Re: [-empyre-] Aesthetics of single user works / versus multi user works

[Adam Nash <adam@yamanakanash.net>]

Tamiko said:

> I think to make a successful multi-user work you really need to understand 
> what "added value" is provided by other users in the space, and orient 
> your piece towards this. In the best of circumstances the other users are 
> an enrichment; all too often they are an annoying distraction, because 
> they are there with some other agenda. ("Hey I'm new to VRML how did you 
> build this" is a fine conversation to build the bonds of the VRML user 
> crowd, but it doesn't add to your experience of the virtual artwork.

Hi Tamiko, everyone,

This is true of works that are conceived as single-user, and most art 
whether virtual or not, is indeed single-user, even if it takes place in 
front of a room full of people. As you note, a work like Beyond Manzanar 
probably wouldn't benefit from being made multi-user. As for online 3D 
works designed for multi-user, most of these until now have really been 
chat rooms with 3D graphics added on. In this case, the multi-user aspect 
is crucial but it is the 3D itself that is of questionable use.

I'm interested in the multi-user space as a live performance medium - 
whilst this is obviously not a new idea, not very much work has been done 
in that area. Something I quickly found to be problematic was the 
avatar-as-human idea. Trying to treat the space as if it were a regular 
physical space in which bodies perform introduces massive problems of two 
major types. First the time and effort required on the modeling and 
animation (with its attendant problem of large filesize), and second the 
audience expectation. It seemed natural to remove these problems 
completely, and use the space for its strengths rather than weaknesses. 
When trying to emulate physical space, the lack of gravity and economy of 
geometry is a weakness, but when the piece is abstract these qualities can 
be used as part of the performance.

It also leads to the questioning of what an avatar is. Again, analogy with 
physical space quickly falls apart. In the version of VNet that I have been 
using, switching to OOBE mode ("Out Of Body Experience", ie, one can see 
one's own avatar from an objective perspective) causes some very 
interesting effects. Sure, you are looking at your representation in space, 
but if you move around whilst in this mode, your avatar does not, begging 
the question of which one is you - the avatar designated as you or the 
position from which you are looking at the space? There are many other 
capabilities that in physical space would be considered anomalies, but to 
me they all point to the conclusion that the virtual 3D space isn't really 
very similar to physical 3D space, and this is a very freeing realisation 
from a performative point of view.

In the multi-user version of Memory Plains Returning, that we performed 
last week, the avatars *become* the space, or at least their visual and 
sonic manifestation is so large that they seem to. The most common comment 
offered by audience members logging in at the start was that they couldn't 
see anything. This was the equivalent of an empty stage or a silent concert 
hall. The action doesn't start till the performers do. I conducted the 
performers, whose avatars were made up of different sections of the piece, 
to change the visual appearance at my command. In this way, they are not 
really avatars in the conventional sense at all, even though it is true 
that they represent the performers in that if the performer logged out, the 
avatar would not be there. It was a highly structured performance with 
little room for the performers to improvise. We are currently working on a 
piece where the interaction and improvisation between the avatars is 
crucial to the performance, as I think this will prove to be more 
interesting. Ultimately, the interest in last week's performance lay only 
in the fact that it was a "live, multi-user performance".

The piece was also being projected onto a screen for the benefit of a live, 
physically present audience in Folly Gallery, and Cornerhouse Gallery. This 
situation has some good and bad points. For the good, at Folly (from where 
I was logged in), I was 'presenting' in the way that Steve suggested in a 
post a few days ago - the live mu performance offered some difficult 
concepts for those new to the form and as a result we were able to have a 
very interesting discussion about the nature of the performance and the 
space itself. I was expecting a similar level of questioning from the 
online audience, but they were surprisingly quiet in the text chat window. 
In a way I was 'conducting' them also, in that I would suggest to them 
viewpoints to hook into as they became available according to a given 
avatar's manifestation. On the negative side, things didn't go so well at 
Cornerhouse, where one of the performers was having problems with crashing 
and being logged out. Preoccupied with these problems, he didn't really 
have the time to engage the audience and take them with him on his, albeit 
frustrating, journey. This also was to do with notions of 'perfection' or 
'maintaining the illusion' that is typical of a lot of live performance. 
Unfortunately, I hadn't discussed with him sufficiently the implications of 
having to perform to two different audiences, online and offline, and as a 
result the audience present in the Cornerhouse gallery were a little 
mystified as to what was happening. I think this medium, particularly in 
these early stages, can only benefit from its 'inner workings' being 
exposed to the audience, as the philosophy behind the performance has so 
much to do with those inner workings. As I have said before on this list, I 
don't believe in the myth of 'suspension of disbelief' and I think the 
audience need to be included in the performance for it to be satisfying for 
them. In the case of my work, at the very least this means teaching the 
audience to use the veiwpoint menu for example. Ideally we'll reach a stage 
when the audience already know what to do when they log in, but for the 
moment we will have to contend with a bit of teaching. I suppose it is a 
bit analogous to giving directions to an unusual or distant venue in a real 
world performance.

The online audience, small as it was, did seem quite content to sit back 
and enjoy the composition, and there were many who put up with crashing and 
logging back in again. This crashing seems to be a combination of the 
flakiness of VNet and the largish amount of geometry. Some interesting 
temporal effects were achieved by this re-logging in, where some members of 
the audience (and indeed the performers themselves) were seeing different 
things - again an 'anomaly' that can be used within the performance. All in 
all, what was supposed to be a higly composed and structured piece became 
quite chaotic in the online performance, and whilst I personally enjoyed 
that very much it was confusing to some audience members. I will need to 
seriously research this behaviour of VNet over the coming months, although 
it is usually quite difficult to get more than one or two people to log in 
for testing. I will be posting notices to empyre and www-vrml and other 
lists, to try to enlist the cooperation of those 'in the know'.

I think the 3D multi-user space offers a huge potential for live 
performance, and my current project "Scorched Happiness" is an attempt to 
really thoroughly investigate the medium's properties and create a 
performance, unique to it, that is as satisfying as a live performance in 
any other medium.

Apologies for the length of this post, but I hope it is a useful 
contribution to the discussion of multi-user space.

Adam


> - tamiko
>
>
>
>
> > Date: Tue, 24 Jun 2003 21:47:44 +0100
> > From: "Taylor Nuttall" <taylor@greenquarter.co.uk>
> > Subject: [-empyre-] thoughts on aesthetics
> > Aesthetics of single user works / versus multi user works
> > So I am intrigued with a question of my own as to whether there are
> > different aesthetics associated with single user / multi user spaces.
> > Obviously interface elements play a part in this, but what about the
> > structures inherent in the space or narratives embedded into the coding etc.
> > I know Simon has already spoken in detail of his ideas relating to a multi
> > user experience and also there has been some discussion on non-Cartesian
> > mapping.
> > But how would our experience of say Beyond Manzanar change if we met other
> > avatars in the space?
>
>
>
> --
> ----------------------------------
>  Tamiko Thiel       Media Artist
>
>  tamiko@alum.mit.edu
>  http://mission.base.com/tamiko/
>
> ----------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> empyre forum
> empyre@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre

________________________________
Adam Nash
adam@yamanakanash.net
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