~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Moving over...

2011-05-22T11:21:00.000-07:00

FILE, pt. II

2011-04-26T13:27:00.000-07:00

After will be showing at the Electronic Language International Festival's Media Art exhibit in São Paulo, July 18th-August 21st.

Robot Fest

2011-04-20T07:11:00.001-07:00

I will be showing Furrowed Brow, Ghosthunter and House at the National Electronics Museum in Linthicum, MD, on Saturday, Apr. 30th.

D-ART 2011

2011-04-13T03:01:00.000-07:00

After will exhibit in an online gallery as part of the 15th international conference Information Visualization 2011 in London, 13 - 15 July.

Escape the Cage

2011-03-26T08:47:00.000-07:00

"The term composer is just convenient shorthand. To the extent that music is a shared experience, audiences must understand that this experience can not take place in a meaningful way without their active participation. This requires a view of LISTENING AS COMPOSITION. LISTENERS ARE PART OF THE COMPOSITIONAL PROCESS."
- David Rosenboom, Propositional Music

This is a networked game inspired by "Escape the Room"-style Flash games. Information from previous games, by the same or other players, is saved to a server and influences subsequent games.

Download: Mac / Win / Linux (updated 4/24 with better UI)

Update 11/18/11: prevents listening lengths of < 1 min from being saved.

Created in Processing. Source: pde

Created for Experimental Gameplay Project March/April '11 theme Cheap Clone.

Game Show NYC

2011-03-15T08:50:00.000-07:00

Ghosthunter will be showing at the Macy Gallery, Teachers College at Columbia University, May 16 to June 3 in conjunction with the Creativity, Play, and the Imagination across Disciplines conference.

@-0

2011-03-13T16:18:00.000-07:00

Depression

2011-02-22T08:25:00.000-08:00

Windows-only download. Uses webcam. No mouse or keyboard required, except ESC to exit. UPDATE 11/27/11: Now works with webcams of all resolutions (though still does best fullscreen with 640x480 or 800x600).

Uses face-tracking library by Bryan Chung as well as libraries by Krister Olsson.

Unfortunately I found that the face tracking library only runs smoothly at 320x240, but wanted it to be full-screen, so it's a bit laggy.

9x12

2011-02-19T16:24:00.000-08:00

Photos from Endless Meal will be showing at the Hungarian Multicultural Center in Dallas, TX, 26 May through 21 June

Action 2011

2011-02-01T14:04:00.000-08:00

REPENT videogame documentation will be showing at this online film festival from Serbia this month.

Serious Immobilities

2011-01-25T11:53:00.000-08:00

Download: Mac / ~~Win (did not work on my version of Vista, has not been tested on other Windows machines)~~ Apparently doesn't work on any Windows machines. Video coming soon.

Instructions:

Uses only webcam, no mouse required. Second part of the game requires a flashlight. ESC key to exit.

Preparation: Make your room dim. You should see yourself on camera but your flashlight should be the brightest spot (from your computer's POV).

If you are having trouble:
There should eventually be sound. If not, sit perfectly still and hit any key on the keyboard. This will calibrate it to what the computer should perceive as stillness. Do this also if the game appears to progress automatically no matter what you do.

The flashlight is moved like a mouse. Move the flashlight like it's on a 2D vertical plane–the computer is essentially tracking the source of the light, not where it's pointed. If you hold your arm still and turn your wrist the onscreen flashlight beam won't move.

Credit:
Uses GSVideo library and example scripts by Golan Levin and Andres Colubi, as well as Fullscreen API for Processing.

danubeVIDEOARTfestival

2011-01-15T08:07:00.000-08:00

Pieces of Jonestown will be screening in Stadtkino Grein, Austria, 4-6 March, 2011.

Spending time on Second Life

2011-01-13T19:49:00.001-08:00

Wesley Eugene Baker

2011-01-13T11:17:00.001-08:00

Waverly neighborhood, Baltimore
Breaded fish & bread: King Fried Chicken, 3300 Greenmount Avenue
Green beans: failed to find
Pasta marinara: Mama Lucia Italian Eatery, 3240 Greenmount Avenue
Milk and orange punch: 7-11, 401 East 33rd Street

Record

2011-01-13T08:32:00.000-08:00

Photo Shoot

2011-01-06T13:03:00.000-08:00

Palmistry

2011-01-06T10:48:00.000-08:00

Visit the unidentified cadavers in a morgue and
read their palms.

Fake Festival?

2010-12-20T09:56:00.001-08:00

Oddly, I'm listed as a "participating artist" in this exhibition in Slovenia, when I never sent them the physical work. Update: Though they never responded to my email, they did remove my project from the list of installations.

Also, a "real" fake festival I had work in.

Mary Bug was screened in "Festival of Videoart, Budapest, Hungary" show at the One Shot | 8th International Short Film Festival in Yerevan, Armenia.

Feature of the Week 52 – 20-26 December 2010

2010-12-20T09:23:00.000-08:00

Baptize is showing in an online exhibit at the netart journal JavaMuseum 2010 "Celebrate!". Part of Cologne NewMediaFest 2010.

Peeping Tom w/ Eye-tracking

2010-12-10T20:30:00.001-08:00

After is finally finished.

2010-12-07T12:02:00.000-08:00

Link.

Performance detritus

2010-11-23T10:20:00.000-08:00

Simulation will be showing at the TPS Reports: Performance Documents exhibit at SpaceCamp MicroGallery, Indianapolis, in February.

Instructions for Initial Conditions

2010-11-10T09:04:00.000-08:00

My Dark Tourism call is participating in a show at the Drift Station Gallery/Parallax Space in Lincoln, NE, from Nov. 5-29.

Final (?) Edit of Pieces of Jonestown

2010-11-05T06:55:00.001-07:00

Reality Show

2010-10-31T12:52:00.000-07:00

Pieces of Jonestown will screen at Video Art for All on 11/13, 11/23 and 11/29 in Macau.

After update

2010-10-15T05:27:00.000-07:00

I've given After a graphical overhaul. Not the final version.

Cyber Human Forms

2010-10-12T14:00:00.000-07:00

Baptize is showing in a web art show put on by UAVM and Fonlad #06_2010 in Barcelona, Oct. 7-Dec. 26.

Suction at Detroit MONA

2010-10-09T07:55:00.001-07:00

Exhibit.

Pieces of Jonestown article up

2010-10-05T16:10:00.001-07:00

On the Jonestown Report.

Got in trouble for shooting this on the NRA range today

2010-10-04T09:34:00.001-07:00

small spaces is now free

2010-10-03T17:32:00.001-07:00

Here.

Force: On the Culture of Rape

2010-10-01T15:34:00.000-07:00

Blue Sex will be in an exhibit at the Current Gallery in Baltimore opening next Friday, Oct. 7th.

Strangely Funny

2010-10-01T05:47:00.000-07:00

Furrowed Brow will play in the next ASPECT-EZ event on Oct. 8, and will also be included in V.17 of their DVD journal, Hi-tech.

Baptize at FILE

2010-09-13T10:23:00.000-07:00

Video Dumbo

2010-09-09T04:56:00.000-07:00

Pieces of Jonestown was selected for a screening at the Dumbo Arts Festival in Brooklyn, Sept.24-26.

Ghosthunter

2010-08-21T10:38:00.001-07:00

Hologram Test

2010-08-20T07:22:00.001-07:00

Dark Tourism

2010-08-17T14:19:00.000-07:00

Send me a description of a place where something terrible happened to you. Include a specific address or crossing streets. It can be as small as a fender bender, or it could be where your dog died, you lost your job, or something you did of which you're deeply ashamed. I'm putting together a travel guide.

aaron [dot] oldenburg [at] gmail [dot] com

PoJ w/ ST

2010-08-17T14:13:00.000-07:00

unwrap UV - Punta Arenas

2010-08-17T13:41:00.001-07:00

Punta Arenas, Chile, lies under the hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica. Ultraviolet A, B, and C (the most dangerous) rays and 130 km/hour winds batter the human body. It is worst during UV alerts in the month of January, between 11-3 in the afternoon. This body will be wrapped with a second layer of skin made of cloth.

The cloth will be painted with cyanotype sensitizer, a photo chemical that is only responsive to UV light. Cyanotypes are often used to test the power of sunscreens ("UV Catalysis, Cyanotype, Photography, and Sunscreens", Journal of Chemical Education). The body will be briefly lain on and under a funeral pyre, with a reflective surface underneath. The sunlight will burn the patterns of wood from the pyre into the cloth. Afterward, the body will be skinned and unwrapped and the chemicals will be washed out of the fabric. The skin will be cut into pieces and displayed two-dimensionally.

The method for applying a 2D texture to a 3D digital figure is called unwrap UVW. The image often looks like an animal hide. This is how the cloth skin will be displayed.

This is a new funerary ritual which embraces the opportunity to give one a closer, more immediate connection to the solar system in death.

Arrival

2010-08-17T12:46:00.000-07:00

"She would have been a good woman," The Misfit said, "if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life."

Simulation

2010-08-16T19:13:00.001-07:00

Download 300 dpi image, print and use as hanging target on shooting range.

Invisible Landscapes

2010-08-16T17:05:00.000-07:00

The viewer walks into a pitch-black room. Overhead is the ear-shattering sound of rain on a corrugated aluminum roof.

Oliver Sacks, discussing John Hull’s book, “Touching the Rock: An Experience of Blindness,” in a July 28, 2003, New Yorker Article titled “THE MIND’S EYE: What the blind see” writes:

Being a “whole-body seer,” for Hull, means shifting his attention, his center of gravity, to the other senses, and he writes again and again of how these have assumed a new richness and power. Thus he speaks of how the sound of rain, never before accorded much attention, can now delineate a whole landscape for him, for its sound on the garden path is different from its sound as it drums on the lawn, or on the bushes in his garden, or on the fence dividing it from the road. “Rain,” he writes, “has a way of bringing out the contours of everything; it throws a coloured blanket over previously invisible things; instead of an intermittent and thus fragmented world, the steadily falling rain creates continuity of acoustic experience . . . presents the fullness of an entire situation all at once . . . gives a sense of perspective and of the actual relationships of one part of the world to another.

Grayscale video of flight over desert landscapes will be recreated using hundreds of solenoids pounding on aluminum roofing. The strength in which each solenoid hits the metal is spatially tied to the grayscale value of the area in the landscape image that the solenoid represents. They will be arranged in a grid over the aluminum, with each solenoid representing a specific part of the landscape. The sound will create a 3D image of the landscape through the sound of the rain.

I am particularly drawn to the deafening roar of rain on corrugated aluminum, which I experienced in short, violent bursts in the rainy season during my time as a Peace Corps volunteer in Mali. I am also interested in the space in-between the 3D analog experience of an auditory landscape and its representation digitally on a 2D surface.

House

2010-08-15T07:04:00.002-07:00

Arduino + RFID reader plays video on a computer monitor.

Unknown Artists

2010-08-07T17:14:00.000-07:00

I just noticed (in the upper-left-hand corner of the image) that Peripheral Amnesia was accepted into the UAVM's Virtual Worlds exhibit.

Also, Mary Bug on the Squeaky Wheel.

unwrap UV

2010-08-04T18:26:00.000-07:00

This is a rough cut cyanotype I made using a doll.

"Interview"

2010-08-03T08:19:00.000-07:00

For videochannel.

small spaces

2010-07-29T04:13:00.001-07:00

For sale at the iTunes store.

Rainey Bethea

2010-07-27T07:16:00.002-07:00

fried chicken and pork chops: Thelma's Chicken and Waffles, 526 Orange Ave NE
mashed potatoes, corn bread and pickles: Fresh Market, 2207 Colonial Ave SW
lemon bar (impossible to find lemon pie): International Food Court ice cream shop on Main St.
ice cream: McDonald's, 2801 Franklin Rd. SW

Roanoke, VA (Washington Park)

Soft Borders

2010-07-21T05:55:00.001-07:00

I just found out that I will be presenting at a conference in Sao Paolo, Brazil, in early October.

Furrowed Brow

2010-07-15T21:56:00.000-07:00

My entry in this month's Experimental Gameplay Project.

ORION

2010-07-12T06:43:00.000-07:00

GPS / KMZ data

Arlington, VA Walking Tours

2010-07-08T09:55:00.000-07:00

SCORPIUS GPS / KMZ data

LIBRA GPS / KMZ data

CEPHEUS GPS / KMZ data

Blue Sex

2010-07-08T09:45:00.001-07:00

Requires web cam and blue object.
Download executables for Mac, ~~Linux and Windows~~, and source code.

Showing in OPEN CALL / OPEN SPACE.

BOOTES (The Herdsman)

2010-07-07T08:13:00.001-07:00

GPS data taken while driving.

6x6

2010-07-04T06:01:00.000-07:00

Video documentation of Drowning will show at the Cine Lab in Athens, GA, on August 4th.

Jonestown Periphery

2010-06-30T13:06:00.001-07:00

KMZ data

GPS data of my trip up Kaituma River

2010-06-30T12:49:00.000-07:00

KMZ data created using GPS Visualizer.

Baltimore vs. the World

2010-06-27T08:06:00.001-07:00

Marko Potatovic will be showing at the Current Gallery's reopening on July 10th.

FILE

2010-06-17T09:13:00.000-07:00

Baptize will be exhibited at FILE Media Art, part of FILE 2010 Electronic Language International Festival in Sao Paolo, Brazil, beginning on July 27th.

Also, Suction will be shown at the Museum of New Art's exhibition "New Media, Sex and Culture in the 21st Century", in Detroit August 6th through September 19th.

TINT Arts Lab

2010-05-27T17:01:00.000-07:00

Jonestown Periphery, a six-week residency.

Slideluck Potshow

2010-05-20T11:55:00.000-07:00

I'll be presenting slides of my work this Saturday at Gallery 4 of the H&H Building in Baltimore.

Brian David Steckel

2010-05-16T07:11:00.001-07:00

Fountain Hill, PA

Fountain Hill Elementary

Cheesesteak: Matey's Famous Steaks and Pizza, 1305 Broadway
Pepsi: Lorenzo's Pizza, 1402 Broadway
Coleslaw: Wawa Food Market, 1429 Broadway

Eaten on the steps of the Holy Child School, as a seemingly endless migration of elderly people passed in front of me.

myApparition

2010-05-06T12:33:00.000-07:00

Here is the proposal for my unfinished Second Life project.

Possession

2010-05-05T05:52:00.001-07:00

Sketches

2010-04-18T12:52:00.001-07:00

FONLAD #6

2010-04-06T11:07:00.000-07:00

Baptize will be showing at the Fonlad Digital Art Festival in Portugal and online in October in the UAVM Virtual Museum's web art show, Cyber Human Forms.

VideoChannel

2010-04-05T15:17:00.000-07:00

Documentation of Memory will be showing at the One Minute Film festival at CologneOFF VI later this year.

The Mischief of Created Things is showing online at Flash & Thunder. Both are part of the year-long 2010 New Media Fest, Cologne.

EYE-KEA

2010-03-31T13:48:00.001-07:00

Video documentation of the unfinished Soumission will be screening at The EYE-KEA Project International Video Art Festival in Cork City, Ireland, 16-25 April in the Basement Project Space.

You Turn Me On and On and On

2010-02-25T07:01:00.000-08:00

I'll be exhibiting sketches of plans for developing myApparition in a show at the Embassy Gallery, Scotland, from the 27th until the 14th of March.

Searching for God

2010-02-01T15:56:00.000-08:00

Baptize and REPENT will be showing at an exhibit at the Kuhn Fine Art Gallery at Ohio State University, Feb. 15 - Mar. 18.

Second Life experiment

2009-12-29T10:37:00.000-08:00

This is a work in progress where I turn my everyday actions into those of a "ghost" in Second Life.

The setup right now consists of an infrared sensor that detects how close I am to my desk, a pressure sensor on the chair and a light sensor. These communicate with a website that Second Life checks regularly. I don't have to have logged in for it to work.

There is quite a bit of lag and when the lights are on the sensor often doesn't register enough light, hence the flicker (when they're off, they stay off, though).

Online exhibit

2009-12-22T07:29:00.000-08:00

Baptize is showing in the Net Gallery of the online journal Hz.

Drowning

2009-12-13T10:14:00.000-08:00

My entry for this week's Ludum Dare 48 hour game competition. The theme was "exploration".

Art

2009-12-11T17:31:00.001-08:00

Here is my entry into the Experimental Gameplay Project's "Art Games" competition.

As X → ∞

2009-11-23T07:13:00.000-08:00

Video documentation of Repent will show at the new Krowswork gallery in Oakland this December.

Awkward

2009-11-09T05:08:00.000-08:00

Retitled shorts, Eye Contact, Waiting and Shame,will be showing at Awkward: A New Media Exhibition at the AVA Gallery in Chattanooga, TN.

Soumission

2009-11-08T13:01:00.000-08:00

An unfinished, self-playing game where the player can only intervene by forcing their character into a submissive pose.

After

2009-10-07T12:29:00.001-07:00

Gameplay is finished, graphics are rough. Play.

Square Eyes Festival

2009-10-02T10:20:00.000-07:00

Documentation of Baptize was screened at a game-themed video festival in the Netherlands on September 26th.

Apparently I also had something (the same video?) at the namaTRE.ba project in Trebinje, Bosnia & Herzegovina.

ArtGrease

2009-09-18T09:33:00.000-07:00

Mary Bug was selected to show on Hallwalls Contemporary Art Center's weekly show ArtGrease in Buffalo, NY.

Gamasutra Article

2009-09-16T10:45:00.000-07:00

A write up on my talk at GDC Austin.

art.tech at The LAB and VIDEOKILLS

2009-08-16T11:09:00.000-07:00

The sucking game will be featured in The LAB's art.tech festival in San Francisco in early September. I will also be showing Baptize (game, video) at VIDEOKILLS in Berlin at the end of August.

Judgment

2009-07-10T06:47:00.000-07:00

Download: Mac / Win

Ctrl/Apple + Q to quit.

Update: Windows version is now working.

Update: I've overhauled the game. It's now called Peripheral Amnesia, and available for Mac here.

Markers

2009-06-25T15:37:00.000-07:00

For two players. Play

Austin GDC

2009-06-24T19:57:00.001-07:00

I've been invited to present at the Austin Game Developer's Conference this September on the topic of Intuitive Design of Interactive Narrative.

Stare, terrify and wash. Repeat.

2009-06-19T14:36:00.001-07:00

3 games created in 3 days, using 3 verbs. Play
(crashes Firefox for some reason)

Baptize

2009-06-12T07:41:00.001-07:00

Requires a fast machine.
Play

REPENT

2009-06-05T06:49:00.001-07:00

Play

~~Note: plays too fast on some computers. I'm working on it.~~ Fixed.

Does it have suction?

2009-05-19T09:35:00.000-07:00

A short, one-level game created in about 36 hours. Play it here.

Suck it

2009-05-17T17:50:00.001-07:00

I'm giving myself a 48-hour game prototype project tonight. I asked my boyfriend to give me a random verb to simulate in this game and he game me "suck". We'll see where it takes me by Tuesday night, 9pm.

Falling Game

2009-05-01T19:11:00.000-07:00

Sweep, sweep, sweep, until you earn your reward. Is that all there is?

Click here to play.

Crosstalk Video Art Festival

2009-04-29T06:54:00.000-07:00

My video Mary Bug was selected for the Crosstalk Video Art Festival, which will be held in Budapest on June 23 - 28, 2009.

media-N Article

2009-04-24T17:49:00.000-07:00

In the Spring edition of the media-N online journal, Foreignness and Translation in New Media, I have an essay on the creation of The Mischief of Created Things.

Faith and Falling

2009-04-03T08:52:00.000-07:00

The actions the player performs in my next game are inspired by those that take place in Pentecostal churches. It will be finished at the end of April.

Touch Them

2009-03-20T04:56:00.001-07:00

Click here to play.

Note: the game is very dark on a PC. I recommend either playing on a Mac or in a dark room with the sound up loud.

Blind/Deaf Game

2009-03-15T20:37:00.001-07:00

My next game is about being blind and deaf and touching people. The goal is to escape to heaven or hell. I should be finished by the end of this week.

What makes a good religious game?

2009-03-04T13:02:00.000-08:00

It doesn't teach you trivia.
It doesn't take a generic action game and wrap it with a religiously-themed story.

It uses core mechanics based on actions that people perform to reinforce their faith.

Pentecostals fall when the spirit moves them, and have faith that someone is going to catch them.
Buddhists focus on solving (possibly unsolvable) problems.
Sikhs create an easily-identifiable look.
Catholics emphasize altruism and give to the church until it hurts.
Muslims shelter themselves from images that might be more beautiful than those provided by religion.
Mormons use religion as a blueprint to structure their families.

Have these ever been simulated?

Games have a variety of structures that could be exploited for the sake of mimicking religious experience (from Rules of Play):
- chance fallacies, players' tendencies to assume design when things are random
- the ability to create the sensation of vertigo
- breaking implicit rules regarding death, repetition, scoring, rewards, punishments
- players will make decisions based on what they think remains hidden

Continue checking back at this blog. Sometime this month I'll have finished another experiment as I learn the Unity engine. Throughout the summer my goal is to produce one brief game a week and post it here, mixing and matching game mechanics and faith actions.

Find Your Spot

2009-02-06T08:59:00.000-08:00

Click here to play.

Faith and Religious Memes in Games

2009-02-02T08:54:00.000-08:00

I'll be taking a break from blogging to work on some experimental religious games. I'm focusing on religious memes and faith-instilling actions that can be reproduced in games. I'm not religious but interested in changing the goals of a game, as well as provoking decision-making processes in players that are based more on faith than rationality.

By the end of the month I'll have posted a short 3D online game, so please check back. It's inspired by a moment in Carlos Castaneda's Teachings of Don Juan, where he's searching Don Juan's front porch for his magic "rolling spot".