Sep 4, 2011

Math Multimedia: Paul Bourke's Random Space Filling Tiling of the Plane; Lots'o Related Info and Links


Paul Bourke is a research associate professor and director of iVEC at the University of Western Australia.  I've been following Dr.  for several years and never cease to be amazed by his mathematical and scientific visualization experiements. 


Dr. Bourk recently posted a video of one of his recent projects on Google+ that I found fascinating.  If you are a member of Google+,  you can view the video at https://plus.google.com/117410063754013499525/posts  (I wasn't sure how to embed the video in this post.)


Take the time to follow the link below to Paul Bourke's web page about his current work. The pictures and math are worth the effort!
RANDOM SPACE FILLING TILING OF THE PLANE

Paul Bourke, July 2011


Paul Bourke's "tiling of the plane" work was inspired by John Shier, a computer artist who integrates random numbers in his creations.

In my opinion, introducing students to the works of Paul Bourke, John Shire, and others might be a great way to spark curiosity and creativity in the study of mathematics, computer programming, and digital art.

RELATED
MRI-style 3D volumetric data set of a liver




"A fulldome (planetarium) visualisation of three microCT volumetric datasets rendered in Drishti.  They include: (i) Liver Lobe, Rabbit liver illustrating venous and arterial (orange) systems; (ii) Interior of a lizard head (common garden skink); (iii) Fossil fish eyeball (Placoderm), 410 million years old, found in Wee Jasper, NSW. "


Credits for Artforms of Nature: A new way of seeing. 
Ajay Limaye, Peter Morse, Paul Bourke. Vizlab, Australian National University. WASP, University of Western Australia. Featuring fisheye volume rendering from Drishti. Datasets Fossil fish eyeball (Placoderm). Gavin Young, ANU Common garden skink. Tim Senden, ANU Rabbit liver lobe. Tim Senden, ANU ©2008 by the artists. "-http://www.youtube.com/user/peteremorse


Drishti: Volume Exploration and Presentation Tool
"Drishti has been developed keeping in mind the end-use : visualizing tomography data, electron-microscopy data, etc. Understanding the data set is important and conveying that understanding to the research community or a lay person is equally important. Drishti is aiming for both. The central idea about Drishti is that the scientists should be able to use it for exploring volumetric datasets as well as use it in presentations."


Lynn Marentette, Interactive Multimedia Technology, 5/14/08

Interdisciplinary Workshop - OZVIZ 2011:  November 23-25, Sydney, Australia
"The workshop provides an occasion for participants to present research outcomes, share innovative ideas, publicise work and meet colleagues. It is highly multidisciplinary, with participants from fields such as mathematics, geoscience, architecture, biology, medicine and astronomy presenting alongside computer graphics and visualisation experts."



Aug 19, 2011

MULTITOUCH NEWS: NUITEQ's interactive display at a business park; Innovation Now's multitouch anatomy application

Multitouch Display for Business Science Park Aurorum, by NUITEQ


"NUITEQ developed a customized multi-touch software solution for Corporate Reception / Lounge Areas for Business Science Park Aurorum in LuleƄ, based on the award-winning Snowflake Suite framework. In addition to the software, NUITEQ delivered and installed a 32 touch points multitouch dreaMTouch LCD from Germany based Elektrosil."-NUITEQ

Harry van der Veen, Multitouch Blog, 8/19/11


Multitouch Anatomy by Innovation Now


"Virtual anatomy surface computer in the shape of autopsy table that show and enable the user to use hand gestures to do the anatomy process virtually." -Innovation Now

Homam Alghorani, CEO, Innovation Now Sdn Bhd

Role of Data in Interactive Multiplatform Storytelling, via iTVT (video and links)


There is a lot of things going on in the field of interactive multi-platform media!

The following videos from iTVT's StoryCentric video column are worth taking the time to abosrb. In the videos, Brian Seth Hurst, CEO of The Opportunity Management Company, interviews Gunther Sonnenfeld, SVP of Cultural Innovation and Applied Technology at Omnicom-subsidiary RAPP. The role of data in interactive multi-platform storytelling is the main focus of their discussion. 


RELATED

According to the iTVT website, "StoryCentric focuses on the business, technology and art of interactive storytelling, and highlights new technologies and other industry developments that have the potential to fundamentally change the way we create and interact with stories and narratives--in television and beyond."

iTVT (Interactive TV Today)
New Edition of StoryCentric Focuses on the Role of Data in Multiplatform Storytelling
Tracy Swedlow, iTVT 8/4/11
New Edition of StoryCentric Features Seth Hurst's Interview with RAPP's Gunther Sonenfeld Tracy Swedlow, iTVT, 8/18/11

A Literacy of the Imagination (Gunther Sonnenfeld's Blog)

Aug 18, 2011

AAC Technology at Camp (augmentative and alternative communication) -via Kate Ahern

The following video clip is an awesome example of how AAC technology (augmentative and alternative communication) can be integrated into a range of activities- learning, social, leisure, and creative, when everyone makes an effort to make it work- and not give up.  Thanks to Kate Ahern for sharing this! (Cross-posted on the TechPsych blog.)
The song in the background is "Talk", by Coldplay, a perfect fit for the theme. 
 
"This year's AAC Summer Camp students taught us a lot. This video highlights some important things to think about when it comes to augmentative and alternative communication." -Communicare LLC
RELATED 
Let's Go To AAC Camp! (Includes a list of AAC camps around the U.S.)

Communicare: Speech-language pathologist specializing in Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) Communicare's resource page

Lyrics to Coldplay's "Talk"

COMMENT
Most of the devices highlighted in the video are very expensive and are difficult to integrate seamlessly with other technologies that are emerging in classrooms- and in homes.  I am in the process of writing a post (or two) about this topic. The ultimate goal of AAC technology is to provide people with a means to communicate more seamlessly with people beyond the "sheltered" circle of therapists, special educators, parents and teachers.

Interactive technologists, from a range of disciplines, can help make this happen.

Aug 14, 2011

Designing Culture: Investigating the Link Between Technology and Culture, an interactive transmedia project by Anne Balsamo

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know that I use it as an on-line filing cabinet. When I learned about Anne Balsamo's recently published book, part of a larger interactive transmedia project, I decided that it warranted more than a "plug" and a quick link.


It warranted a shrine.
For this reason, I've embedded a number of videos and presentations from the project's website, along with a host of links.  Prepare to spend some time exploring her work over time!  It is food for reflection.


DESIGNING CULTURE     "Investigating the link between technology and culture, this transmedia project is realized as a print book, a dvd, and this interactive flash website ." -Designing Culture


"Anne Balsamo is a Professor of Communication in the Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism and of Interactive Media in the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California. She is a co-founder of Onomy Labs, a Silicon Valley technology design and fabrication company that builds cultural technologies. Previously, she was a member of RED (Research on Experimental Documents), a collaborative research group at Xerox PARC that created experimental reading devices and new media genres. She is the author of Technologies of the Gendered Body: Reading Cyborg Women, also published by Duke University Press." -Designing Culture


Video Overview:

Designing Culture: the Technological Imagination at Work from Anne Balsamo on Vimeo.


BOOK
Designing Culture: The Technological Imagination at Work
Anne Balsamo, Duke University Press, 2011


BLOG: Designing Culture


DVD (packaged with the book)
Women of the World Talk Back: Gendering the Technological Imagination


PUBLIC INTERACTIVE WALLS: Designing Technological Literacies -Interactive Wall Books "Interactive Wall Books are large-scale dynamic mixed-media documents"
Here are a few links to online versions of the wall books for your convenience: Episodes in the History of Reading, Part 1     Episodes in the History of Reading, Part II  Episodes in the History of Reading, Part 3     Deslizate En El Tiempo: Epsodios en la Historia de la Communicacion (Developed for the Children's Museum of Mexico City)  Science for All Ages

XFR: EXPERIMENTS IN THE FUTURE OF READING  A museum exhibit.
(The above link will take you to the Onomy website's version of the exhibit. The project version can be found on the Designing Culture website.)


MAPS: Mapping the Technological Imagination Spatial Documents.
Learning to Love The Questions - an interactive semantac map, for the online journal VECTORS
Where is the Museum? Mapping the Distributed Museum -presentation at Museums and the Web 2011
Ways of the Hand: Tinkering in the Digital Age -presentation at DIY Citizenship: Critical Making and Social Media conference, 2010
Working the Paradigm Shift: The Cultural Work of the Digital Humanities - presentation at the Digital Arts Conference, 2008


VIDEOS
Tools for the Asking

Anne Balsamo HASTAC Presentation 4_16_2010 from IML @ USC on Vimeo.


Gendering the Technological How a Robot Got its Groove


Cool Fusion: Designing Culture - Working the Paradigm Shift



RELATED
Reviews of Designing Culture by Lawrence Grossberg, Cathy N. Davidson, and John Seely Brown (Amazon.com site for the book)
Balsamo's New Book Details Technological Imagination at Work
Annenberg News, 8/10/11
HASTAC: Humanities, Arts, Science, and Technology Advance Collaboratory


Anne Balsamo worked on the following project:
Tangible Interface for Viewing the Aids Quilt

"This project will develop an application that enables collaborative browsing of a database of images of panels of The AIDS Memorial Quilt that have been “virtually stitched together.”  The application will be used with Onomy Lab’s Tilty Table, a tangible interactive device that serves as a display surface for large-scaled images." -(info from Anne Balsamo's blog)