"Watching" -- Project notes and critique

Gail, Elaine, Me, Inger, Ernie -- the morning of our presentation, Wednesday June 18, 2008

The presentation of my group's new media project "Watching" gave me the anticipated outcome I'd hoped for. We heard several layout suggestions in the critique that were interesting for consideration and there was a lively discussion, which is always a good sign of the work having an effect on the audience. Here's a summary of my thoughts on our project, the concept, development, class presentation, expectations, outcomes, learning experience and critique feedback:

Description and Concept -- I posted a description of my project in my blog on June 9th. We were playing with notions of watching and what it means to be in a private environment but not certain you are alone. As the project developed we considered notions of the surveillance sign on the washroom door that states "This area under security surveillance". (play the film clips at the end of post). The project incorporated a three-camera multiple perspective of a live performance and a projected random playback order of the performance narrative through a MaxMSP patch. Our idea was to take the audience through three steps that turned them into the watcher, watching themselves.

We filmed Mike in a washroom stall, being watched from three cameras and played the clips through the random order playback patch. The projection of the random clips was intended to move the viewer to a box with a hole that replicated the peephole view of Mike in the clips. Originally we were going to have the clips play on a 20" monitor but in the end we projected them on an AV projector. I liked the look and I'm glad we did it this way, but the size may have taken away from people wanting to go to the box. Having them side-by-side, and roughly the same scale may have worked better than what we did for the presentation.

We had to encourage the audience to go to the box initially, and I think this may have been because of the layout. However, people did eventually make their own way there and the result was much as I'd anticipated. A small light was set up in the box so that when someone peeped in they could see the same magazine that Mike had been reading in the washroom clips, and a camera mounted in the box would record the eye peering into the box and seeing the magazine. The image of the recorded eye was then fed to an AV projector that projected it on the wall behind the person peeping, which completed the watching cycle.

The idea was to watch Mike in the washroom being watched with cameras, and be encouraged to peep in the box to see the prop, which would then complete the cycle of looking when the person's eye projected behind them. That was the concept, and the trajectory of the project cycle but of course concepts are subject to change as they develop...

Development and Production -- I learned about electric circuits, arduinos, and MaxMSP. But without Professor Steve Daniels to write the code there would be no time to mount such an ambitious project. After casting Mike Sage as our washroom performer we determined the look, location and camera coverage. The film shoot of Mike went well and gave us good results. We cut a two minute narrative and then made 28 individual clips intended for the MaxMSP random order patch. We tested it and it worked the way we had anticipated. This part went smoothly.

Meanwhile we attended workshops, built our circuit and constructed the box to hold the sensor, small light, camera and the magazine from the performance. There were a few things that didn't work but I considered them small because they didn't alter the anticipated outcome too much. For instance we couldn't get the sensor to work so the light and camera were on all the time instead of being triggered by an eye filling the hole in the box. Along the way we got interested in sound conversion of emails into music, which became Quicktime files in a sort of effect soundscape by using a software called Soundhack. We attended two workshops and the rest of our time was spent figuring things out, building them and refining them. There was no time for a trial run. We tested both setups the night before the presentation, and we came in early to set up our installation in the RCC presentation room. At 10:00 a.m. we had everything ready for our 11:00 a.m. installation to be viewed by the class. At this point we walked to the Image Arts building for a different presentation and had our photo taken on the way.....

Presentation and Feedback-- It turned out we were the first ones to present because the other presentation wasn't ready. I enjoyed showing the class our project and having them try it out. I thought our "mock gallery" setup looked good, especially given the regular classroom aesthetic. We worked on this project for two weeks, grappled with several new media techniques from lessons we'd taken just prior to making it, aimed for documentary relevancy with notions of watching, being watched and becoming the watcher, and worked at making the projection environment appealing and a bit off-the-wall to suit our main theme of looking at Mike being peeped at through the keyhole and then moving on to become the peeper looking through the peephole in the box. I thought our soundscape created from adapting our visuals through soundhack was complimentary to the visual presentation. I think we were successful in creating an environment that looked and sounded professional. If I walked into a gallery with the look, sound, feel and interactivity of our presentation I would enjoy it. I think there are problems in some smaller details, but overall I liked the result.

I learned that the path we wanted the audience to move through was not necessarily the path they immediately took and some encouragement was needed. If we were to reshow the piece we would all likely agree to try some things differently to move people into the experience of the clips more personally and connect the clips to the box through a better floor plan. These were some of the helpful suggestions from the critique.

Several people felt the piece was more voyeurism rather than surveillance rather than seeing both as being notions of watching, who is watching and who is being watched. There was a lively discussion and it was great to see people getting excited about the topic. I wish in retrospect I'd had a pad to take notes, both to keep track of bundled questions and to have more clarity on the feedback because it went quickly. I like the suggestions I remember.

If time had allowed there would have been a midway presentation to get feedback prior to the final presentations, because it offers a chance to make changes and see how they work. (So in fact, the presentations were all midway in that regard). All things considered I learned a lot about the intricate detail of making an installation. I have made notes on spacial changes to consider to move the audience through the components more effectively. We also discussed the magazine not being much of a payoff and I wonder about the different ways to bring this to life-- a computer screen with the same clips we played of Mike, or Mike no longer being the subject that is watched, but instead having a camera pointed at the peeper. I don't know the answers but I see room to adjust and strengthen the flow to the box and the end point in the box.

I'm intrigued and considering an installation component in my thesis. I'm not sure if it would be intended for a gallery show or be a site specific intervention, but some form of projection or human triggered movement would be involved. I'm also interested in considering an interactive website presence.

Expectations vs. Outcome -- My expectations and outcome were pretty close. From the feedback I believe we could find a different layout and make a more dynamic use of the box. These shifts might have improved the audience's experience and if I'm ever to revisit the project they are the main things I'd work on.

Summary -- I thought the course gave me many options to think about. I liked the fact that we were told early on to experiment, because failing at making something wasn't seen as a failure, it was preferred that we aim big and learn from our mistakes rather than be safe. Our group followed this advice as did many other students in the course. The projects by other students were imaginative and and their critique feedbacks were engaging. I enjoyed this course and have only one suggestion. Taking new media for twelve weeks instead of jamming it into six would have been preferred. I was introduced to more tools in this production class than photography or film/video production and I wanted more time to use them.