Create Digital Motion

VJ Kung Fu: Structure in VJ Performance from Momo the Monster on Vimeo.Sometimes, paradoxically, doing more prep and adding more structure is what allows you to really let loose when you improvise. That’s true of music, and it’s just as true of visuals.You’ve no doubt seen “button-mashing”, chaotic VJ sets - and maybe, in weaker [...]

A big thanks to Resolume for their support of coverage on Create Digital Motion this month. We have the final say on which sponsors we work with, and we’re pleased to be building relationships with people we believe in.One of the trends we see coming is the release of visuals on “labels”, curated and collected [...]

Let’s back up for a second. You hear terms like “spatially augmented reality” or “projection mapping,” and it may seem as though you’ve wound up in the latest movie adaptation of a Philip Dick sci fi short story. When we talk about these terms, we really mean one thing: getting projection off of flat, [...]

Whatever your feelings about Microsoft, their R&D operation employs some of the smartest minds in the business - and has done so for a long time. TechFest is the event that shares some of the best experiments. Some turn into products, others don’t, but the events always have some gems, and can provide plenty of [...]

Nine Inch Nails have been on tour around Australia with the Soundwave festival, and their artistic director Rob Sheridan has been along for the ride, and took his Canon 5D MKII on stage at various venues.Full HD Version from Nine Inch Nails.Screw resolution charts and slow focus pulls on flora, this is how you test [...]

What if virtual reality and seamless three-dimensional interfaces arrived, and they turned out to be a lot simpler technologically than you imagined? Well, perhaps you know a technology is within reach when it can not only be implemented, but implemented in a way that’s elegant and lightweight. The latest in the ongoing YouTube-able head-tracking and [...]

Architectural Visual Design aka Apparati Effimeri apparently have liked our ongoing projection mapping stories, so they send along their showreel. The music, appropriately enough, is Apparat.Visual performers:Federico BigiRoberto FazioMarco Grassivarohttp://www.apparatieffimeri.com/The documentation is a bit rough (boy, do I know that challenge), but I absolutely love their visual style. Even in their flat projections, architectural space [...]

Artist Patrick Gunderson creates spectacular canvases of particle-generated paintings, a bit like code action paintings. (Action as in the likes of Jackson Pollack, not just ActionScript.) Above, an image from the Create Digital Motion Flickr pool. It’s worth having a closer look on Flickr - as with a physical painting, the closer you get, the [...]

Projection tools in the wild: relief projection lab at Bit Teatergarasjen; photo (CC) hc gilje.Projection mapping has been a running theme here, as visualists are dying to get their projections onto objects other than flat walls. If you’re ready to experiment and develop new material but have been intimidated by figuring out how to properly [...]

While we’re on the subject of User Interface…Adobe, as makers of the dominant creative software that powers the planet, are certainly due some criticism. But beware the wrath of the angry user. Via lili katschen on Twitter, I see the Intersphere has its own forums for endless Adobe gripes.Now, don’t get me wrong: I have [...]

Ah, those crazy Linux-using, Deviant Art artists. Someone has created an anaglyph theme for the GNOME (Linux) desktop. Don some red and blue-tinted glasses, and watch your desktop pop out of your screen. After all, it’s not as though all this Vista Aero glass and drop shadow and flying windows and such makes it really [...]

On Monday I had a CT scan. If you haven’t already, every visualist should go for a ride in a computed tomography machine. It’s the best mix of futuristic medicine and video geekness I’ve ever encountered. As happens with most medical imaging these days, I came away with both a collection of printed films and [...]

In which this humble author, with tongue sometimes planted in cheek:1. Shares a how-to video on datamoshing.2. Forbids the use of the word datamoshing in future.3. Challenges obscenely-gifted motion artist David O’Reilly to a rumble.Here’s the story so far: there’s a compression artefact created when videos are compressed improperly, which causes frames to melt into [...]

Resolume Avenue 3 Getting Started from Resolume on Vimeo.It’s officially shipping: Resolume Avenue 3 is a new live audiovisual performance tool for Mac and Windows, a complete, ground-up successor to the legendary PC-only VJ app Resolume. In fact, Resolume Avenue 3 demonstrates why the term “VJ” should become a relic of the past. Resolume is [...]

Perhaps it’s the church setting for the installation, or the strains of 17th-Century choral composition by Allegri. But Streetwise Opera’s My Secret Heart, binding together reactive visuals and post-Minimalist musical strains, has the feeling of a 21st Century passion play, a digital devotional piece.My Secret Heart is a commission by Streetwise Opera, which develops work [...]

MSA Remote for iPhone from Memo Akten on Vimeo.Apple, apparently unclear on what multitouch clients actually are, have chosen to reject Memo Akten’s brilliant-looking MSA Remote client for the iPhone/iPod touch. The free(!) app could empower installations and performances with the standard multi-touch protocol TUIO, as used on the Reactable (and, thus, by Bjork, among [...]

ofxMSAPhysics v2 from Memo Akten on Vimeo.In a word: yummy. Or maybe that’s “bouncy.” Memo Akten’s brillian ofxMSAPhysics brings open-source physics programming to the C++-based OpenFrameWorks environment, an artist-friendly combination with an elegant API. Coding physics doesn’t require an advanced degree. See today’s post on the beautiful My Secret Heart to watch this library in [...]

CG Society has a beautiful article on the use of 3D scanning and printing in the Neal Gaiman/Henry Selick stop-motion movie Coraline.Selick wanted to tackle an even bigger accomplishment: creating a true stop motion film with the smooth facial transitions of CG animation in a hands-on medium.The answer to this quest was to use replacement [...]

Jean Poole has posted a practical and personal review of Numark’s AVM02 audio/video mixer (site | on CDM):Why?There are video mixers, there are audio mixers. Combining them into one unit mostly makes sense if you want to mix both simultaneously. One smooth crossfade that leaves your other hand free for shaking a tambourine / zooming [...]

Multi-display visual installation by The Pixel Addicts for the London club space Matter.Part of the big idea behind Resolume Avenue 3 is putting audio and video in the same real-time performance app, without sacrificing quality or live processing in either. One key ingredient, hope the developers, is a new codec that transfers video decoding to [...]