Paul Hinderliter: Week 1-3 (Background Mapping)

Concept

For my first Projection Mapping project, I decided to explore the buildings around UTD which don't seem get as much attention as the rest. I was also looking for spots which wouldn't be too complex or irritating to map on to, as a newbie to Madmapper and projection mapping in general. After getting my hands on Madmapper and playing around with it's tools, my idea for the projection evolved into using bright technological visuals inspired by the aesthetic of Tron and Cyberpunk.  

Projection 1 and 2 Origin

Projection 3 Origin

Technique

I began by mapping out the areas on the building I wanted to project on and masking out the places where the quads overlapped with other quads or elements in front of the projection. 

Projection 1 and 2 Mapping

Projection 3 Mapping

To establish unity among the elements, I decided to use a single color for each Projection. For both projections, I used the addition blend mode to eliminate the black backgrounds, revealing more of the original color of the building. Wherever a quad coincided with each other (the two sides of the pillars, the corners where the wall and ceiling meet), I wanted those projections to connect by playing the same projection, creating the sense depth.

Interpretation/Final Products

For both projection 1 (first half of first video) and 3 (second video), I decided to imitate techno and futuristic aesthetics as a way to illustrate the technological focus of UTD. The culture here, especially in ATEC, tend to embrace new technology and futuristic ideas shaped by emerging technologies. On the flip side, I wanted projection 2 (second half of first video) to be more cozy, illustrating the chill and easygoing environment on campus.

Projection 1 and 2 Final Product

Projection 3 Final Product

Morgan Grasham Project 4 Relief Mapping -- Altered States

Altered States is a pair of works exploring experiences with psychoactive drugs, mental illness, and comparisons between the two. Whether you read into the pieces as drug-induced or caused by mental illness depends on your personal experiences with either. Either way, we experience a warping of identity and reality itself. I combined processed footage of my family members with shaking, vascular-colored lines to emulate altered mental states. The lines increase the hallucinogenic feeling while also expressing how altered mental states can act as a hazy filter or even confinement through which we view the world.

I started by taking footage of my husband Eric and my grandmother Rita (both good sports) and digitally rearranging them in Processing to simulate time compression and warping effects.

After harvesting thousands of images, I bring them all into Movie Maker and set the duration of each to .06 seconds to create a smooth video.   

From here, I bring the created video content into Madmapper. After using the spatial scanner to calibrate to the relief sculpture, I added and adjusted the video content to best fit the structure and desired expression. After days of building content, I only end up using about 15 seconds of each video. On top of this I added lines in vascular colors of reds and blues with some auto-shake. I decided not to add background content, because altered mental states is often an isolating experience separating you from reality and other people. 

Altered States

Altered States 2

I chose to work with the large abstracted head sculpture because it compliments the Dali-esque style of video I make using Processing and Movie Maker. I enjoyed combining a favorite process of mine with a new output and mode of expression; I think the relief sculpture compliments and adds to the work. I would like to explore this combination more in the future and experiment more with lighting, After Effects, audio inputs, and background possibilities. 

Week 9-12: Relief Mapping - Pablo Reyes

Concept

Continuing on the concept of my Room Mapping Project, this composition expresses a different perspective towards my idea of allowing the viewer to step inside my mind and with it, to have a moment in which my memories are seen through space.

The second composition is the successor of a work created in my video production class, the story talks about a hacker who lost his wife due to an automated car accident. He loses his mind throughout the video and creates an Artificial Intelligence that replaces his wife but such becomes a much greater burden than her physical state.

Process

The first composition was created in After Effects and Mad Mapper, I initially exported the line output from MM and used it as a base to create the animation of the videos within AE.




Interpretation

Project 3 Room Mapping : Travis Fowler & Morgan Grasham

Transitions is a room mapping installation with a narrative told through the combination of constructed audio and visuals. The piece follows an unnamed protagonist through death and imagines his afterlife. He begins in the city, driving a car and switching between radio stations when he gets into an accident and crashes. His death is implied through the sound of slowing heart beats and a transition to white as he goes into the light. He is transported to a natural space, where he reflects and interprets his life experiences through nature. After this meditation, he is transported again to the quiet infinity of deepest space.

Credits:
City footage
forest footage

Week 6-9 Classroom Mapping - Pablo Reyes

Concept

Its hard to keep my mind together sometimes, especially when there are so many things to think about; Family, Friends, Career, Food, Nature, and Indulgences. This composition shall allow the audience to step into my head and get a taste of goes through it every day, it's a lot I know, but wear my shoes for a moment and understand my story. It's important for me to share where I come from since I got big plans for where I am going next and I want to make sure that everyone knows that dreams come true if you work hard for them and that some will have to work harder than others but that is perfectly fine!

Process

This composition was created by analyzing every possible surface in which the light from the projectors would hit, every single pixel! From boxes on the shelves to pre-made sculptures at the studio, I aimed to interact with as many surfaces as I could. I created a quad for each individual video and placed it according to the following layout.

Projector setup

Interpretation

Memories Composition

..::Party::..

Here lays a bonus composition due to my latest party mood. 

Rainbow Veins Composition

Morgan Grasham: Project 2 - Tape Mapping

My main composition is Mist Beast, a piece about identity that blurs lines between human, animal, and technological life. It is a conceptual play on tape mapping as a technique which emphasizes lines as boundaries between spaces and content. Mist Beast was inspired by indigenous masks which were worn in spiritual ceremonies meant to evoke the spirit or qualities of animals. The morphing face of Mist Beast expresses a tension in identity felt by being not quite animal, not quite technological, only enigmatically human. All compositions are audio-input controlled. I also created two paper crane compositions, including one for Valentine's Day set to Ella Fitzgerald's Dream a Little Dream of Me.  For my subversive commercial, I created a satirical piece set to ASPCA commercials. Here the ambiguity of identity is poking fun at the way ASPCA commercials humanize animals in order to invoke empathy from human potential donors.

I start by mining Youtube for usable footage, and input the media into Madmapper. A crucial part of my process is adding quads and aligning each section in the input screen to perfectly fit eyes, noses, mouths, and ears. I find an ideal loop and speed for each body part. I added cloudy presets for the face, plus drone footage of forest for the background. I input audio from Spotify and Youtube and started adding audio controls to lines and layers. Working with two sets of lines, I tried out every combination of animations, and saved presets when something looked dynamic and balanced. I made 50+ compositions and then narrowed it down to the best dozen. I recorded with Syphon while switching between presets to the beat of the music. In Movie Maker, I edited together two versions of the video and added fades in and out from black for a finishing touch.

Tape mapping is a relatively quick way to make an interactive and immersive installation. It is a great choice when the concept of the work is related to boundaries. It is really fun to do tape mapping with audio inputs. Choose music you really really like and won't mind listening to for several hours on end. Also, when you add audio input controls it is possible to effect saved presets, so watch for that. Otherwise you may end up spending several hours editing together two videos when you didn't have to. :)

Mist Beast - set to Lines of the Broken by DROELOE

Dreaming of Flight - set to how many stars are there by Idealism

Happy Valentine's Day - set to Dream a Little Dream of Me by Ella Fitzgerald

Will you be an angel for a helpless mist beast? - set to ASPCA commercial

Videos used:
crying face
cat
woman's face
deer
human face

birds

forest

woods

how to ring a pig's nose

lion

paper cranes

tear drops

hearts

Pablo Reyes - Assignment II - Tape Mapping

Concept:

Inspired by the origins of this origami crane, I constructed a composition in which all of my hypothesis regarding the nature of such are designed in a single layout. 

Crane Setup

Process:

The creation of this composition was serviced by a pre-made origami stop motion which served as the main video, free footage of a swan swimming on a lake, and a slow-motion cloud formation visual. The videos were compiled in adobe premiere pro and animated in adobe after effects.

MadMapper Setup

After Effects Sound Reaction Process

Interpretation:

This video represents three theories regarding the origin of the crane: The first is that of a single piece of white paper, folded with care yet accurately, it initially transforms into a more organic form of a crane then into a standard origami style. A second theory involves a reversed transformation, from an organic shape into a two-dimensional form. Lastly, a third theory is based on a formation of clouds that were compiled and compress until the crane shape was formed.

Video of crane context composition

MapMapper Crane Composition

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Concept:

Inspired by the music video Human by SEDVALIZA, this composition is organized as of how I perceive the visual to be projected into the following static wireframe.

2 Projector Setup-Left Projector

2 Projector Setup-Right Projector

Process:

The composition was edited in adobe's after effects and premiere pro, within the latter a series of masks were created in reference to the rectangle design of the right projector, as well as a sound reactive opacity. On the opposite side of the design, the sound reactive rectangle lines were animated in after effects implementing the keyframing assistant, a blender effect, and the ease(value, x,y, minx, max,y)  expression. The animated lines on the sculptures, speakers, the projector, and the pipe, were created within the MadMapper software using the projector as a reference.

MadMapper Setup

After Effects Masking

Interpretation:

The meaning of this composition relies on SEVALIZA's song Human, which was introduced by a friend of mine, during a trip to Cici's pizza. I interpret the video of this piece as stating that she is a human despite her minotaur half and with the lyrics, "I am flesh, bones, I am skin, soul, I am human, Nothing more than human" resonates with my perspective on how one should compare itself to another being. 

Two projector composition

MadMapper Two Projector Composition Left

MadMapper Two Projector Composition Right

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Concept:

This creation was inspired by the lamp setup and the functionality behind candle lanterns, though they are not convenient during such modern times, I always wanted to own one thus the following composition.

Lantern Setup

Process:

Pre-made footage of some animated 3d candles was taken into adobe after effects and altered using a scatterize effect, sound reactive scale transformation, and color correction. The orange lines and sound reactive ellipses were animated within MadMapper.

MadMapper Setup

After Effects Sound Reactive Process

Interpretation:

This is a lantern that is traveling through space. A distorted flame appears whenever the lamp goes through a wormhole and arrives at a dimension where enough gravity allows its shape to remain unified.

Video of lantern composition

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Concept:

I drink monster's zero ultra energy drink whenever I need that extra push. The latter inspired this composition to be a commercial implementation of projection mapping where the company would project this on a wall next to a corner store and even a building.

Lion Setup

Process:

Compiled in adobe's premiere pro, a monster energy drink 3d animation commercial by youtube user Vproductions was altered one and at times two mirror effects in order to create a kaleidoscope visual, creative lumetri color corrections and a glitch reaction to Monster Energy's logo made from scratch. 

MadMapper Setup

Interpretation:

Power, energy, and lots of movement are all I think when I see a visual of a lion, thus this composition is created based on such. I decide to keep the original audio of the animated commercial since it produced an active yet controlled sense of energy, which represents the feeling I get whenever I drink my emergency dose of this energy drink.

Video of lantern composition

MadMapper Lion Composition

James Hoggatt:Project1 Backdrop Mapping

For this project I decided to go off campus and get some flat architecture from one of the beautiful modern building in Dallas. The section I'm using is from the Omni Hotel. One of the new key features in the vibrant Dallas skyline. The part of it that I'm using is located on the back side of  the hotel right next to the event entrance. These compositions together are a proof of concept and could be custom themed to have information about the current events. It could even serve help direct patrons toward parking, ticket purchase, and the event itself.  For now I have it setting two examples of general moods for the people coming threw. I decided to do it  in a way that is non specific and could be custom fit to any given event.

This is directly outside the event center and an ideal location for information to be displayed. It has some beautiful unique architecture and is a rough white stone. The perfect surface to act as a screen

This is a composition is intended to insight motion and excitement. It would be a great thing to project at the beginning of an event. It says"This is where it's happening!" It has a strong flow toward the entrance of the building. With side swipes on most of the surfaces. It also has a large yellow arrow going into the parking area. Coupled with some projected text or street signs, it could be a very useful tool to help direct traffic.

This composition would be ideal for projecting at the end of an event. It says"Goodnight, go home, the fun here has been had." Once the event is over patrons don't necessarily need any additional information as they would know where there cars are. Instead it would be better to just give them a pretty parting gift. Leaving a lasting memory of there time spent at the Omni.

Pablo Reyes - Week 1 Backdrop Mapping

Concept:

Both of my concepts are inspired by Mike Winkelmann also known as Beeple, a graphic designer that releases content through a creative commons license in which famous artists like Srillex, Tiesto, and Flying Lotus have used during their concerts. Also, the outstanding architecture and magnitude of the Founders and ECS building at UTD begged to be spatially activated thus the following ideas were implemented:

Founders Building - The University of Texas at Dallas

Engineering and Computer Science Building - The  University of Texas at Dallas

Technique:

For the Founders building concept I used Beeple's UNPLUG (loop) and projected it on the main surfaces of the composition using quads, mesh quads, lines, and masking, such would be visible from a distance as well as experienced when walking from both sides of the building. The grid pattern of the windows was accentuated with animated lines and a fill-up animation that complemented the orange dominating color of the video as the lines flowed through the grid. Lastly, a smooth wave animation was used on a couple of horizontal surfaces which balance the magnitude and power of the main vertical quads.

My second concept was also inspired and constructed for Beeple's Transparent Machines. Major ideas came from the message of the composition and the current net neutrality situation, my take on this topic is reflected by the emphasis of the text used in my projection and various other quads with relevant sections of Beeple's composition such as people like Barack Obama & Mark Zuckerberg. I aimed to keep the intended eye movement of the audience thus the position of text which persuades the viewer to flow throughout the design.

Materials:

MapMapper 3.2.1.
Microsoft's Game DVR functionality.
Adobe Photoshop CC 2017.
Adobe Premier Pro.
Beeple's UNPLUG loop & Transparent Machines video.
YouTube.