Animastage: Tangible Interactive Display

From MIT Media Lab Tangible Media folks, an odd little interactive display: Animastage [2].

The idea is “Hands-on Animated Craft on Pin-based Shape Displays”, i.e., a system that lets you create animated 3D puppet like scenes that move.

The underlying technology is from earlier TML projects [1], which were inspired by player pianos and other pre-digital technologies. This particular system is heavily influenced by puppetry

The creator makes scenes and puppets, and places them on the pin surface. The vertical movement of the pins pushes the figure like a puppet. Programming the actuators animates the scene.

The neatest effect is the “Invisible String Control”, in which the animator wiggles his or her fingers and the animation responds as if they were connected by a string. This effect uses hand tracking via a Leap Motion camera, which is mapped to the actuators.

This effect is far, far more interesting for a viewer than the other more complicated animations.

I was immediately struck by the fact that this effect mainly works—and draws our attention—because the viewer fills in the story from imagination.

The finger motions aren’t necessarily related to the animation in an obvious way (which is also true of marionettes), and we can’t really tell if the hand movements are leading or following the animation. But what we clearly see is the hands controlling the puppets.

This is a general principle of visual interaction: humans unconsciously construct stories and fill in ambiguity form their own imagination. In this case, the design makes good use of this principle, creating a very compelling and entertaining illusion from the simplest parts.

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1. Hiroshi Ishii, Daniel Leithinger, Sean Follmer, Amit Zoran, Philipp Schoessler, and Jared Counts, TRANSFORM: Embodiment of “Radical Atoms” at Milano Design Week, in Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 2015, ACM: Seoul, Republic of Korea. p. 687-694.
2. Ken Nakagaki, Udayan Umapathi, Daniel Leithinger, and Hiroshi Ishii, AnimaStage: Hands-on Animated Craft on Pin-based Shape Displays, in Deisgn of Interactive Displays (DIS). 2017: Edinburgh, . https://tangible-fmp.mit.edu/publishedmedia/Papers/636-OTEyO/Published/PDF

Antiquities Trade Fuels War

From time to time I comment on aspects of the Art Game.  I am amused by well executed fakes, and the mysteries of “authenticity”.

But I have no sympathy for the antiquities trade, which fuels looting and steals from the poor to amuse the rich.

This summer we have seen yet another episode that illustrates why you should never, ever buy antiquities, and certainly not without provenance–and anything with good provenance is not for sale.

Many sources have reported that various parties to the wars in Syria and Iraq are profiting from the illicit antiquities trade.  Whatever you think about this trade, the profits are used to support the fighting and killing.  For instance, there is good reason to believe that the Islamic State is aiding and “taxing” smuggling out of Syria and Iraq.  Anyone who buys these objects is aiding and abetting this horrible, violent, conflict.

Given the general lack of provenance, it’s difficult to even know if you might be feeding this conflict–or some other nasty mess elsewhere.

As I’ve said before:  don’t buy antiquities.

Egyptian Antiquities Trade: Emergency Restrictions Needed

I have repeatedly condemned antiquities trading and collecting, which is almost always fuel for looting and smuggling, as well as fraud.

In the last three years, political turmoil in Egypt has led to horrible looting and, inevitably, illicit sales overseas, especially in the US.

One thing that should be done is to impose restrictions on imports of antiquities from Egypt.  The antiquities minister, Dr. Mohamed Ibrahim Ali, has requested fast action, which seems the least that should be done.

For independent information on antiquities looting from Egypt and everywhere, check out the Antiquities Coalition and the The Capitol Archaeological Institute of George Washington University.