Performative Media - Weekly Journal

Jump Links

• Week 1 - Aquasphere
• Week 2 - Community Time Capsule & Stomp Typography
• Week 3 - Story Telling
• Week 4 - UI Analysis and Presentation
• Week 5 - AR Ideation
• Week 6 - Site Analysis
• Week 7 - Introduction to HeavyM
• Week 10 - Learn to use HeavyM

Week 1 (25/09/2024)

In our first performative media class, we were tasked with forming groups of three to design a performance-related space. Renee, Vasuntra, and I teamed up, and we came up with a rough yet brilliant idea for an immersive space called AquaSphere within an hour. We were glad that our lecturer also likes our idea which have the potential to invest more in the future!✨⛲

Figure 1.1 AquaSphere's proposal

As the name suggests, AquaSphere is an immersive room that allows the audience to experience being under the ocean. Our target audience is broad and inclusive, including individuals with disabilities such as blindness and deafness. The room engages multiple senses—sight, motion, and sound—creating an experience that makes the audience feel as though they are truly in the ocean.

Figure 1.2 Concept idea

Immersive waterbed - Audiences lie on an immersive waterbed and feel vibrations mimicking the motion of ocean waves.

Sensory wall - Audiences can interact with an interactive projection wall to experience marine life like seaweed, corals, and fish.

Hemisphere projection screen - A hemisphere dome creates a seamless, endless view, projecting marine life on the screen as users lie on the waterbed (suitable for both deaf and hearing users).

Sound system - Soothing music plays, enhancing the calming environment for everyone.

Reflection

This group activity brings me back the university experience of group discussions after a month long semester break, and it has made me more motivated for our upcoming assignments. Although our proposal is just a rough idea without detailed content, I believe it is a good start, as every project needs a solid foundation, including a background, target, and objective. I'm excited to learn more about performative media and create content that is engaging and memorable for audiences.

< back

Week 2 (30/09/2024)

Class Activity 1: Brainstorming Community-focused Media Installation

In today's online lesson, we are required to come up with an idea for a community-focused media installation, considering how it can foster community connections. I'm thinking of a community time capsule that stores stories and the history of a particular area. This idea is inspired by the Golden Record carried by Voyager 1, which serves as a record that showcasing the existence of humanity.

Figure 2.1 Golden Record

Figure 2.2 Proposal

This is just a rough concept of how the community time capsule would look. I believe this installation can encourage connection and empathy within the community by allowing people to learn from real stories and preserve local history from being overshadowed by the rise of technology.

Class Activity 2: Stomp Typography

In our physical class, we were introduced to stomp typography, which involves using mostly text with upbeat music to create short videos, mainly for advertising purposes to catch audience's attention. We were assigned to create a 30-second video for Taylor's University app.

In this video, we used CapCut for editing, which is an easy-to-navigate video editing software for beginners compared to Adobe Premiere Pro. I used happy, upbeat background music from YouTube and also used ChatGPT to generate text for the app promotion.

Figure 2.3 Taylor's app advertisement

Reflection

We were given one and a half hours to try out this video editing method, but I only managed to create a 10-second video, which made me realize it's not an easy task. In my opinion, the hardest part is synchronizing the text with the rhythm, as well as using colour and animation effectively to capture the audience's attention. As a reflection, there are several areas where I can improve in stomp typography. I need to watch more references and learn how they effectively use animation, colours, rhythm, and fonts in creating this type of video.

< back

Week 3 (9/10/2024)

In today’s class, we learned about storytelling in immersive media, which can take many forms, such as projection, VR, or interactive screens. However, we don’t need to focus on projection mapping this semester, only on creating the content that tells the story. We were shown videos of projection mapping on historical buildings to help us better understand performative media.

Class Activity: Building Story Telling

In this lesson, we were asked to choose a significant building and create a story that represents it, using projection mapping. For this task, I have chosen the Maritime Museum, a boat-like building in Malacca, and my storytelling will focus on the history of Malacca.

Figure 3.1 Simple proposal

Reflection

This exercise has helped me generate ideas for Assignment 1, where we need to develop a stronger proposal. The proposal I created in class was just a practice exercise, but it gave me inspiration to create a more creative, informative, and eye-catching storytelling experience. I believe that by considering user experience, inclusivity, and content, I can create an engaging projection mapping.

< back

Week 4 (14/10/2024)

Class Activity 1: UI Analysis

In this exercise, we are required to choose a UI that we use frequently and analyze its strengths and weaknesses in terms of usability, accessibility, and user experience. I have chosen Spotify for this exercise, one of my favourite music listening applications.

Figure 4.1 UI analysis

< back

Week 5 (21/10/2024)

In today’s online class activity, we were given a brainstorming task to come up with an AR/VR idea. My proposed idea involves using AR in an art gallery to make static paintings come alive.

Figure 5.1 AR Art Gallery

< back

Week 6 (28/10/2024)

In today’s online class, we were assigned a site analysis task, where we had to choose a public space and create a proposal that would benefit and engage the site’s community. For this exercise, I chose Tung Shin Hospital, a quality hospital that provides great care for patients and deserves an improved environment for both patients and staff.

Figure 6.1 Site analysis and proposal

< back

Week 7 (6/11/2024)

In today's lesson, we were given the brief for Assignment 2, which requires us to create a more detailed storyboard of our proposal. Since my last submitted assignment already included most of the storyboard details, such as action descriptions and the meaning behind each scene, for this assignment, I will focus more on drawing each asset, adjusting names, suggesting music, and adding further details to the proposal. Apart from that, we were also introduced to HeavyM, a projection mapping software known for being beginner-friendly and offering a free demo for first-time users.

• Left - layer
• Middle - canvas
• Right - source, effect, shade

< back

Week 10 (27/11/2024)

In today's class, we learned how to create a projection installation on a building by using HeavyM, a projection mapping software, to implement video and mask it onto the canvas.

Lecture Notes

• Add images, videos at the right panel "sources"
• Choose the screen scale at the top panel and drag into the canvas
• Add the sources into the canvas
• Masking at the left panel "layers"
• To adjust the timing for the animation - Adjust in "sequence settings" at the bottom panel

< back