Janet Cardiff

Cardiff layers sounds over the real perceptions one experience of different types and tech textures of space.
Cardiff's work explores how technology impacts on our consciousness. She has time-based fictional works that are experienced by participants who have headset attached to a Discman or DV Walkman and follow pre-recorded instructions that lead them into open-ended and ambiguous narratives.
There are similar contrast between her work and ours because of the headphones which allows to hear what is happening. However we are doing it in a different entirely environment. Through research and development we know how dramatic it can be for anyone to go blind. So we don't want anyone who goes in there feeling scared

There were a couple of works that we looked into that we thought were related in a way of using headphones as the main narrative to the story of her works. The way in which she uses sound is more for normal people.

What is next?

The next few steps in the project are or need to include:

* Making the flash side of the project
* Start to test it
* Test Long Wires
* Decide on the sounds that will be triggered
* Look into headphones suitable for the piece

The Regent Street Lights

Nokia has sponsored the Regent Street lights as part of a campaign to advertise the imminent arrival of its flagship London store. The lights were designed by United Visual Artists, who have worked with the P2 Group to create the 14 space-age-looking “light clusters” that make a pleasant break from the Disney-themed displays that normally grace London’s busiest shopping streets at Christmas time.



The lights are obviously attractive in a space age way, but the more impressive thing is that they are interactive. The lights are designed to react to the movement of people walking beneath them via motion cameras, and change formation depending upon the amount of pedestrians in the street. In addition, they will respond to environmental factors such as wind speed, weather and sunlight levels. And if this weren’t enough, Nokia and Wieden + Kennedy have also considered the environmental impact of the displays, using low energy LED cores and making them 100% recyclable.

Tutorial Two

We had another tutorial with Peter today in which we discussed our progression and an queries we had. Following the talk we understood that we needed to be progressing through the project at a faster rate, and that some careful planning was needed in order to be successful. In the tutorial we had discussed the expenses behind the project and how they would effect the piece, in terms of how many props we would be able to have in the room.



Our original idea was to have at least three beds in the room, then due to expense issues we were limited to two. We imagined the room to look like the diagram above. However, talking this through with Peter we highlighted that there may be a problem with the IPAC card and its response to the pressure pads far away, with long lengths of wire between them. This will obviously be something that we will have to test in order to see if its possible or not. The other problem is that the bigger the room the more potential there is that the user will become lost in the piece and just wonder around without actually setting anything off. For these reasons we are currently considering the possibility of decreasing the size of the project and only including one bed in the piece. This will be something that we will have to give extensive thought to.

Interview Details

Through contact with the Middlesex Association for the Blind we have managed to organise an interview with a blind person for Monday 26th of November at 11am. We are looking forward to the chance to gain useful information and input into our project. Before hand we knew that it would be very important that we were clear of what we would ask during the session. We decided upon the following:

Diana Gromala

We were interested in a piece of Diana Gromala piece of work called Living
Book of the Senses. Users war a headset/head-tracker/colour camera system that enables them to see physical reality enhanced with virtual reality overlay. The camera inputs images/patterns and feeds them back into the software which then displays digital information associated with the physical markers onto the headset. As the user simultaneously interact with the book in multiple physical sates to express resulting changes in narrative.

With the work she done on 'Book of the Senses' was all about the headphones and how it moved around with the narrative.
It is related to our project because of how the work is using headphones to project to users what narrative it could be.

Hospital Supplies

Having spoken to numerous companies regarding the hire of the props that we would need for the piece, its looking like the most suitable will be prop companies. Where quotes have been around:

Beds- £60 each
Tables- £20 each
Drips + Bag- £20 each
Screens- £25 each
Lighting Panels- £30 each

This could amount to alot of money, but would be worth it for the authenticity of the piece. However, we still need to contact the hospitals regarding the issue.