So I picked up the paperback of William Gibson’s latest novel, Spook Country, at the airport on the way to Vegas for Infocomm. I haven’t read anything of his since Neuromancer, back when that was all the rage. To be honest, that groundbreaking book didn’t do much for me except give me a headache, but I’m sure I was as behind the times as the book was ahead of it. I’m finding the new one a little easier to grasp so far (I’m currently only about 100 pages into it). It’s discussing the utilization of GPS, VR, and other technologies to create “locative” art; one installation is a virtual recreation of River Phoenix’s death scene outside the Viper Club (sooo LA), while another one is a giant squid floating over a Japanese department store with a constant flood of video imagery passing over its surface.



Of course, you gotta wear goggles to view this stuff in the book, though, this being William Gibson, it suggests that someday we’ll all be wired to view such site-specific stuff automatically, without all the accessories. But what struck me about it, particularly the latter project, was the fact that there are projection designers already doing this kind of work, maybe not site specific, but certainly in the context of another project, be it onstage or in an architectural setting.

So the question is, are projection designers so far ahead of the curve they’re anticipating Gibson? Or does Gibson just not get to the theatre very often?

Assuming there are a healthy number of cybergeeks out in our world, I’d love to hear any feedback on this latest novel, and if you think there are parallels to the world of entertainment technology. But please, no spoilers, I gotta lot left to read.

(Originally posted June 28)

I’ve decided that trying to say goodnight early in this industry is fruitless, and by early, I mean 11:30pm. But when you start making the rounds to bid everyone adieu at that time, you suddenly find yourself chatting another two hours.

But starting at the end of the night isn’t very helpful here, is it? Last night was the Barco event at Philadelphia’s Comcast Center, where the largest indoor LED screen (and a pretty high res one at that—7,000 Barco NX-4 modules and 10 million pixels, to be exact) is the center of attention in the building’s lobby. At 83′ x 25′, it’s sort of hard to miss.

You really have to see this. It’s a fantastic example of art and technology creating a stunning work of public art, and that’s just what it’s meant to be—no Comcast logos or branding in sight. In fact, it’s called The Comcast Experience, a name that probably does it a tad more justice than “the screen.” The content (which can loop unique combinations for up to two years, courtesy of the programming of Alan Anderson of Medialon) was created by David Niles of Niles Creative, who consulted on the project from its early stages and shot all the content in his New York studio.

The wall looks like wood paneling to match the rest of the lobby (and it really does look like wood paneling, not like a screen). Then, dare I say, out of the woodwork comes content (everything from a piano virtuoso filmed at various angles taking up the entire screen, to almost 1:1 scale people climbing the walls, to a Van Gogh painting that appears to seep out of the wall for its reveal). What struck me most about the presentation is that the content looks incredibly three dimensional, like nothing I’ve ever seen before. You can say I don’t get out much, but you really do have to see this. It has a 30% higher resolution than IMAX.

Dana Cory from Barco did a great job hosting the event, and I had a lovely dinner with Serge Nalbantian of Liberty Property Trust (partner of Comcast in this project), Laird Nolan from MIT, and Ken Romaine of Barco, followed by a tour of the control room with Alex Carru from Medialon and Guy Russel from Barco.

The project is actually on the cover of The Philadelphia Inquirer this morning, but nothing in print or on screen will do this thing justice.

I am back up in Vermont to start my third summer stock experience at The Bread Loaf School of English. I hope to do a weekly recap of my seven weeks here as the master electrician. So far, it has been a relaxed opening week of the summer. The equity actors and production team arrived within the first few days of classes starting, and everyone went straight to work opening up the theatre. There is a welcome back speech the second day, so it is always a rush to get the space prepared for the 250 students sitting in the house. The play this year is the Bard’s Twelfth Night. There is a static set for the show, so it seems the show will be lighting heavy to dictate the different locations. Students at the school fill in the additional roles to the hired actors as needed. All in all it ends up being a very enjoyable experience for everyone.

To my surprise I found a dozen new S4 Pars waiting to be installed as the new house lighting system. We are lamping them down to 375 watts so we only have to devote two of our 96 dimmers to the house system. It is going to be a big improvement over the previous system, plus it will provide flexibility for our space which can be oriented in any direction. The theatre is interesting as it is a converted barn with a static grid hanging above.

I also took a drive up to Production Advantage this week, which is conveniently located in Burlington to pick up some L520s for the house lights, but also to pick up an Apollo Right Arm. It’s a little complicated, but basically the T.D. here ordered this unit for his theatre, but decided to pick it up in Vermont. So now I have a Right Arm to finally check out and play around with. I have only had time to open the box up, but I will hopefully give a little overview of my thoughts about in, especially in comparison to an Autoyolk.

Rich Dale of Apollo has moved to New York City and is out on the town. His job is to meet and interface with lighting designers and what better place to do that than the Big Apple (well, he was based in Fort Wayne, Indiana…). We met for coffee the other day and talked about the New York lighting scene as well as Apollo’s commitment to young designers, as seen in the Standing Ovation ad campaign they have been running, and which featured our 2007 Rising Star winner John Horan. They are also hosting a gobo design contest with entries accpeted through June 30… so if you have nothing else to do this weekend, get out the old drawing pad and maybe your name will be added to their gobo catalogue. Good luck to all those who have entered!

Many years ago, I was in Las Vegas and Adam Steyh took a few of us out on the town, sort of an informal club crawl. Adam knew everyone in town and we wandered into all kinds of clubs, saw part of a Sheena Easton concert someplace and ended up at a way-off-the-Strip Italian restaurant that Adam liked—complete with third rate Elvis impersonator. But what a Las Vegas experience. Adam also stepped in during LDI that year to lead a tour of the lighting at New York New York, which had just been completed, and I knew I could always count on him for information or introductions I might need. As we wander the ins and outs of Las Vegas in October during Backstage Las Vegas at LDI2008, I know that Adam will be there in spirit. Jim Holladay and Barbara Brennan have promised to send their thoughts about Adam so please keep an eye out for that….