Membrane_Dynamics_Harry_Xinwei chat 20.09.04

Xin Wei Sha: hey!
Xin Wei Sha: fabulous!!!
Harry Smoak: dunno
Harry Smoak: same dang error
Xin Wei Sha: yep
Xin Wei Sha: HEY this is GREAT!
Xin Wei Sha: let me email our diagram to the folks here .
Harry Smoak: yes, please
1:40 PM
Xin Wei Sha: ok -- you and i can talk. c + j are plaing with y' & patches in order to get a feel frot he dynamics
Xin Wei Sha: for the ...
Harry Smoak: some random, notes, thoughts
Harry Smoak: playful other (solids from gas)
- least "sepectacular"
- backgrounded by smoke
- bodies emerge as their vectors intersect (both bodies? maybe just one side?)

intimate
- string model
- individual action can affect the strings, lift is compounded by two or more players in coordinated action
- upward motion raises local activity on the screen, moving thorugh effects, changing background images
- too much activity will push it over to --> teeming masses


wandering lost
- fog low on the ground
- kicked up like dust as people walk by
- dust floats to top of screen and collects
- when enough dust has collected forms the string which begins falling --> transition to playful others



teeming massess
- overload state
- system unable to privilege intimate activity
- calms down to <-- intimate space based on moving average of recent activity
OR decays into <-- wandering lost of if activity is low enough
Xin Wei Sha: let me read and ponder.
Harry Smoak: ok, brb
1:45 PM
Harry Smoak: ok, back. message me whenever
Xin Wei Sha: ok i will.
Xin Wei Sha: this is good -- im waiting for them to finisdh their physics meeting with y.
You left the chat.
Reconnecting to Harry Smoak …
Xin Wei Sha: harry 00 sorry 0 i am wqiped outby jet lah rt now
1:55 PM
Harry Smoak: I bet

Xin Wei Sha: phooey
Xin Wei Sha: we're here with joel playinng with the smoke patch (and string patch0
Harry Smoak: how does he like it?
Xin Wei Sha: totally fun -- wish you could see this -- or even jst hear joel's comments -- he's incredibly precise and intuitive about the effects response to gesture
Xin Wei Sha: yep hes mnakiung valuable comments as we hunt for sweet presets
Harry Smoak: wonderful, wonderful
Xin Wei Sha: im trying to take some notes as he comments - ideas on how to make presets that give very fun responses -- lots of diff character
2:30 PM
Xin Wei Sha: fine details on sweeinng how the smoke patch changes response while params are varied -- looking for the right sets of params to vary as state changes
Harry Smoak: did the diagram help?
Xin Wei Sha: eg velocity decay in the smokepatch -- you can try it
Xin Wei Sha: yes it helped me -- i think it makes sense -- especially to see the state to stae changes
Xin Wei Sha: ie to see what state could overlap with what other state
Xin Wei Sha: im going to ask joel and chris and yoichiro to look at this --
Xin Wei Sha: at dinner -- after we break for dinner -- joel will have to go back to amsterdam tho -- 2 hour commute -- he may actually come back to rdm tomoror
Harry Smoak: that's terrific. he must be having fun
Xin Wei Sha: vel decay seems liek a param thta can change live -- in response to state change OR even arbitraarily to vary the behavior of the systyem, to keep it interstingf
Xin Wei Sha: Joel and chris and y have been doing very detailed work right now to find sweet spots in param space and writing down specific values
2:35 PM
Xin Wei Sha: dt time step integration and density seem like other interetsong params to vary.
Xin Wei Sha: tomorrow he plans to show chris his supercollider (os 9 only) instrument
Xin Wei Sha: and wil come back to rdam if we can supply him data in osc
Xin Wei Sha: from these jitter patches to sc
Xin Wei Sha: one global issue here -- joel asks is : is that what we want to do to our fellow man?
Xin Wei Sha: (images of our fellwos)
2:40 PM
Harry Smoak: interesing question
Xin Wei Sha: and i said all along that i want to opposite -- i want to have Others bodies come _into_ definition in respoonse to my gesturing
Xin Wei Sha: not destroy bodies
Xin Wei Sha: but the best we can do might be to move params from fuzzy to sharp edged/ better-0defined features...
Xin Wei Sha: joel thinks a few good shortlived scenes suffice
Xin Wei Sha: ie we may not need a long "narrative" carefully choreographed
Xin Wei Sha: path through state space mapped out bc
Xin Wei Sha: the parm space is so damn rich, and moset of it semes to yield fun interesting and divcersze repsonse behaviors
Xin Wei Sha: i think these guys are pretty deep into minutae of playing with the patches rightg now, so it'l be awhuile before they come up to macro design


Harry Smoak: they're fascinating. Are they capturing qt movies of their trials?
Harry Smoak: and get a camera on them playing with it, if you can
Xin Wei Sha: ok -- theyve written down some param sets and so can go through the interesting opnes with recording...
Xin Wei Sha: we don t have a spare dv cam -- oh maybe i can suie the isight and imovie?
Harry Smoak: yeah!
Xin Wei Sha: the blackbox is so dark here -- wer'e lit by a few flourescenst 20' overhead !!! we cant find the swithces to the theater lights !
Harry Smoak: haha
Xin Wei Sha: its so frustrating not to be able to use the iSights on iChat -- we should find a way to do that or undestadn the obstacle
Harry Smoak: did Wilco come back with samples of that plastic they were talking about?
Xin Wei Sha: joel says we look like we re in a bad TV prison movie
Harry Smoak: lol
Xin Wei Sha: nope. the v2 ppl sort of forgot us today monday --= being all totally intensely focused on getting stuff to the press etc.
Xin Wei Sha: that s ok -- we've been rpoductive with sw level work. and talking . im going o slap your diagram in front of chris at/after dinner
Xin Wei Sha: and yoichiro too.
Xin Wei Sha: so bascially 3 core states?
Xin Wei Sha: i agree --
Harry Smoak: yes, three seems to be a good number
Harry Smoak: with the memory spaces coursing through them
Harry Smoak: an accessible substrate that is treated differently depending on the state space
Harry Smoak: something like that
Xin Wei Sha: and three temproal regimes of memory response: immediate current, recent past, remote past -- right now they're focussed on immediate .
Harry Smoak: yes, you should be able to bump into ghosts
Xin Wei Sha: whats useful in your write up is a start on defining conditions for transition between states
Xin Wei Sha: (haha boo)
Harry Smoak: and memories of people who may no longer be there, recent shadows
Xin Wei Sha: yes -- intimate others state is in between activity -- we may figure more nuanced way of interpreting camera data to correlate with that state
3:00 PM
Xin Wei Sha: trying to imagine whether it may be confusing or compelling to see traces of ghosts
3:20 PM
Xin Wei Sha: hi
Xin Wei Sha: we;re back
Harry Smoak: hey
Xin Wei Sha: we're done with this for now -- joel's telling us about a guy who wore white gloves on black shirt and digitzed one line of video of himself
Xin Wei Sha: and used it to map to midi to make sound as he "danced"
Xin Wei Sha: 15 years ago
Harry Smoak: amazing
3:30 PM
Xin Wei Sha: we're saying gbye to joel
Xin Wei Sha: and wrapping up for the night
You left the chat by logging out or being disconnected.
3:35 PM
Reconnecting to Harry Smoak …
Xin Wei Sha: ok joel just left and we're going to dinner now ... thanks for thinking along side
Harry Smoak: enjoy your late dinner
Harry Smoak: I'm going to go into the work at earthlink tuesday and Wednesday to try and salvage the time off so I can use it later
Harry Smoak: I took today off to rest and catch up on things here.
Harry Smoak: just FYI
Xin Wei Sha: ok -- take it easy so you 'll heal up fine
Harry Smoak: will do
Xin Wei Sha: my wrist is hurting
Harry Smoak: I'll be on ichat during the day
Harry Smoak: ouch
Harry Smoak: I have just the meds for that
Xin Wei Sha: any recommendations on what to do for it?
Xin Wei Sha: heat or cold?
Harry Smoak: heat
Harry Smoak: and ibuprofren
Xin Wei Sha: ok - i'll need to build up strength so i can lfit the suitacase back to paris -- damn
Xin Wei Sha: see you around harry
Xin Wei Sha: bye for now
Harry Smoak: ciao