and at base everything is elements. I don’t worry about organic or inorganic.
Gary Hazlitt: OK to put it another way, are your creations a representation of the biological world? Or is the goal to be completely removed from the bio world?
Dancoyote Antonelli: It is not a representation of anything in real life and no the true goal is discovery and wonder for me and for the viewer. It is to push forward into new territory of reactive environments. I wish this world had a null gravity sim for example!
Gary Hazlitt: Do you think that your very experiential works can be enjoyed as linear pieces on two dimensional video?
Dancoyote Antonelli: Only to a certain extent. I am having problems transmitting the idea to curators for instance who simply scratch their head when I show them video
Gary Hazlitt: So can it leave this world and be experienced elsewhere?
Dancoyote Antonelli: I think it can with the proper context until people become aware of this continuum
Gary Hazlitt: Regarding that do you feel you lose control if too much spills out of this world via the social web?
Dancoyote Antonelli: I want it to spill and populate and I always appreciate any help to help me contextualize it.
Gary Hazlitt: Will do my best. Well look forward to new show if I get invited. Many thanks for you time DC I will leave you to prepare

The talented troupe again.

A final reminder in the cold light of day of the scale of this piece.

Posted by Gary Hazlitt from inside Second Life (pictures and film by Gary Hazlitt with kind permission of DanCoyote Antonelli)

Categories: Creative Collaboration, Digital Art, Environments, Events, Exhibition, Friends, Second Life, Sent In-World, Sound Design, Virtual Worlds
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Had a wonderful experience on Tuesday teaching eight students on the island I built and manage, AFTRS Esperance (slurl). They were here to learn how to approach professionally designing sound for games and worlds like this ours. From my perspective they appeared early in the day and I took trained them for five hours in the basics of communication, moving around our world, building, general management of one’s assets but most time was spent on intermediate sound design. I was stunned how quickly new students nowadays pick things up so quickly as I took them further through the scripting for our amazing world. From relative babies of this world after five hours they were flying, dancing and more importantly building and adding scripts to sound objects all over the place. A mixture of ambient sound, transient effects and interactive sound. There were even two screen composer students who were adding evolving music around the spaceship and ghost castle sets I mentioned in my previous post.

To put the icing on the cake we were joined at the end by Robbie Dingo for an hour master-class. Robbie, who develops the best musical instruments in our world (click here to go to his store) and a sound guru, had set up a great interactive walk-through on one of the backlots and we were treated to listening to him speak (and my students spoke back), yes really weird, hearing avies in this world speak - where does their voice come from? Robbie did a post on his in-world blog called ‘Virtual Lecture’ that may explain it. Anyway Robbie took us all through the basics of scripting sound showing large boards with key examples on. We then listened and interacted with each example as we walked around in our class-like huddle. At the end we saw some of Robbies wonderful musical instrument creations, synchronised marimbas and his incredible installation ‘The Whisper Box’. I have installed his Elven drums and other instruments around the island already and Robbie has kindly left the Whisper Box on the island for a while click here to go to precise spot.

All in all a great day and an example of how new people in this world can with the right guidance and mentorship really learn some great skills. From zero to a hundred in six hours.

Here are some images.

Robbie prepared a wonderful interactive teaching walkthrough

We all listened intently as Robbie took us through some more complex scripts.

I had already taught them the basics of looped, ambient and some trigger sound and this is one of the sets we sound designed.

Robbie explains the wonders of the CollisionSound script, we all seem to crash into things regularly in this world.

and here we are about to test that out by each of us walking through the trip wire.

Beware the objects that listen and sensor us. We walk into the sensor circle which triggers a sound. Normally one wouldn’t see the dome of course.

and a fun bit as bees sounds swarm and circle around our heads.

There are more images on flickr that someone uploaded of this event.

Posted by Gary Hazlitt from inside second life

Categories: Communication, Creative Collaboration, Digital Art, Environment Design, Events, Music Experiments, Second Life, Sent In-World, Sound Design, Training, Virtual Worlds
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As I have been doing for the past few months I am continuing to train talented avatars in the many skills in this world. They often come as newbies so after giving them the grand tour I then go into basic tips on how to survive here, all the tools, how to communicate, some of the dangers and only then do we go on to learning. It has been great fun teaching them such things as how to animate themselves, how to build, design and animate objects, how to film using the many cameras in here and next week how to make the place ’sound’ exciting. As part of this creating the sounds around you we will be sound designing a space-ship and a haunted castle set, with the idea that this would help them develop sound for games. I just spent a couple of hours setting up a ‘mute’ forest, graveyard and interiors of a horror castle. Still some work to go. But it has been useful hanging out in Midian (which has strangely disappeared today - sure it will be back) and the City of Lost Angels - useful being immersed in some of the ambience from these places. We will be a) doing constant ambient, background and environmental sound, b) random ambient sound (for horror this would be occassional screams, thuds etc:) and c) interactive sound, what happens when you walk into somewhere, touch something or it is triggered by a timer. Anyway as I haven’t blogged for a while here are some pics with me and my Island boss A. Ebi, she was posing for the pictures…

I built the scene into a closed black production set.

The fog makes a big difference to the feel, even when it is silent

Props scattered around all ready for those interactive sound effects

More tombstones ready for random ambient sounds. There is a lot in the castle to set-up for possible game-like sound, will save that for another post.

Posted by Gary Hazlitt from inside Second Life

Categories: Environment Design, Environments, Events, Second Life, Sent In-World, Sound Design, Training, Virtual Worlds
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