750 Cafe
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Architecture firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill designed a new cafeteria for magazine publisher Conde Nast. The space was designed as a “light spa,” with 75,000 RGB LEDs from Color Kinetics. I wrote the software that runs the space, and designed the current lighting setup.
Hans Steiner and Evan Raskob also contributed to the programming, writing a php based web interface and a 3d abstraction tool.
Leo Villareal
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Since 2004, I have been helping Leo Villareal by writing control software for his light installations. I use Max/MSP/Jitter as a programming environment.I have worked with Leo on a large number of installations that have been shown around the world, several of which are on permanent display.
Please Be Seated
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I programmed Nicole Cohen’s piece “Please be Seated” at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles. While I may not think much of LA in general, the Getty is a pretty nice place.
The installation recreates 6 chairs from the Getty’s permanent collection, all done in white. The originals were then photographed, and a cinematographer (Michael Merriman) filmed the locations in France where the chairs were originally located.
The images of the original chairs were composited into the footage. This footage plays in a loop on monitors placed above the replica chairs. As you approach and sit in the recreated chair, you see yourself in the video, inhabiting 18th century France.
The programming was done in Max/MSP/Jitter, utilizing background subtraction, and a bit of chromakeying to eliminate some of the peskier shadows.
Controlled Entropy
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I helped Kevin Centani of Controlled Entropy on a number of projects, building out cotrol systems and interactive spaces for clients such as Madame Tussauds in New York, the Rachel Ray Show and Good Morning America.
A few highlights of the work done with Controlled Entropy :
- Madame Tussauds: I helped create a number of systems for green screening, video projection and playback, and interactive spaces relying on physical interaction.
- Rachel Ray Show: I authored a system for control and content management for seven solid state MPEG-2 playback devices, allowing the show’s director to control the content on a number of plasma screen on the set.
- Good Morning America: I created software for recording and capturing people’s questions for the show’s personalities.
JetBlue Storybooth
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Local Projects was hired by Jet Blue to create a storybooth, where people would relate their experience of Jet Blue travel, and it would be recorded for later use. I designed the software that ran the interaction, which included 3 networked computers that performed diagnostic functions, recording and playback capabilities. This monster of a project went on to win a Bronze Clio Award for Interactive advertising.