Bertrand Gondouin - Motion Tracking

Växthusprojektet - Greenhouse Project - Dramatiska Institutet

Bertrand Gondouin — Mon, 12 May 2008 14:30:00 +0000

I'm invited by the scenographer Johan Rödström to create an interactive video for his "Greenhouse project" at Dramatiska institutet. I'm going to work with wireless accelerometers, thanks to the Lilypad Arduino!

Multimedia as a helping device in dance teaching and choreographic process

Bertrand Gondouin — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 10:00:00 +0000

I'm giving a workshop and lectures at the Choreography Department of Tallinn University,Estonia.24-26th april 2008.

What happen when the body becomes the only interface ? How can the body learn, play and compose an audio-visual artifact ? How does it affect creativity and emotion. Can the body function as a visual instrument ?

Topics:

Presentation of the Laeterna Machine Digital Dance Collective
Overview of electronic devices, sensors and their usage
Overview of mainstream electronic devices and their usage
Live video mixing history and interactive visuals software
The virtual space: Social Networks and VR
Drawing in space: from gesture to artificial intelligence

Workshops:

Live Video Editing, Motion Tracking, Video Publishing on the internet, 3D drawing with the Wii Controller. and my Tag Cloud!

Interdisciplinary Studies Course, Konstfack, Stockholm

Bertrand Gondouin — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 10:00:00 +0000

I'm guest lecturer at Konstfack for an Interdisciplinary Studies Course organized by Nadia El-Imam (more info below). I will present a short history of live visuals production tools and software + projects I'm involved in. Students will be invited to mis/use my "Sramble" software using their own digital materials. Scramble will be used in an semi-immersive environment / fake Second Life using the Wii remote control as the main control interface.

Course Background:

As we spend more and more of our time socialising and conducting the business of our everyday lives Online, we see the rise of economies of the virtual; over the past eight years alone, Real-money trade of virtual property ('RMT') has burgeoned into a 2 Bn USD market. With the emerging visibility of new relationships and communities we see the emergence of new forms of ownership related to the accumulation of meta-data; these can be seen as attempts to obtain outwardly extending, all- encompassing ownership of information as opposed ownership of content, or enclosures of information. In order to identify and meet the challenges these developments pose to our lives in general and work in particular, we need to understand human experience in these environments. Exploring relationships between embodiment and enclosure as related to ownership is a central concern, obliging us to revisit what we know about how and what it is that distinguishes between how we function in bodied and disembodied contexts.

Course Description:

We are de-constructing idea of ownership as related to embodiment and the boundaries of integrity or ìthe state of being wholeî. This obliges us to revisit what we know about how and what it is that distinguishes between how we function in bodied and disembodied environments. With its central concern with the implications of ìpost humanî experience and embodiment, the course finds its natural home and setting in Second Life (SL), the Linden Labs online platform, and students are expected to participate in related seminars and lectures. Students are also expected to make presentations that explore and relate the different aspects of implementation using the Second Life platform with ones they make in a designated physical space.

Rehearsals in Toulouse

Bertrand Gondouin — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 19:09:00 +0000

Laeterna Machina is having rehearsals in Toulouse at the "Pavillon Mazar" !

Wii and Dual screens experiments! More videos

Wii immersive 3d - Didactic Forest sent by b_gondouin

Wii immersive 3d sent by b_gondouin

Grains & Pixels Lecture at the Open in Process event, London

Bertrand Gondouin — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 18:30:00 +0000

Grains & Pixels is giving an open lecture on AI in the context of performance at the Open In Process Event in London.

Open in Process body>data>space | Tue 5th June 2007 | 6.30-9.30pm | 3GBP

body>data>space are hosting two more exciting 'Open in Process' events in May & June. These nights take place as live open debate & presentation events focusing on the making processes for interactive arts. Speakers for the 5th June - Grains & Pixels (Sweden) working with AI & performance and Paul Sermon (UK) well known internationally for his pioneering work with telematics. More info & how to book

body>data>space merge live audio-visual interaction with telematics and the new generation of intelligent materials and wearables computers. body>data>space takes installations and live performances into large-scale public environments and architectural builds, shifting the relationship between the artist, the media/content and the user/audience.

Monaco Dance Forum: Presentation of my work

Bertrand Gondouin — Wed, 15 Dec 2004 09:00:00 +0000

I'm invited to be part of the workshops organized by Monaco Dance Forum and Johannes Birringer. I will present Grains & Pixels, the Sys-Org Show and some example of my VJ work. There are also nice topics of discussion:

Real Time and digital choreographic performance space
The video as a source of lighting and space
The spatialization of sound
Scenic space

Grains & Pixels

Bertrand Gondouin — Thu, 21 Oct 2004 15:31:00 +0000

A live cinema show with artificial intelligence and interactive media in wich improvisation is augmented in real-time by custom interactive visualization and sonification software.

“By making use of artificial intelligence, the work represents an advanced development of audio-visual works. It is not simply a live performance, the material it uses has been processed in real-time. Human intelligence and emotion on one hand artificial intelligence on the other hand perform together.”. CYNETart Festival Price jury laudation, Dresden, Germany, 2006.

Watch the videos or the podcast

2007-06-05 Lecture at the Open in Process event, London, UK
2007-06-02 Performance the Roxy Bar & Screen, London, UK
2007-05-31 Performance, Reboot 9.0, Copenhagen, Denmark
2007-04-01 Prix Möbius Nordica Experimental, Pixelache Highlights 2007, Helsinki, Finland
2007-04-01 Performance, Pixelache 2007 , Kiasma theatre, Helsinki, Finland
2006-12-19: Screening, The Austin Museum of Digital Art, Austin, Texas, USA.
2006-11-15, Award and Performance, CYNETart 2006, Dresden, Germany.
2006-09-29: Performance, Clandestino Institute's inauguration, Göteborg, Sweden.
2006-09-07: Screening and lecture, Upgrade! Nabi Art Center Nabi, Seoul, South-Korea.
2006-03-25/26: Nominated for awards, VIPER, international festival for film video and new media, Basel, Switzerland.
2005-11-29/12-02: Selection, 404 Festival, international festival of electronic art, Rosario, Argentina.
2005-11-25/26: Presentation, Technology and the Avant-Garde Conference, Stockholm, Sweden.
2005-09-30: Selection, Videomedeja festival, Novi Sad, Serbia.
2005-03-25: Performance, Today in Paradise - Genetics & Art, Rödasten, Gothenburg, Sweden.
2004-10-25: Installation and Performance, Gallery Big Love, Gothenburg, Sweden.
2004-05-10: Performance, Poetic Vision and Sound, Galleri 54, Gothenburg, Sweden.

Background

Grains & Pixels is a collective project involving three artists - Bertrand Gondouin, Jacob Munkberg, and Kristofer Sunden Ringnér. The project is a creative encounter between artificial intelligence, sound and image. By designing their own software, controllers and a protocol connecting the computers the artists have invented a new instrument for live improvisation.

Having developed their own instruments for sound, music and movement individually, they now come together to play. They bring their different instruments and experiences together, focusing on experiment and improvisation in a collaboration where the working process as such is an integral part.

Grains & Pixels is conceived as a set of different structures that can be played and performed in many ways. The animation of these structures create complex and nuanced images and sounds which combine abstract and figurative.

The image and music are nestled and are working tightly together. The structures are listening to or watching each other, responding to the input they receive. The sound is sculpted in a very elastic way in order to respond to the many degrees of freedom the image space contains.

Some of the structures are purely random noises, others are "original" media, yet others are 3D objects or raw information about the localisation or trajectory.

The point is that they can all be played together - with error, imagination or very delicately. Sometimes surprising and exciting, sometimes boring. According to the mood of the performance, Grains & Pixels create a unique and subjective experience that evolves each time it is presented.

Often, it will not be perfect: the image will dribble, the sound will be noisy or the 3D object will remain hopelessly flat. It may even output a completely silent, black screen. The result is never what or where you expect it to be.

Thus the interaction of coincidence, surprise, and attention, create the density and complexity of the image/music.

Interactive 3D software : Bertrand Gondouin
Sound synthesis : Jacob Munkberg
A.I. Programming : Kristofer Sundén Ringnér
Composition & Performance: Grains & Pixels
Production : Grains & Pixels
booking, technical rider and press material

Roller toaster sent by b_gondouin

Playing with particles sent by b_gondouin

Laeterna Machina, Digital Dance Collective

Bertrand Gondouin — Wed, 11 Jun 2003 22:27:00 +0000

What happen when the body becomes the only interface ? How can the body learn, play and compose an audio-visual artifact ? How does it affect creativity and emotion. Can the body function as a visual instrument ?

The Laeterna Machina was founded in 2003 in France as an interdisciplinary research project combining dance, music, video and light engineering.
The Collective is unique in the world of contemporary dance, it has succeed in developing new electronic interfaces with custom sound and video software alongside powerful shows, workshops and lectures. It's also the first dance collective that has published all of its rehearsals on a website (video blog) and that is now available on the iTunes Music Store (video podcast).

Laeterna Machina Collective

Choreography : Gaetano Giunta
Image : Bertrand Gondouin
Light Direction : Cyril Monteil
Sound : Laeterna Machina
Choreography consultant : Mireille Reyes

Shows

Sys-Org (2005-2006)

The performance is a Frankenstein mashup of nostalgia and mental illness, centered round a dancer’s double identity. The choreography creates a sonic and visual instrument which transforms physical impulse and energy into acoustic gestures and visual territories. Composed as a sequence of concentrated scenes, it creates an emotional and narrative logic underscored by intense, abstract imagery. Taking the spectator through the looking glass into what may be the paranoic vision of an android, or simply a tale of modernity.

Download the video : iPod video (QuickTime), 89.6Mo, sony PSP, 152 Mo

Tempo Line (2004) Burn Hollywood Burn !

At the beginning of the show, Gaetano, super dance performer, has to make a huge decision : will he burn fat, hollywood or the electronic devices he is wearing ? Depending his initial impulse, he may change the face of the world...or only his weight.

Tour

27/01/2006 20h30 - Theatre municipal de Montauban, Montauban, France (Sys-Org)
26/01/2006 14h00 - Theatre municipal de Montauban, Montauban, France (Sys-Org)
10/04/2005 - Festival "Les pas de Troyes", Troyes, France (Sys-Org)
03/03/2005 - Festival " Rebonds 05", Albi, France (Sys-Org premiere)
06/06/2004 - Dance at School Workshop, Albi, France (Tempo Line)
03/04/2004 - Festival "Rebonds 04", Albi, France (Tempo Line)
13/10/2003 - Dance at School Workshop, Castres, France (Tempo Line)

Technical aspects

Laeterna Machina uses body sensors patched to the dancer. They measure the movements of the performers and send the signal wirelessly to our computers and home made software.
The raw movement signal is then converted to code that we can use to manipulate directly video, light and sound. We are mostly using the MAX/MSP graphical programming environment, with some drops of PureData, and the MIDI protocol.
With such a system, the performer creates the music with his movements together with the musician and the video artist. Body gesture filters, triggers and transforms sounds and pictures in an unpredictible and complex live show.

Bertrand Gondouin - Motion Tracking

Växthusprojektet - Greenhouse Project - Dramatiska Institutet

Multimedia as a helping device in dance teaching and choreographic process

Topics:

Workshops:

Interdisciplinary Studies Course, Konstfack, Stockholm

Course Background:

Course Description:

Rehearsals in Toulouse

Grains & Pixels Lecture at the Open in Process event, London

Monaco Dance Forum: Presentation of my work

Grains & Pixels

Background

Laeterna Machina, Digital Dance Collective

Laeterna Machina Collective

Shows

Tour

Technical aspects

Sponsors