1969
- VIDEOPLACE
by artist, Myron Krueger
Videoplace is an early example of augmented reality art, done by
an artist whose interests lay mostly in VR. The installation features
computer projection that interacts with the viewer's physical shadow.
-- jtnimoy

Myron Krueger is one of the original pioneers of virtual reality
and interactive art. Beginning in 1969, Krueger developed the prototypes
for what would eventually be called Virtual Reality.
These "responsive environments" responded to the movement
and gesture of the viewer through an elaborate system of sensing
floors, graphic tables, and video cameras. Audience members could
directly interact with the video projections of others interacted
with a shared environment. Krueger also pioneered the development
of unencumbered, full-body participation in computer-created telecommunication
experiences and coined the term "Artificial Reality" in
1973 to describe the ultimate expression of this concept.
-- Jeremy Turner of CTheory


After several other experiments, VIDEOPLACE was
created where the computer had control over the relationship between
the participant's image and the objects in the graphic scene. It
could coordinate the movement of a graphic object with the actions
of the participant. While gravity affects the physical body, it
may not control or confine the image which could float, if needed.
A series of simulations could be programmed based on any action
and Videoplace offered over 50 compositions and interactions (including
Critter, Individual Medley, Fractal, Finger Painting, Digital Drawing,
Body Surfacing, Replay, among others). To illustrate, when the participant's
silhouette pushed a graphic object-the computer could choose to
move the object or the silhouette. Or, as in Finger Painting where
each finger created flowing paint without the distraction of the
silhouette.
-- from Praveen
Vajpeyi's Parsons Thesis


Originally trained as a computer scientist, Myron Krueger, under
the influence of John Cage's experiments in indeterminacy and audience
participation, pioneered human-computer interaction in the context
of physical environments. Beginning in 1969, he collaborated with
artist and engineer colleagues to create artworks that responded
to the movement and gesture of the viewer through an elaborate system
of sensing floors, graphic tables, and video cameras.
At the heart of Krueger's contribution to interactive computer art
was the notion of the artist as a "composer" of intelligent,
real-time computer-mediated spaces, or "responsive environments,"
as he called them. Krueger "composed" environments, such
as Videoplace from 1970, in which the computer responded to the
gestures of the audience by interpreting, and even anticipating,
their actions. Audience members could "touch" each other's
video-generated silhouettes, as well as manipulate the odd, playful
assortment of graphical objects and animated organisms that appeared
on the screen, imbued with the presence of artificial life.
--quoted from ArtMuseum.net
Those images at the top of the page are probably © Myron Krueger,
and are being used without his expressed consent. I pasted them
from the cited sources. |
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