The HDTV Converter converts JPG, TIFF, PNG, PCT, and PICT images into one of three formats: (1) High quality HDTV 16:9 aspect-ratio, 1920×1080 pixel, DCF compliant format. (2) Original aspect-ratio images in letterboxed HDTV, 1920×1080 pixel, DCF compliant format. (3) Original aspect-ratio, 1080 pixels high, DCF compliant format.

A DCF compliant preview thumb is inserted into every converted image. The HDTV Converter software has been released for Macintosh.

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Gekitora choreographs both dancers and avatars. It is fantastic experience for him to choreograph avatars, because artist can share only pure movement of motion with many users in Internet. Now, A series of four dances can be tested with the dance-pad. A free body expression act is done in the weightless space. Those expressions reminds users of the space suit of “2001: A Space Odyssey”.

I think that Metaverse tends to imitate space recognition of the physical-world with gravity, and those expressions might be able to works in more multi-dimensional environment after the development of virtual environment, such as Second Life. This challenge produces the space recognition with the movement of the body without the wall and the floor might be a prototype of “Architecture in Metaverse”. The activity of Gekitora in the future will come to be excited.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGjEvpq1m7Q

Everyone can test it freely at NikkeiBP here.

Ten development grants of up to $2,000 will be awarded to individuals and collectives using ShiftSpace as a platform to create new “Spaces” and “Trails”.

About ShiftSpace: While the Internet’s design is widely understood to be open and distributed, control over how users interact online has given us largely centralized and closed systems. The web is undergoing a transformation whose promise is user empowerment - but who controls the terms of this new read / write web? The web has followed the physical movement of the city’s social center from the (public) town square to the (private) mall. ShiftSpace attempts to subvert this trend by providing a new public space on the web.

By pressing the [Shift] + [Space] keys, a ShiftSpace user can invoke a new meta layer above any web page to browse and create additional interpretations, contextualizations and interventions - which are called “Shifts”. Users can choose between several authoring tools - called “Spaces” - that allow web users to annotate, modify and shift the content of a page and through ShiftSpace, share that shift with the rest of the web. “Trails” are maps of shifts (shiftspace content) that create meta-layer navigation across websites. These trails might be used as a platform for collaborative research, for curating net art exhibitions, or as a way to facilitate a context-based public debate.

Go to the commissions site, watch the introductory video, apply for a grant and help us spread the word.

The ShiftSpace Commissions Program is a 2007 commission of New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc., (aka Ether-Ore) for its Turbulence web site. It was made possible with funding from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.

BIOGRAPHIES

Dan Phiffer is a new media hacker from California, interested in exploring the cultural dimension of inexpensive communications networks such as voice telephony and the Internet.

Mushon Zer-Aviv is a designer, teacher and a media activist from Tel-Aviv whose work explores media in public space and public space in media. Mushon is the co-founder of Shual.com, ShiftSpace.org, YouAreNotHere.org and the Tel Aviv node of the Upgrade international network.

In the last few years some of the most exciting new developments in location-aware computing, mobile GIS and web cartography have come from a new wave of developers, hackers, bloggers and entrepreneurs from outside the traditional GIS industry and research community. These new players have developed a new type of geo-application that is service-oriented, collaborative and web-oriented in nature and have pioneered mass market and collaborative applications. These applications range from niche tools like Zurfer to browse photos taken by others around you to mass applications like Plazes to manage your social network on the move, and are supported by developers like Metacarta who produce the supporting spatial tools. The underlying philosophy of this loosely-knit movement has become known as ‘Neo-geography’ in a term coined by Di-Ann Eisnor of Platial Inc., to characterise the break-away nature of this new movement.

The innovation and promise of Neo-geography has begun to change cartography and GIS by engaging with consumer audiences and campaigning on public policy issues, and as a consequence government, academia and the GIS industry has had to rethink its priorities and methods. LBS is one of the areas where Neo-geography has had the greatest impact. With the arrival of mass market smartphones and PDA’s with positioning and wireless networking has come an opportunity to develop for new audiences and to begin to deliver location-sensitive content that earn revenues and engage users. This Special Issue of the Journal of Location Based Services aims to bring together some of the key developers, academics and writers on Neo-geography to document its lineage, debate its philosophy and methods and to envision its future. Contributions are welcome from any source, and in any style appropriate to the arguments being made. More >> [PDF]

Twitter Fountain
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SF59hA8xIC4

Daden Limited is a Virtual Worlds agency based in the UK.

The goal of the Handbook is to be a signpost, a source of practical information and content that bridges the gap between new users and the platforms and resources that are available, but not always very accessible. The Handbook will be slowly filled with articles written by invited artists and specialists, talking about their tools and ways of working. Some articles are introductions to tools, others are descriptions of methodologies, concepts and technologies.

When discussing software, the focus of this Handbook is on Free / Libre Open Source Software. The Handbook aims to give artists information about the available tools but also about the practicalities related to Free Software and Open Content, such as collaborative development and licenses. All this to facilitate exchange between artists, to take away some of the fears when it comes to open content licenses, sharing code, and to give a perspective on various ways of working and collaborating.

The digital artist handbook is brought to you by folly and has developed out of ongoing consultation with artists working with technology, which has shown a need for removing the barriers for artists to use digital tools. The project is supported by Arts Council England.

From August 2007 until January 2008, the editors of the Handbook were Marloes de Valk and Aymeric Mansoux of GOTO10.

Cathie Boyd, Artistic Director of Theatre Cryptic and Martin Naef, Research Programmer will talk about their collaborative project Living Canvas, which uses real-time projection to enable a performer to “wear virtual costumes”. These can then adapt to the body, or even provide a different face. The system enables a dynamic or even improvised performance by detecting the posture and silhouette of the performer and projecting imagery precisely to the selected parts of the body. This innovative project aims to create and explore a new expressive medium by taking projection systems to a highly interactive level and providing a powerful new tool for live video artists.

This talk is FREE, but space is limited, so to make sure of a seat please email: rsvp ‘at’ mediascot.org

Cathie Boyd founded Theatre Cryptic in 1994 and is committed to interdisciplinary productions using interactive and new technologies. Theatre Cryptic’s recent production The Paper Nautilus worked with Edinburgh based LUX Biotechnology to “transfer ‘living light’ from the laboratory to the stage and successfully integrate luminous and fluorescent proteins within the set design”. In 2001 Boyd was awarded a NESTA (National Endowment for Science Technology and the Arts) Fellowship which enabled the company’s fusion of sound and visuals to ‘ravish the senses’.

Martin Naef received his Ph.D. from the Computer Graphics Laboratory at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. He was responsible for the blue-c Application Programming Interface, a software toolkit for collaborative, immersive virtual reality and telepresence. With a background in computer science and graphics, his research focuses on real-time multimedia technology such as 3D graphics, 3D video, spatialized audio, and VR.

In the class, participants are shown and experiment with the Arduino’s capabilities and learn the basics of common microcontroller interfacing, such as: digital output to control lights and LEDs, digital input to read switches and buttons, analog output to control motor position or LED brightness, and analog input to read sensor inputs. The class assumes no previous electronics knowledge, though it does assume a little programming knowledge. No soldering is needed during the class, as all circuits are built with solderless breadboards. See Class Description, Class Notes and more here.

SVEN CV is a software application for real time tracking of pedestrians, using OpenCV. Its robust build has features for tracking several individuals with all kinds of foreground and background occlusions. It also provides real-time subjective features such as face detection and expression; hair and clothing color; segmentation of the body to give positions for head, shoulders, and torso; direction of movement and more. It transfers the data including the coordinates of the person’s outline (matte) to a specified IP address or the local machine via a UDP port. It supports input from both live camera and AVI files.

SVEN Credits: Amy Alexander, Wojciech Kosma, Vincent Rabaud with Nikhil Rasiwasia and Jesse Gilbert; Production Assistants: Marilia Maschion, Annina Rüst, Cristyn Magnus.