So, last week I realized I did not like the direction this project was going. I felt that much of the interactivity capable by the MAX/MSP/Jitter language was being limited by computer vision problems and inaccuracies. Instead, after seeing ACCESS, "an interactive installation that lets web users track anonymous individuals in public places, by pursuing them with a robotic spotlight and acoustic beam system" by Marie Sester, I decided to do a redesign of the project.
I particularly still wanted to keep this concept of virtual space and idenitity (two places at once) and the idea of interacting physically from a distance. This project will deal with constructing a "robot" from a toy remote car which will be receiving OSC messages from a server locally hosted on my computer. The robot will have a camera for guidance and an LED ticker that can be used to display messages.
I feel this project has a lot of potential due to the anonymity of the beholder and the forced interaction of passerbys. It really test the bounds between the 2 dimensionality of social web applications to a less human exterior, but far more human interior of a human-guided robot.
Goals for this week:
Redesign UI and get FlashServer running for video feeds.
Design robot. I am thinking to make it out of cardboard similar to the architectural topographic models (the ones that look like level sets) to get past the robotic stereotype (chrome and lights).
