ALT DigitalMedia

<ALT> Introduction \|\| <ALT> Form \|\| <ALT> Texts \|\| <ALT> Culture \|\| <ALT> Special Projects \|\| Events
<ALT> Culture American Museum of the Moving Image The openness and flexibility of digital code, wielded by a generation of creators for whom software serves as a natural medium of expression, has given rise to do-it-yourself software-fueled subcultures and creative communities whose members express themselves through the computed, real-time moving image. For many of them, videogames, rather than television or film, is the mass medium that captures their attention, to which they react, and whose conventions and interfaces they reference or attempt to upend. They adopt the methods and ethos of the DJ, by mixing, manipulating, and performing media in a live setting, and also of the hacker, by infiltrating and modifying existing code. The goal of such activities may be subversion, celebration, or simply the desire to use the material to one's own creative ends. Works in <ALT> Culture: Vagamundo: A Migrant's Tale Creative Uses of Engines I Shot Andy Warhol by Cory Arcange/Beige NewYorkExitNewYork by Martin Lenclos and Priam Givord REZ by Tetsuya Mizuguchi/United Games Artists The Demoscene Works Previously in <ALT> Culture: VJ Station by Eric Redlinger with o.blaat, Bubblyfish, GeoffGDAM, j.u.l.i.e.t.a, and Daniel Vatsky	I shot AndyWarhol by Cory Arcangel/Beige

*Vagamundo: A Migrant's Tale, 2002 Ricardo Miranda Zuñiga Macromedia Flash Ricardo Miranda Zuñiga uses the format of the videogame to express his feelings about United States immigration policy. Vagamundo* confronts audiences with the plight of undocumented immigrants. Its protagonist is modeled on the comic persona of famed film star Mario Moreno, aka Cantinflas, often referred to as the Mexican Charlie Chaplin. Events depicted in the game are informed by Zuñiga's personal experiences as a youth living in San Francisco and Nicaragua, as well as from interviews he conducted with Latin American residents of New York City. Vagamundo is housed in a cart similar to those pushed by ice cream and shaved ice vendors (palateros). Intended to function as a mobile public art project, Vagamundo has been featured at numerous street fairs and other outdoor events. Related Links: www.volume71.com	Vagamundo: A Migrant's Tale by Ricardo Miranda Zuñiga

Creative Uses of Game Engines Adam Killer, Brody Condon Velvet Strike, Anne-Marie Schleiner QThoth, Julien Oliver Hardly Workin, Ill Clan Developers of commercially-released computer games sometimes make aspects of their software, or even its entire codebase, available for modification and manipulation by audiences. This sometimes results in new software-based experiences that, while utilizing the game's underlying engine, constitute a departure from its original purpose and intention. Some Mods are radical revisions of the original computer games, others function as critiques of issues related to violence and gender. Individual Works: Adam Killer, 2000-2002 Game MOD (Original Game: Half-Life) Brody Condon Adam Killer is a modification of the commercial game Half Life. Condon exploits a bug in the Half Life engine to create harsh trailing effects, turning the screen into a chaotic mess of bloody, fractured textures. Players have no option other than to shoot at the benign central character, Adam, who appears in multiples. Related Link: Adam Killer Velvet- Strike, 2001 Game MOD (Original Game: Counter-Strike) Anne-Marie Schleiner Note: This work is not currently on display. Anne-Marie Schleiner has inserted spray-paints into the popular shooter game Counter-Strike. Players can graffiti walls, ceilings, and floors during the game. This is a demo and not interactive; fully functioning versions of the game are available online. Velvet-Strike was conceived during the beginning of the "War on Terrorism" and has received a large number of negative e-mails from Counter-Strike loyalists who find it an unworthy alteration of the original. Related Links: Velvet Strike Main Response from Gaming Community QTHOTH: The Quilted Thought Organ, 2000 Game-Hack (Original Game: Half-Life) Julian Oliver Australian sound artist, Julian Oliver, modified a Quake II game engine to create QTHOTH: The Quilted Thought Organ, a real-time audio performance environment. Object and action trigger sound samples, allowing the game to be played as a musical instrument. Related Link: QTHOTH Hardly Workin', 2001 Machinima (Original Game: Quake II) ILL Clan Produced by the ILL Clan, a New York-based group of film and animation professionals, Hardly Workin' is a tale of two itinerant lumberjacks in search of employment. Hardly Workin' is a Machinima, a form of low budget, computer generated filmmaking utilizing video game engines for production and presentation. Machinima productions are distributed over the Internet: the maker provides the underlying code for viewers to render on their home PC. Related Link: Hardly Workin' on Machinima.com	Adam Killer by Brody Condon Velvet Strike by Anne-Marie Schleiner QTHOTH by Julian Oliver Hardly Workin' by ILL Clan

I Shot Andy Warhol, 2002 Cory Arcangel/Beige Reprogrammed Nintendo Entertainment System videogame cartridge, Nintendo Entertainment System, Light gun Cory Arcangel is one of a group of artists who work within the strict limitations and visual styles imposed by early digital technologies and media. For I Shot Andy Warhol, Arcangel reprogrammed a 1980s Nintendo videogame, Hogan's Alley, and populated the game with mass-culture icons. The artist chose the iconic personalities based on their ability to be readily recognizable even at the extremely small pixel size in which they are rendered. Related Links: www.beige.com More about I Shot Andy Warhol	I Shot Andy Warhol by Cory Arcangel/Beige

NewYorkExitNewYork, 2002 Martin Lenclos and Priam Givord Virtools visualization software Open GL In 2001 while Marin Lenclos was in New York on a fellowship, he took over 6,000 photographs of Times Square with a digital camera. Upon returning to Paris, he and Priam Givord worked with Virtools, a French company that produces visualization software, to model the geometry of the neighborhood around Times Square. Covering a 2.5-square-mile patch of New York in just over forty megabytes, NewYorkExitNewYork achieves its dizzying hyperreality through movement, not photorealism. This work was recently exhibited at Villette Numerique, the digital art biennale at the Cité des Sciences et de i'Industrie in Paris. Related Links: www.newyorkexitnewyork.com	NewYorkExitNewYork by Martin Lenclos and Priam Givord

REZ, 2002 Tetsuya Mizuguchi/United Games Artists Sony Playstation 2 Rez, the concept of Tetsuya Mizuguchi of United Games Artists, is a hypnotic hybrid of the action and music game categories. Set inside a computer network, the player is an endorphin-releasing machine that must kill viruses infecting another machine. The player's emissions release unique musical frequencies that set the rhythm of the game. That rhythm, in turn, dictates onscreen graphics, encouraging the user to consider audio and visual composition during game play. Related Links: About Rez	REZ by Tetsuya Mizuguchi/United Games Artists

The Demoscene, 2000-2003 Various Artists Assembly Language, C++, Visual Basic, other specialized programming and sound composition tools Demos are musical computer animations computed in real-time, usually programmed in Assembly language. Demos are made to "show off" a computer's hardware capabilities (a 3D graphics card, for instance) as well as the demo-maker's programming and creative abilities. Demo flaunting reaches its peak at competitions like Assembly and The Party where people share Demos and vie for awards. A Demo gains extra praise when it packs powerful visuals and sound effects into a limited file size that is sometimes smaller than a typical word processing file. The Demoscene is most active in Northern Europe, although the Internet has given the movement an increasingly global profile. Current featured Demos: pass the cookie thing (final) by aardbe fr09: goldrausch and fr-022: ein.schlag (final) by farb-rausch (we took the) green pill by haujobb different engine and b10 by Zden/Satori Related Links: Scene.org Demoscene FAQs	diferent engine by Zden / Satori

VJ Station, 2002 * Eric Redlinger with o.blaat, Bubblyfish, GeoffGDAM, j.u.l.i.e.t.a, and Daniel Vatsky Keyworx Software The sophistication and widespread availability of laptop computers has led to an explosion in the use of computer moving images in collaborative live performances. This VJ Station illustrates the power available to visual artists today using real-time manipulation of digital media. For this installation, several New York based DJs (disc jockeys) and VJs (video jockeys) have contributed original material that is grouped together into three performable segments using media performance and automation software called Keystroke. Some parameters of the video material are programmed to respond automatically to the audio through beat and frequency analysis, while others are left to the user to manipulate in real-time with the gamepad interface-a simplified version of the various hardware interfaces like midi controllers, keyboards, game controllers, and graphics tablets, used in live situations. Related Links: Keyworx Share *VJ STATION IS NO LONGER ON VIEW IN THE FOX GALLERY.	VJ Station by Eric Redlinger with o.blaat, Bubblyfish, GeoffGDAM, j.u.l.i.e.t.a, and Daniel Vatsky
<ALT> Introduction \|\| <ALT> Form \|\| <ALT> Texts \|\| <ALT> Culture \|\| <ALT> Special Projects \|\| Events © 2003 American Museum of the Moving Image. All rights reserved.