After a decade without a new record, David Bowie fans were pretty certain that the legendary musician was de facto retired, but that assumption shattered today with the release of his new single “Where Are We Now” and the announcement of an upcoming album, The Next Day. Accompanying the song is the above video by multimedia artist Tony Oursler, who implemented his signature creepy puppets for the video, with Bowie as a tiny doll seated on a table next to a similarly-shaped companion.

As for the song itself, “Where Are We Now” sounds like it was recorded in an era closer to Bowie’s heyday, and though the melody and pace may bore those more accustomed to the current standards of overproduction in pop music, fans of Bowie’s classic catalog will likely love it, and that’s really all you can ask for with a comeback. We’ll have to wait and see what the album holds.

The announcement of Bowie’s return to the game came today, his 66th birthday, reminding us that though his style has calmed and sobered a bit with age, he was once the flamboyant centerpiece of popular music culture in what is often considered to be the best era in rock music.

Photographer Mick Rock captured the essence of Bowie’s prime alongside many of his musical contemporaries, and years after the era, director Barney Clay uncovered a treasure trove of lost documentation while researching his documentary on Rock. He handed the goods over to The Mill, who transformed it into an interactive film work that amazed Rock himself. The installation, Life on Mars Revisited, toured our 2011 global events, and you can check out our coverage of the project below.

@ImYourKid

I didn’t think Anamanaguchi could get any more hyper from the looks of their live shows, but after watching their FIRST music video (out today!) for “Meow,” I’m sitting here spinning from all the 90s nostalgia and middle school/high school flashbacks that have just grazed my eyeballs.

Directors Daniel Gray Longino and Eric Notarnicola (of Tim and Eric Awesome Show fame) take you on an ADD, sugar-fueled journey to Daddz Fun Zone where ravers, jocks, pizza, glow-in-the-dark mouthpieces, mall goths, Ouija boards, Furbies, etc. converge in one hell of an epic ball-pit-drunk party that kind of makes me feel as if we just fell through the band’s Tumblr. (Speaking of Tumblr, is that Molly Soda we spy first at 00:43?) The vid culminates in a Japanese-anime-style video game setting (fitting) before the band erupts on stage. Meow!

Now before I’m off to dig out my Polly Pockets and inhale some Fun-Dip, let’s play a quick Where’s Waldo-esque game.

1. What’s the mascot of Daddz Fun Zone?

2. What drink brand is on the cooler that’s poured on James?

3. Name three pop-culture icons spotted towards the end of the video (Furby doesn’t count).

4. Giants or Jets?

What do you spy with your little eye? Leave your answers in the comments below, and let us know what you’re most 90s nostalgic about while you’re at it.

“Meow” is off Anamanaguchi’s upcoming album Endless Fantasy out later this spring. Stay TOONed!

@kfloodwarning

The Consumer Electronics Show kicked off earlier today in Las Vegas, and reports on the next generation of gadgets and technologies are already flowing in. In the realm of gaming, several new players from related areas in game development entered the gaming console arena. Valve, makers of Source Filmmaker, unveiled their as yet mysterious Piston console, Razer came through with a Windows 8 gaming tablet called Edge, Nvidia presented its new portable Project Shield, and the Unu emerged as a threat to other early Android-based gaming formats like Ouya.

Razer’s Edge portable

Something to note about all these new products is that major home gaming products continue to revolve around a screen-based interface. The technology continues to improve, with higher processing speeds making way for better looking, more complex games, but the visual interface doesn’t travel to any realm beyond that of the two dimensional, square screen.

Unu tablet

Years ago, when the seventh generation of consoles emerged, we saw great leaps in the depth of interaction with controllers like the Wiimote and PlayStation’s Move, not to mention the advent of the Kinect, which was not only groundbreaking for gamers, but for interactive designers as well. As the eighth generation rolls on, we see a focus on portable devices and integration with other home media devices, as well as a foray into the concept of open-source gaming consoles, but innovation on the actual experience remains somewhat stale.

As casual gamers, by now we were hoping to see more immersive gaming experiences that break away from the TV and take on a more artistic gaming character. Projection-mapping technology can visually transform any surface and motion sensing technology can turn your body into a controller, so why aren’t we seeing more attempts from major companies at turning the console format on its head? All the major players (Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, etc.) followed suit when Nintendo’s Wiimote flipped the controller paradigm, so all it should take is one domino, one big dog to begin developing an immersive gaming experience, and the others are sure to step up their game to compete. It might not be long before we each have something like OctoCloud in our homes.

There are still a couple of days of CES left, so we could potentially see some of these innovations this year, but really, who knows how long we’ll have to wait?

What types of innovation in gaming would you like to see at CES? Let us know in the comments below.

@ImYourKid

No doubt you over did it on the booze over the holidays, and maybe you had one of those alcohol-induced blackouts because you drank too much egg nog and woke up on the living room floor with your family staring down at you sorrowfully shaking their heads. You may think it’s time to quit the sause—at least for a day or two. Well, a blackout experience happened to Dhairya Dand from MIT Media Lab, but instead of just moping about and feeling sorry for himself, he did something about it.

That something was to, naturally, create illuminated LED cubes that you can place in your drink, which also beat in time to music. OK, you might think, but how’s that going to stop him drinking? Because, as well as supplying him with an impromptu disco environment, they also change color depending on how many vodkas he’s downed and even text a buddy when the cubes think he’s had enough and is likely to be dancing on a table with a tie around his head.

Inside the cube is a circuit that tracks time and notes the number of sips, this is set in an edible jelly to create the “ice cubes,” which also react to ambient sounds. They then calculate when you’ve had enough tracking time passed and sips taken, turning red so you know when it’s time to “Go home Dhairya, you’re drunk.” If your judgement’s long gone, they text a friend if you’re continuing to hammer shots with no sign of letting up.

[via Hackaday]

@stewart23rd

You’re probably kept awake at night wondering about the future of interaction design and user experience, tossing and turning as you ponder the interactive interfaces we’ll be engaging with in the world of tomorrow. If so, then you might find some respite from your sleepless nights in this 18-minute documentary Connecting from Bassett & Partners.

In it, industry experts and the like deliver their thoughts on what kind of designs will be shaping, among other things, the much-hyped Internet of Things—where objects in the physical world will become “smart” and connected to the web by having software, or technology, embedded into them.

The first thing to remember is: let’s not forget who uses these devices. Without us humans supplying the demand there would be no interaction design. So the human component is important, but so too is something like the ever-annoying act of someone constantly checking their phone when they’ve agreed to go out for lunch/dinner/a two-day bender with you.

So the future of interaction design has to take a lot of factors into account, while also looking to create a more naturalistic experience which nods to, but doesn’t completely replicate, the analogue world with which we’re familiar with.

As these two worlds continue to come together—the physical and digital, the human and technological—what kind of designs will they necessitate?

[via Laughing Squid]

@stewart23rd

Chinese multimedia artist and game designer Feng Mengbo’s work often involves digital technology, from gamifying communist China and Western capitalism into a Mario-like platformer in installation Long March: Restart, to his Bruce Lee VJ Project which was at The Creators Project: Beijing 2011 event. But before Mengbo got into using technology in his work, he was a painter.

In a new exhibition “Not Too Late: Recent Works by Feng Mengbo” at New York’s Chambers Fine Art gallery, he’ll be exhibiting some of his current ink and mixed media paintings, along with a video art piece.

Inspiration for some of the paintings (and video work) was taken from Chinese calligraphy and also the video game Quake 3. These influences can be seen in the compositions and techniques used to create the pieces and show how Mengbo uses technology both old and new—a paintbrush or a computer—to create his art.

You can check out some of the pieces on show below.

M Shot 0317

L Shot 0281

M Shot 0399

To find out more about Feng Mengbo and his artwork, check out our behind-the-scenes documentary.

“Not Too Late: Recent Works by Feng Mengbo” is on view from January 10th to February 22nd. Images courtesy of Chambers Fine Art.

@stewart23rd

Each week we chat about the tools of the trade with one outstanding creative to find out exactly how they do what they do. The questions are always the same, the answers, not so much. This week: Adrien M and Claire B.. Click here for more User Preferences Tech Q&As.

Who are you and what do you do?
Adrien: I’m a juggler and computer scientist. I worked at the (French) National Institute of Research in Computers and Robotics (INRIA) 10 years ago.
Claire: I’m a graphic designer and stage designer. I have always loved creating imaginary spaces through images.

Together, we are now creating performances and exhibitions that fall between art and technology.

Cinematique (2011)

What kind of hardware do you use?
We mainly build Hackintoshes to have perfectly adapted hardware for our projects at a small cost. We use also a lots of Kinects and Wiimotes to build interactions, but also Wacom tablets and various kinds of captors.

What kind of software do you use?
We develop all our own software. Mainly eMotion and some custom patches for Quartz Composer.

What piece of equipment can you simply not live without?
Adrien: My laptop…
Claire: Idem…

Hakanai (2012)

If money were no object, how would you change your current setup?
Well, we like to make big things with a small setup. We use very low cost video projectors, and we are happy with that. We would just like more time to create.

Is there any piece of technology that inspired you to take the path you did?
Not really. When we started our mix between dance and computer in graphics in 2003, the approach wasn’t so similar. Mainly technical and formal pieces were presented, but nothing like the things we wanted to do.

What is your favorite piece of technology from your childhood?
Adrien: MacPaint and HyperCard both from Bill Atkinson on the first Mac. My father bought it when I was eight years old, and after that KPT Bryce from Eric Wenger and Kaï Krause when I was 13.

Un Point C’est Tout (2011)

What fantasy piece of technology would you like to see invented?
Short term:
- Long range Kinect-style camera. The actual 5 meter limit makes it really difficult to use on stage.
- Thunderbolt external graphics card that works, in order to use laptops instead of Hackintoshes.

Long term:
- Powerful enough Raspberry Pi style computer.
- Short throw laser led projectors at full HD resolution with enough power.

@ImYourKid

The film starts with what looks like petals floating to the ground, tons of gray and black crashing, and then sprouts into a field of sharp stalks. Into this field enters a polygonal bearded man, who nervously makes his way through the atmospheric soundscape suggestive of a dream, or perhaps a nightmare.

The German word for “Catcher,” Faengar, is a new a short released by German filmmaker Fabien Koppenhöffer. In his directorial debut, Koppenhöffer developed a story based on J.D. Salinger’s iconic Catcher in the Rye, the classic novel of adolescent angst.

“It’s a bit inspired by the title,” he noted in a Skype interview with The Creators Project. “I read it 10 years ago in school, and I think and it’s a nice metaphor for getting old and all that stuff.”

Koppenhöffer developed the characters with Markus Färber, a colleague from the University of Art and Design in Kassel, Germany. “I didn’t want a very realistic look,” he said. “I wanted an abstract world. I just wanted really abstract, reduced, low poly look.”

Indeed, in early sketches we see the original old man character with his arms outstretched. His head is hunched, almost at the same level as his shoulders. The child creature, on the other hand, stands tall, though he only comes up to the old man’s knees. It’s this creature that evades the old man’s efforts, vanishing like an apparition.

Part of what makes Faengar successful is its rich sound environment, which complements the straightforward polygonal shapes and animation with a touch of hypnotic realism. For this project, Koppenhöffer relied on the terrific FreeSound.org for open sound files. With his music background, he edited them to exactly what he needed.

“I really knew what sounds I needed, and I arranged them in a totally new way,” he explained. Koppenhöffer worked briefly with two sound designers and also relied on his own skills. “I in put a lot of sounds and layered them over and over and just mixed them together. It was just really trial and error to just get the right mood.”

This is the second minimalist black-and-white animation I’ve reviewed now involving old age, and I wonder if there’s a trend brewing. In Mikey Please‘s The Eagleman Stag, an old, bearded man reflects back on his life with melancholy. It gets me wondering if technologists’ nonstop talk about the future has us imagining a time in our lives where we look back on today.

And perhaps in that future, the idea of a film festival will be a ghostly past we chase after in our old age. Despite being featured as a Vimeo staff pick and receiving almost 700 likes, Faengar has yet to see the inside of a traditional theater. “I decided not to go the normal festival way,” Koppenhöffer noted. “I want to spread it out right now.”

He promised that he and Färber will be releasing more making-of material in the near future, but in the mean time, check out some of Färber’s original sketches below…

@anxiaostudio

In 2001, Rockstar Games changed the very nature of gaming with a release called Grand Theft Auto III. A sequel to a free-roaming cult hit, GTA was one of the first major blockbusters in a new era of gaming, opening its gameplay up to serious gamers who completed its missions to progress forward, as well as to kids who just wanted to steal cars and crash them into buildings until their character died. Moving forward, the franchise continued to give gamers of all levels exactly what they wanted with greater and finer detail.

There was one pioneering move in the creation of GTA that broke from all previous standards, and that was the music. Heard on the car stereo anytime your character entered a new vehicle, the game offered multiple stations featuring original music written for the game, previously published music, as well as talk radio featuring characters from the game as callers. Though it had little effect on the actual gameplay, it demonstrated a way of thinking about the gaming experience that set a new standard, and from that pivotal innovation, Rockstar has continued to deliver gaming experiences that defy convention.

For Max Payne III which came out this past May, Rockstar sought to apply the same mindset geared toward breaking new ground. The series had already established itself with innovations like Bullet Time action and extremely detailed physics within the game, so to build further nuances, the company brought on experimental rock band HEALTH to create a dynamic score.

Though the story of the game moves linearly, the player has some freedom within its framework, a style of gameplay that demanded accompanying music that could ebb and flow with the various moods and settings. HEALTH’s soundtrack amplifies the intensity of every possible moment within the game. Using their signature style of melodic yet heavy noise, the band created a series of “stems” for every level of the game, each a set of related tracks that flow in and out of one another depending on the action ensuing onscreen.

To demonstrate how this system of stems works with the game, HEALTH’s John Famiglietti told us about how the band went about creating a score fittingly intense enough for the grueling journey of Max Payne and gave us a thorough breakdown of “The Stadium” level.

The Scoring Process for Max Payne III

The Creators Project: How did you alter the instrumentation setup of the band to create the score for the game? What instruments did you incorporate that you hadn’t before? And did you have to abandon any instruments or sounds that you love but just wouldn’t fit with the score?
John Famiglietti: With the score, we didn’t have to change anything or jettison anything. It was really about adding lots and lots of other instruments we’d never touch normally to match the setting and to reference the previous games—cello, cembalo, Brazilian percussion, etc.

So you took cues from Brazilian music for this score?
Yes. Especially for the Favela levels. We integrated a lot of Brazilian percussion into the score.

Did you begin developing the score while the story and plot of the game were still in development? Was there any back and forth influence between the score and the development of the game?
When we came into the game, the story and plot were completely written, however the levels would change often and we would have to accommodate it musically. Score and gameplay really come together on the final airport level where “Tears” comes in and overrides the whole music system for a part of the level.

Are there any film scores or game scores that inspired your score for Max Payne 3? Any standard you hope to live up to?
With Max, we were mostly concerned with adapting our sound to the game, while referencing the previous two games in the series. We felt real pressure to live up to previous Rockstar games (the soundtracks are always amazing), especially Red Dead Redemption. However, there are a few moments in the game (flashback levels) where we wanted to reference the feel of some classic dudes such as Giorgio Moroder and Brian Eno to make the levels feel noticeably really different.

How many of you are lifelong avid game players and how many aren’t? Prior to this project, what was each of your favorite video game score from childhood?
I’m the only serious “gamer” in the band. I think my all time favorite video game scores as a kid would be Streets Of Rage 2, Diablo 2, and Baldur’s Gate 2.

The Stems

John Famiglietti: All stems can be used alone, and nearly all can be combined. The two dominant musical stems are two and four which do not mix. The other stems were designed to support one or the other, but a lot of them can go both ways as well.

STEM 1

Suspense – Low subbass synth rumbles, and some sparse guitar. Used for moody non-action moments of the level.

STEM 2

Moody Synths – A rhythmic synth bass pulse, and some distorted hi synths atop, with some electronic hi hats. Inspired by early 80s sci-fi films (Rockstar’s personal request). Used for the more stationary heavy shootouts.

STEM 3

Heavy Drums – Live drums, toms, with a subtle amount of delay. Ups the intensity when paired with STEM 2.

STEM 4

Bass Guitar – This is a heavily effected bass guitar run into a sequencer that chops it up into a rhythmic pattern. Used for the sniper section of the level and certain “Run + Gun” moments.

STEM 5

Delayed Drums – Electronic Kick Drums and Hi hats run through a boss DD-5. Pairs with STEM 4. The “train” ish sounds are heavily effected guitars.

STEM 6

Brazilian Percussion – Energetic Brazilian percussion, can pair with the 4+5 combo to kick it up a notch, or add movement and energy to STEM 3.

@ImYourKid

Joy Island is an emerging young fashion photographer based in Beijing, and she can’t stop dreaming about Yayoi Kusama. When the opportunity came for her to materialize her “dream project,” she pulled the scenes from her dreams (like Kusama) and recreated them in virtual reality. Over the course of nine months, this became her latest photo series Fashion Laboratory, in collaboration with China’s leading lifestyle magazine iLOOK.

In Fashion Laboratory, Island blends her highly saturated and colorful photography style with 3D modeling, creating virtual rooms where models appear to be floating pensively in the air against giant, primary-color-painted objects looming in the background. Just as Kusama felt that she was gradually disappearing into a sea of poka dots, Joy Island’s photos evoke the same feeling of things “melting away” in her imaginary room.

We chatted with the photographer to learn more about how the series came together…

The Creators Project: Where did you get the inspiration to create the Fashion Laboratory series?
Joy Island: When we decided to create this series, my inspiration came from a room in my dreams. I didn’t want to just finish this project, but I wanted to make a breakthrough collection that shapes some sort of dream environment. The theme of the iLook issue was “De Stijl," [Dutch for “The Style]) then the words “Fashion Laboratory” popped into my mind during a discussion, so then we combined the theme and my dream together into Fashion Laboratory. The elements of the 3D room and model were designed and inspired from ”http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piet_Mondrian" target="_blank">Piet Mondrian’s masterpieces. From the collection’s explanation:

The orderly black and white stripes and pure primary colors were the essence of De Stijl art moment pioneered by Piet Mondrian, they evoke perfect and rational spiritual energy. From YSL’s famous Mondrian dress to the now fashionable color-blocked jumper dress and squarely platform shoes, De Stijl style continues to influence world fashion. Besides experimenting with 3D modeling for the background, I hope to capture the emotion and serenity of the models facial expressions, as well as the spiritual aura that floated in Mondrian’s mind at that time.

How did you approach the fashion shoot?
I always like to incorporate elements of surrealism, futurism, dreams, or emotions into my shoots. We initially wanted to build a physical set, but that proved to be too difficult, so we decided to use 3D modeling for the background, and then Photoshop the models in. With the help of a friend, a professional 3D modeler, we recreated the environment and objects in my imagination, then repeatedly deconstructed and transformed the scenes.

Besides a room of red, yellow, and blue colors and black and white stripes, we also created 3D models of objects like an ice cream cone, polar bear, windmill, baby, rainbow, rabbit, the planet Mars, and a comet—all of these objects have one thing in common, they are melting. We worked on it for one month, destroying ideas then rebuilding them. We filled tens of gigabytes of 3D modeling material, then we began numerous experiments with arranging the positions of the people and objects.

During the shoot, I tried to capture the models’ dreamy, yet frozen, facial expressions. The girls look like futuristic people who are deep in thought while floating in space or in the ocean, or even on top of a melting ice cream cone.

Photographs courtesy of Joy Island.

@CreatorsProject

If you want to freak out the drinkers down at your local watering hole, then you could do worse than donning this robotic hexapod dress that puts the creep into “Jesus! What the hell is she wearing?” It’s designed by haute-tech designer Anouk Wipprecht, who has previously created high-tech fashion garments for the Black Eyed Peas’ Fergie and made dresses that turn transparent when electrified.

For this latest creation, Wipprecht teamed up with developer Daniel Schatzmayr, and the result looks like it could walk straight off the set of the 1980s robotic insect thriller Runaway, except without the naffness.

Instead of shoulder pads (they’re so early 00s 80s revivalist), the dress is fitted with three robotic insect legs on each shoulder that twitch in the creepiest way possible, and protect the wearer from anyone who gets too close and tries to swat the legs to death with their slipper. Not very practical, but it looks badass.

[via Nerdcore]

@stewart23rd

You’ve always wanted a 3D paper printout of your own head, haven’t you? That way you can put it on a stick and pretend like you’re conversing with a decapitated android version of yourself. An android you that’s, er, made of paper.

Well now you can finally live that dream with the Paper-Kit app, which enables you to turn a photo of yourself into a 3D model. All you have to do is take a pic of your head from the back, sides, and the front, upload them to their head-modeler web app, and they’ll do all the hard work of creating a digital 3D model.

Then you print it out and, using some scissors (be careful with these as they might be sharp), cut out the different components, fold, and stick them together—then off you and your replica head can go on whatever adventures you like.

[via PSFK]

@stewart23rd

Last January, filmmaker Behn Zeitlin and his grassroots crew Court 13 wowed audiences at Sundance, taking home a Special Jury Prize for their breakout film Beasts of the Southern Wild—a fantastical tale depicting the life of an independent six-year-old girl, Hushpuppy (Quvenzhané Wallis), growing up in the bayous of Louisiana.

Though it seems like the same big-budget pictures always get nominated for all the awards, this morning we were ecstatic to hear that Beasts is is up for four Oscars: Best Picture, Best Actress (Quvenzhané Wallis), Best Director (Benh Zeitlin), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Lucy Alibar and Benh Zeitlin).

While they were filming, we went behind the scenes with Zeitlin and crew and learned how they created the mythical bayou monsters, toured their production studio (set up in an old gas station), broke down the film’s score and cinematography, and found out how the film’s star, Wallis, was cast.

We’ll be pulling for Beasts at the awards ceremony on Sunday, February 24th, but until then learn more about one of this year’s best films in our YouTube playlist above. And if you haven’t seen the film, watch it now on Amazon Instant Video.

@CreatorsProject

The intricate and unpredictable world of particle physics is the subject for the sixth story in Energy Flow, a non-linear film project from FIELD. Beneath the surface of the matter that surrounds us lies a world of subatomic ferocity and seemingly boundless energy, a place of quantum fields and particle reactions.

It’s a world full of mystery and wonder that continues to hold mankind’s fascination. It’s a place that’s full of surprises too, which, although technical and at times mind-boggling to comprehend, still captivate the public’s imagination—as can be seen from the reaction to the Higgs boson discovery last year. But for every discovery made and theory confirmed, a whole new set of questions arise as, paradoxically, both our understanding and ignorance of the universe seems to grow.

In this part of Energy Flow, called LHC, FIELD collaborated with Russian artist Maxim Meshkov (aka DXMIQ), who designed and art directed the visuals. The viewer is taken on a trip that begins with the behemoth atom-smashing scientific instruments that help us understand these subatomic lands. Then journeys down into the fundamental places that photons and quarks call home, in a series of astonishing and spectacular encounters between microscopic forms.

Meshkov’s take on the atom-smashing scientific instruments (above) and particle collision (below).

Using 3D animation, Meshkov created a series of imaginary and elaborate collisions, where the particle structures behave in fanciful and byzantine ways and where “fractal tree structures, nodal networks, or chaotic trajectories are some of the principles applied to grow these captivating structures out of a single point of barely visible size.”

We spoke with director Meshkov to find out how he went about creating this fascinating world.

The Creators Project: Can you tell us about your involvement with FIELD’s Energy Flow project?
Maxim Meshkov: I made a short piece for the project inspired by scientific research and particle physics. My piece consists of two parts, firstly the depiction of different high-tech structures which was inspired by images of LHC and National Ignition Facility and other scientific labs like that. I wanted to show what an enormous effort humanity is making to achieve advances in our understanding of the world around us, and what complex structures we need to build for that. And also how scientists from all around the world are working on these collaborative projects and uniting to solve these problems.

The second part is more abstract, it was inspired by visualizations of scientific experiments and particle collisions—I wanted to show the beauty of science and how art and science can be mixed together.

Inside the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.

What ideas are you exploring in the film and how do they tie in with the overall theme of Energy Flow?
Ideas like how one event in the universe could influence another, how everything in our universe is interconnected. For instance, a small, tiny difference at the beginning of the Big Bang could’ve lead to the development of the universe where life is not possible at all. But we are now living in a world where the laws of nature allow the appearance of the building blocks of life and can sustain an environment required for the beginning of life—and all this was just chance. It’s fascinating that some random mutation millions of years ago becomes the cause for the development of the human brain and all the stuff we achieved using it, and the connection between the two events is very distant in space and time.

But there are a lot of important things happening in the world right now which we don’t know how they’ll influence us in the future. What will become of modern social upheavals? Of revolutions? Or how will current scientific breakthroughs define our future? How could they drastically change our world in, say, seven years? What technologies might emerge from that breakthrough? We just don’t know. A century ago there were discoveries in physics and they’ve influenced humanity, not only in science and technology but also society and philosophy and religion. Cold War military technology evolved into the internet, which affects hundreds of millions of people every day. So for me, that’s the “energy flow.”

Scientific drawings showing the collision of particles inside the LHC.

How did you come to work with FIELD?
I was familiar with their works for a long time, and we’ve been following each other for several years on various social networks. And then last spring they contacted me and invited me to make a story for their project. There were several themes they suggested and I chose the one about LHC, which was close to my heart because I’m really interested in science, especially physics.

That’s how we started our collaboration and working with them was a really great experience. The whole process was smooth and clear. We started by discussing the ideas and I described to them my vision for the project and how my segment can interact with the other parts. And we pretty quickly came to the conclusion that our views on the subject were pretty similar. And then we started the process of actual making. We started sending each other some references and inspirational pictures and stuff, then started to find a visual style.

Stills from the film showing particle collisions.

Where did you get the inspiration for the visuals you created?
There is a lot of scientific stuff you can find on the internet about LHC and the National Ignition Facility—both are very interesting projects and they served as a great source of inspiration to me. And there are a lot of beautiful-looking scientific data and scientific evaluations which we used for reference. The inspiration came from different fields of science: some is biological data, some physics, some network maps—everything. We believe there are similarities in all this material—that’s what was inspiring us.

Visit EnergyFlow.io for more information on the project and more behind-the-scenes imagery. Check back on The Creators Project every week for an in-depth look at a different storyline or feature of the film.

Meet FIELD in the video below…

@CreatorsProject

As motion graphics lean towards the snappy and software grows ever more robust, “Mirage” is a music video that stands out for its restraint. In the piece (above), sound and motion designer Frederic Kokott slowly glides a camera through hundreds of flat planes that are rigged together to form a cinematic portrait of a city. And while the scenes look rich and multidimensional, no 3D software was used.

“We are living in a fast century and everything is growing faster. Every year comes a new computer… and a better device,” says Kokott. He hopes that his work urges viewers to slow down.

At its heart, “Mirage” is about the tension between urbanity and nature. Yet Kokott wanted to err on the side of abstraction, so that it would be up to each viewer to interpret if nature was being exploited or emerging triumphantly. Whether the city’s portrait is ultimately negative or positive isn’t for Kokott to say.

The first phase of the project was to find personal inspiration to grow visuals around. He composed 30 songs that were whittled down to an 11-track album, now posted on SoundCloud. For Kokott, “the musical ideas are the source.” While he layered beats and melodies in Abelton, Kokott started visual R&D, sketching storyboards and animating test renders to find a matching aesthetic.

Much of the 10-week production schedule was spent positioning one dimensional shapes into low-poly looking sculptures in After Effects—effectively pushing the limits of 2.5D.

Kokott documented his entire process in a series of videos categorized by the different pieces of software he used. “I like the idea of collaborative consumption,” Kokott said.

Though the piece was named “Mirage” to spur personal interpretation, the title card also includes a set of coordinates. Kokott confirmed the easter egg: the numbers point to Masdarcity, a building project in Abu Dhabi, which is a part of a new green city that will be completed in 2016. Maybe Kokott isn’t as objective as he claims after all.

@gorociao

With the 80-button Ableton Push coming out this year, we’ve reached a new level of controller complexity, and you can do more on the fly than ever before. But do you remember the simpler days when all you needed was a synthetic kick, snare, and hi-hat? In the end, you could have 1000 sounds at your fingertips and you’d still come back to the basic tenets of beatmaking. And no one has a better appreciation of the old paradigm than Stones Throw’s master of old school boogie DâM-FunK.

Last year, the musician gave his fans the ability to funk like he does with the Dam Drum, a tiny, simple drum machine with four buttons, each assigned to a sound hand-selected by DâM-FunK. Those bad boys sold out so quickly that Stones Throw has decided to do a second run, but with a few upgrades this time.

The Dam Drum 2.0 is a bit sleeker than its predecessor and contains brand new sounds inspired by the Roland R70, as well as one bass tone based on the Juno 106. Like the original, you can alter the pitch of two of the sounds, create loops on a metronome, and assign entire patterns to each button that you can switch between seamlessly.

A couple of little details that will appeal to any beat nuts out there: When you record a loop it will also record any pitch automation, there’s an option to reverse all the sounds, and you can adjust the tempo with a tap button.

It may look limited, and it is, and that’s what makes it so great.

@ImYourKid

We’ve seen hybrid devices combining the vastly different arts of music and cooking in the past, and while combining the hardware for both into one product may be misguided and even dangerous, here’s one that cuts out the actual cooking completely and instead allows you to control a set of tracks synced up in Traktor.

The Beatoven consists of a pot on top of what appears to be a stove, all connected to a computer running the DJ software. Drop each of the cubes, tethered to the box via wires, into the pot and find that each one represents a looped part which begins playing as soon as it’s in the pot. Covering the pot cuts out the high frequencies so that it seems as if the sounds are inside the pot and you are smothering out the high end with the lid. The device is also outfitted with a few knobs that control Traktor’s built in effects, like delay, for example.

While it might not be the most functional workflow, it does simplify a process that is commonly misunderstood by novices as being overly complicated. In the end, working with samples is in fact a bit like cooking: You start with the best ingredients (sounds), chop them up, and then combine them in the most sensorily enjoyable way. A slight advantage to beatmaking is that your practice tries don’t get eaten by your roommates before you can properly judge them.

[via: CreativeApplications]

@ImYourKid

One thing that digital technology has effectively made obsolete but still clings to is the Polaroid camera. Having a digital camera on your phone (and replicating the aesthetic of a Polaroid with Instagram) meant that this beloved camera went the way of a lot of dead media—it lives on through its nostalgic currency, never completely vanishing from our hearts.

Adrià Navarro has created a digital experiment, the Polaroid Cacher, using this analogue device, which captures the fleeting nature of our online experiences with a physical memento. All that time spent on Facebook and Twitter or waiting for YouTube videos to load—all those moments will be lost in time like teardrops in the rain, to quote a fictional android. But no more!

Recording those precious digital moments like you would a sub-standard night out, Navarro’s device is essentially a printer housed in an old polaroid case, which uses a browser plugin to allow you to take a quick snap of your screen whenever you want. This then gets wirelessly printed out so you get a printed physical record of your virtual activities, so you can look back at them and laugh with your hologrammed friends when you’re old and half cyborg.

Navarro explains the reasoning behind it.

We believe that our daily online activity—conversations, discoveries, games—is as meaningful as our activity in the physical world and, as such, should be preserved the same way we try to capture every important moment in our life. Especially because most of these experiences will be soon forgotten, lost under layers of information, databases and outdated services.

[via The New Aesthetic]

@stewart23rd

Online anonymity: it’s a dubious luxury. On the one hand, it means people can highlight corruptions and injustices in the world without retribution. On the other it’s given birth to the culture of trolling, where bullying and abuse can also be practiced without retribution. But this anonymity is changing as trolls get hunted down and persecuted by the law—so in a way that anonymity is just an illusion.

Exploring our relationship with this is an installation called The Stranger by Maxence Parache and Robert Diel. As you approach what Parache calls an “interactive social experiment,” a virtual face looms at you out of the darkness, spouting Facebook status updates as you get nearer, while people’s names and their connections are displayed at the side as visuals.

Along with this, live public information that’s freely available on the web pours forth from this creepy digital entity. “It’s all about discovering and daring this giant face as you move toward.” Parache says. The visuals and sounds intensify as you get nearer and you can also enter your name via an app on your phone and listen out for the installation to whisper it (the whisper is used to reflect the gossipy ways of the internet). This presumably goes on until you finally get completely spooked and run away screaming.

@stewart23rd

Aaajiao has a knack for re-imagining existing structures and landscapes so that we consider them in a new context. Using projection mapping and sound design, he recently transformed the facade of Shanghai Art Museum into a morphing surface showcasing a variety of visualizations, from the gears and inner workings of the clock itself to examples of traditional Chinese art.

Coinciding with the projections, a soundtrack gives the visualizations another dimension of palpability. For example, as the building deconstructs and reconstructs brick by brick, we hear the sound of each brick being laid. We also hear the gears of the clock, the robotic sounds of some of the more space age visualizations, and the virtual scratching away of the facade to reveal a multicolored pattern underneath.

See more of Aaajiao’s work in our behind-the-scenes-profile below, as well as some stills from the Shanghai Art Museum project.

@ImYourKid