- Spring 2019, Fridays, 3:20PM-6:15PM in Room 50
- Schedule for Barnard/Columbia Students
- We will be making weekly field trips to the dance studio @NYU's Center for Ballet and The Arts @16 Cooper Square
- Instructors: Mimi Yin, [email protected], Kat Sullivan, [email protected]
- Office Hours Signup
Course Structure | See introductory description below.
Over the course of the semester, we will cover 3 topic areas that correspond to 3 parameters of choreography: Pathways, The Body (Form + Substance) and Space. Topics will be introduced through movement-based improvisation exercises. Computational strategies will be examined through code examples. For each topic, students will create small movement studies with the aim of fully exploring how technology "intervenes" and changes the choreographic process.
The class will culminate in a showing of student work. Final projects can either be in the form of an interactive installation or live performance.
This class runs in conjunction with a course in the Barnard/Columbia Dance Department and will comprise of students from both NYU and Barnard/Columbia. All classes will take place @NYU. Most weeks, the last hour of each class will be devoted to a separate technical lab for ITP students only.
Because course topics are organized around movement concepts, technical topics will be introduced and built upon week to week.
- What do cameras see? What don't they see?
- Skeletons, Depth Maps and Contours
- 2D v. 3D
- Mapping values
- Working with position versus speed of movement
- Position tracking
- 2D Projection mapping
- Computational approaches to choreographing pathways of motion
- Computational approaches to dividing and defining space
- Modes of interaction
"Soft Skills" we will practice:
- Sketching (as in drawing on paper) choreographic ideas.
- Defining rule sets for movement.
- Defining rules of interaction.
- Deconstructing choreography into parameters for code.
- Extracting choreographic ideas from code.
Each topic will be introduced through paper-based drawing exercises and code examples. Google Drive Link
- p5.js | Reference | Web Editor
- Coding Rainbow
- Atom Editor
- Kinectron
- Delicode NI Mate
- The Nature of Code Book
- Select chapters from The Viewpoints Book | PDF | NYU Library
- Select chapters from Dynamic Alignment Through Imagery | Google Books | NYU Library
- Forsythe Technique Videos on Youtube
- Introduction to Computation and Interaction through Movement
- Cartesian Plane, Linear Motion, Drawing with the Body with the Kinect
- Resources
- Examples
- Linear Pathway
- Linear Pathway - Deconstructed
- Drawing a Line
- Drawing Expressive Lines
- Drawing a Trail
- Kinect Skeleton
- Kinect Skeleton - Draw Lines - 4 modes: Code
- Kinect Skeleton - Draw Trails: Code
- Watch videos 1-9(111 minutes)
- Watch videos 12, 14, 16, 18-20, 25, 26(95 minutes)
- Why are we here?
- What is computational thinking? What is choreographic thinking?
- What is an intervention?
- What is interaction?
- What are the parameters of choreography?
- How is code an expressive medium?
- Observe pathways of motion.
- Walking improv.
- Drawing with the mouse. Drawing with the body.
- Examples:
- Drawing Lines | Fullscreen | 1-Mode-At-A-Time: 0 | 1 | 2 | 3
- Drawing a Trail | Fullscreen
- For background on approaches to movement improvisation:
- Watch Forsythe Technique Videos: They range from 10s to 1 minute. Very short!
- Read chapter 2 of Viewpoints.
- Complete Chapter 1.0-1.3 of the Workbook
- Can a pathway be expressive?
- What are all the different kinds of pathways?
- What are all the ways to interact with a pathway?
- How do you choreograph pathways in code?
- The dramaturgy of a line?
- Does random() feel random?
- Deconstructing pathways through computation: linear, random()
- Interacting with a static pathway (rope)
- Interacting with moving pathways
- Resources
- Examples
- Drawing a Trail
- Linear Pathways
- Linear Pathway
- Linear Pathway - Deconstructed
- Linear Pathway with Controls: Code | Fullscreen
- Moving in a Line | Fullscreen
- Random
- Random Pathway
- Graphing Random
- Random Intervals | Fullscreen
- Random Pathway with Controls: Code | Fullscreen
- Choreograph a 15 - 180 second generative random pathway that contains 2 ideas. (You may either write your own code or use the interactive example.)
- At least 1 parameter needs to change over time.
- Work in pairs. You should each choreograph a pathway on your own and then come together to create your final choreography. Use the Random Pathway with Controls to explore ideas.
- Think about the linear pathways that are baked into Random Pathways.
- Discuss and diagram choreographic possibilities for how to interact with your pathway.
- Post a link to the code you will demo with here: Assignment Page
- Complete Chapter 1.4-1.5 of the Workbook
- Workshop Study No. 1: Linear and Random Pathways.
- What does uncertainty look like?
- The paradox that is a circle?
- Deconstructing pathways through computation: noisy, circular
- Examples
- Noisy
- Bobby McFerrin
- Gaga
- Noisy Pathway
- Graphing Noise
- Noisy with Controls: Code | Fullscreen
- Circular
- Noisy
- Choreograph a 15 - 180 second generative circular pathway in code with 2 ideas. It should be recognizably "circular" movement.
- At least 1 parameter needs to change over time.
- Work in pairs. You should each choreograph a pathway on your own and then come together to create your final choreography. Use the Circular Pathway with Controls to explore ideas.
- Think about how "noisy" and "random" the pathway can get before it loses it's circularity.
- Discuss and diagram choreographic possibilities for how to interact with your pathway.
- Post a link to the code you will demo with here: Assignment Page
- Complete 1.5a of the Workbook
- Workshop Study No. 2: Noisy and Circular Pathways.
- What makes a body recognizably human?
- What do computers see when they see a human body?
- How would you describe the human body to an alien?
- The body as a constellation.
- Hello Kinect + Kinectron
- Hello Kinect Skeleton
- Resources
- Camera CheatSheet
- Kinect
- Hello Kinect Tutorial
- Kinect Skeleton with Bones
- Delicode NI Mate: Processing | p5.js
- Read Chapter 7 of Dynamic Alignment: Google Books | PDF
- Watch Forsythe Technique Videos: They range from 10s to 1 minute. Very short!
- Complete sections 2.0-2.2 of Chapter 2 of the Workbook
- Collect 10 very different representations of the human form. Add them to this folder on Google Drive.
- How can we re-architect the body?
- What is the body made of?
- How can a body choreograph interaction? How can interaction choreograph a body?
-
Re-architecture improv.
-
Substance improv.
-
Hooking up generative pathways to distance and speed.
- Calculating the distance between joints.
- Calculating speed of movement.
-
Resources
- Bodies We Collected
- The Richards
- Heartbeat by Sarah Rudner: About | Full Piece
- Synchronous Objects
- Getting out of Fase
-
Examples
- Hook up the joints of the skeleton to interactive media. You can continue to work with pathways or explore other mediums: video, sound, text. Upload your code here
- Bring a piece of clothing that alters (confines, expands, distorts) your body to class next week. Look here for inspiration:
- Danse Des Masques
- Martha Graham: Lamentations and Satyric Song
- Issey Miyake and Irving Penn
- David Byrne: Stop Making Sense
- Rei Kawakubo: Shifting your center of gravity. Scenario by Merce Cunningham
- Workshop interactive pathways.
- How do mirrors change the way we move?
- Clothing improv.
- Play with Mirrors
- Visualizing the sensation of pins and needles with Silhouettes
- Morphing with Depth Map
- Morphing over time with slit-scan video
- 2D wire body
- The Gumby Effect: Morphing body contours.
- 3D bodies to shift your center of gravity
- Resources
- Bodies We Collected
- XYZT
- XYZT Slit-Scan
- The Echo Game (2:14)
- Danse Des Masques
- Drunk Guy In Convenience Store
- Alexander Calder: Wire sculptures. | Ghostcatching by Bill T. Jones
- Martha Graham: Lamentations and Satyric Song
- Issey Miyake and Irving Penn
- David Byrne: Stop Making Sense
- Tutus: Romantic v. Pancake
- Rei Kawakubo: Shifting your center of gravity. Scenario by Merce Cunningham
- Examples:
- Work on your own. Create a slit-scan dance and perform it 2x. Screen record it. Include both the resulting slit-scan and your actual face/body in the screen recording. Upload your recording to this folder.
- Please bring your piece of clothing next week!
- Complete Chapter 3.0-3.3 of the Workbook
- Watch: Jiri Kylian | NDT : Sweet Dreams
- What are all the ways in which Kylian is working with space? How are the spaces defined?
- Why angular spaces? Why sharp edges? How would it be different if he used more traditional spotlights?
- Workshop a couple of mirrors.
- What are the parameters of space?
- What are all the ways to define a space?
- What are all the ways to interact with a space?
- What are all the ways to divide a space?
- What are all the ways to define a boundary?
- What's the difference between a division and a boundary?
- Moving Bezier
- Kazimir Malevich
- Interacting with Divisions / Boundaries / Areas / Terrains
- Create a space that changes.
- Are defining and interacting with space the same thing?
- Does one preclude the other?
- Interactive Divisions, Boundaries and Areas
- Ways to calculate divisions / boundaries / areas | Tutorial
- Watch Videos 1-3: Transformations | Video 9.22: Drawing Custom Shapes
- 3 Ways To Divide
- 3 Boundaries
- Semi-exclusionary Square
- Hello Projection Mapping: The Set-up Tutorial | The Code Tutorial | p5 Tutorial
- Processing Base Examples
- Design an interactive space. | See sample.
- Extra credit: Prototype it in code.
- Fill out this survey about who you want to work with by Monday Apr 1: ITP | Barnard/Columbia
- Brainstorm what you'd like to explore in your final project. Please see guidelines and example.
- Collect source material this week: Sound, visuals, video, choreography, text, diagrams, drawings, storyboards and stick them in your folder.
- Prepare material to show in class: 3 choreographic ideas. 1 sketch. (You can make more than that.)
Over the next 4 weeks, in groups of 3-4, create a movement-based interactive work that explores one or more modes of interaction and one or more of parameters of choreography from this course. The work can take the form of an installation or a performance. Installations can be time-based or persistent with no definitive start or end time. The only requirement is that the choreography must be interactive, meaning the performers are making choreographic decisions in real-time. This doesn’t mean there is no element of pre-set choreography, however there must be room in the choreographic structure for individual decision-making. You will have a maximum of 10 minutes to show your work. Each group will consist of 1-2 students from ITP and 1-2 students from Barnard.
This course re-conceives interactive media as a form of choreographic intervention. Instead of asking how moving bodies can control media, we will ask how interactive systems can influence movement. How do you make someone feel soft inside? How do you shake an entire room? How do you orchestrate duets between strangers?
To accomplish this, the class facilitates a semester-long collaboration between ITP students and dancers from the Barnard/Columbia Dance Department. Choreographers will learn to apply computational thinking to choreography and creative coders will learn to apply choreographic thinking to computation. To whatever extent possible, we will attempt to embody code.
Using computer vision and visual media, we will look at directing both how people move (quality of movement) as well as where they move (pathways and spatial relationships).
We will evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the various sensing technologies available to us today. How wide is the gulf between what we can see and feel (strength, hardness, contortion) and what a computer can see and interpret (locations, contours, velocity)? Class time will be split between movement exercises, playing with examples and deconstructing code.
The class will culminate in a final showing of student work.
All classes will take place at NYU with a separate weekly technical lab for ITP students.
The course is intended both for anyone looking to deepen their practice in working with movement-based interaction regardless of previous experience with movement technique or programming.
As a result, there is no pre-requisite for dance and no pre-requisite for code.
- 40% for showing up (on time!) and participating with curiosity and enthusiasm.
- 15% for each topic study. (Pathways and Body)
- 30% for the final project.
- More than 2 unexcused absences qualifies you for a failure.
- 2 lateness of 15 minutes or more qualifies as 1 unexcused absence.
Please see ITP's statement on Pass/Fail which states that a "Pass" is equivalent to an "A" or a "B" while anything less would be considered a "Fail".
We will have weekly assignments that are relevant to material from the previous class. These assignments are required and you should be prepared to show/talk about them in class. It is expected that everyone in the class will create and maintain a blog for their assignments.
Attendance is mandatory. Please inform your teacher via email if you are going to miss a class. Two unexcused absences is cause for failing the class. (An unexcused lateness of 10 minutes or more is equivalent to 1/2 an absence.)
This class will be participatory, you are expected to participate in discussions and give feedback to other students both in class and participate with their projects. This (along with attendance) is 40% of your grade.
Class will culminate with final projects. You are expected to push your abilities to produce something that utilizes what you have learned in the class that is useful in some manner to yourself or the world. This will comprise 20% of your grade.
Plagiarism is presenting someone else’s work as though it were your own. More specifically, plagiarism is to present as your own: A sequence of words quoted without quotation marks from another writer or a paraphrased passage from another writer’s work or facts, ideas or images composed by someone else.
The core of the educational experience at the Tisch School of the Arts is the creation of original academic and artistic work by students for the critical review of faculty members. It is therefore of the utmost importance that students at all times provide their instructors with an accurate sense of their current abilities and knowledge in order to receive appropriate constructive criticism and advice. Any attempt to evade that essential, transparent transaction between instructor and student through plagiarism or cheating is educationally self-defeating and a grave violation of Tisch School of the Arts community standards. For all the details on plagiarism, please refer to page 10 of the Tisch School of the Arts, Policies and Procedures Handbook, which can be found online at: http://students.tisch.nyu.edu/page/home.html
Please feel free to make suggestions to your instructor about ways in which this class could become more accessible to you. Academic accommodations are available for students with documented disabilities. Please contact the Moses Center for Students with Disabilities at 212 998-4980 for further information.
Your health and safety are a priority at NYU. If you experience any health or mental health issues during this course, we encourage you to utilize the support services of the 24/7 NYU Wellness Exchange 212-443-9999. Also, all students who may require an academic accommodation due to a qualified disability, physical or mental, please register with the Moses Center 212-998-4980. Please let your instructor know if you need help connecting to these resources.
Laptops will be an essential part of the course and may be used in class during workshops and for taking notes in lecture. Laptops must be closed during class discussions and student presentations. Phone use in class is strictly prohibited unless directly related to a presentation of your own work or if you are asked to do so as part of the curriculum.