User:Max Dovey/Reading Writing Research Methodologies/TRIMESTER 1 rwrm/Week2 rwrm

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WEEK 2

The Why

Emotional Stock Market

WHAT? An Installation in which real time online content is streamed and printed according to emotional categorization. Modified receipt printers continuously print out tweets containing the words ‘happy’, ‘sad’ and ‘love’. Tweets are sold by the performing stock brokers to the audience as shares in the emotion stock market. The audience then trade their tweets according to the share index of the emotion they have invested in. When the traders stop trading the installtion automatically continues piling up unsold tweets. A website accompanies the project displaying the share index and value of each emotion that is being traded in the emotional stock market.

HOW? Tech: 3 x macbook pro, 3 x g4 systems, 3x cpu screens, 3x plinths for them to be displayed on. Behind each plinth is an arduino and a circuit connecting the laptops to the receipt printers for the tweets to be printed through. Each plinth (1.2m high) is separated by 0.5 meters to allow for the performer to stand next to it. During the performance a stockbrocker stands beside his staton selling tweets to the incoming audience. Each one is competing to sell shares in their emotion for the lowest price. The audience member can read the printed tweets and select the ones they would like to buy. After purchasing the audience member can sell their shares back to the stockbroker and make a profit if the index value has increased. Emotional Stock Market was made to highlight the value in social data and its relation to markets. The fantasy stock market was a direct attempt to present the economic value in digital communication. I was responding to political discussions of replacing GDP with wellbeing and wanted to present a satirical format for this to work. The piece is humorous and satirical however on reflection the implications in the value of our data being used in markets has become a reality. Advertisers pay to know as much about as possible and our emotional state has become an extension of that as we become the ideal target customer.

YourHomepage

A website that displays the google map interface with different landmark icons that reveal videos of people remembering where they grew up against a backdrop of the environment on google streetview. Each landmark icon when clicked reveals a video recording of somebody talking to camera remembering where they grew with a chroma keyed streetview landscape of their street and local area in the background of the video. The streetview chromo key explores the local area behind the person in the video while they recall their favorite aspects of their neighbourhood and where they grew up. The collection of videos is navigated through the standard google maps interface within the website. The people talk about what they can see, how the place has changed (or how different it looks) and what they can remember.

Making the videos videos are created by setting up the correct lighting and green screen backdrop for chromo key to work so that the google maps streetview can be layered onto the background of the video. Someone comes in and tells me the postcode or address of where the grew up. on a computer i search this location in google maps and make a screen recording using ishowu HD. Once i have recorded this video for 30 seconds i then insert the video file into a chroma keylive to test it as a backdrop on the video. Their is a computer monitor mirroring my desktop so that the participant can see themselves within the video preview. I start recording audio, go full screen on the chroma key preview, click to sync the video and sound and then ask the participant to begin. The streetview recording plays in the background while the participant remembers the area.

Creating the Website Create a map in google, turn all your participant recordings into a spreadsheet with postcode and video file link to youtube url. turn this spreadsheet into a table and then by using "google fusion" the table can be visualised onto google maps. you may also need to add a colour key for the landmark icons. this you do by entering the shortcode small_purple and applying it to the attributes of one of the columns or rows

YourHomepage is about the relationship between the user and the google maps service. By presenting personal memories in front of the ubiquitous digital interface the emotional expression and standardised navigation creates a conflict. im interested in relationship between the memory, the place and the digital representation. The piece is a an online work that returns to the digital form , creating layers of personal memories onto the google maps landscape. It is interesting to archive such personal histories onto a public platform, that sits within the discourse.

The Last Day of Tv

A series of 5 boxes that contain 5 videos that together make up a bootleg recording of the last day of analogue broadcasting in London, UK. Each box has a different UK national channel logo on the cover and each video is labeled with the date and time information of each recording. The boxes are hand made with a gray tone with white lettering and are a single edition. Each video case contains an image of a television tower overlayed with 5 circles that represent an analogue broadcast signal. The logo is a rebranding to package the last day of TV. 5 Televisions with RF antennas are placed on individuals plinths with a vhs recorder below them. The recorders are constantly recording the channel that the Television is broadcasting. Each Television is showing a different Channel. Once the recordings are made card is screen printed with the logo and title information of each video. These were constructed using craft glue so they can be archived. The Last Day of TV was made in response to the end of analogue broadcasting in Uk in April 2012. Primarily we wanted to raise awareness that the broadcasting medium that had served us for over 70 years was quietly ceasing transmission. The last moment was of particular importance for me , and i wanted to record and archive this final frame onto vhs recording. This felt important because the vhs format and its relation to recording copyrighted television was also coming to an end. In the information age where all digital signals leave a trail capturing the last moment of analogue felt important.