Spain

ninja style


Having just returned from a week of vacation in Madrid following Arbertura2 in Lisbon I am playing catch up with some planned postings. This was my first visit to that country with more visits already planned in the coming week when Boris and I fly to Barcelona for a little gig at La Terazza in Barcelona.

On this trip to Madrid I got to hang out with the wonderfully talented Raquel Meyers. She gave a tour of town. Recommended the best places for drinking and eating.

Unfortunately a lot of the VJ's that I was trying to get in touch with to meet up with in Madrid were away. Apparently we are at the tip of the void/vortex of August where almost everyone in Spain goes on vacation.

From what I have been hearing VJ's in Spain love modul8. The video above is from Raul of ENTTER, the visual component of a bit sexy man MENEO who performed and stripped for us at the Mapping Festival this year. Hopefully being that Barcelona is party town some of these VJ's will be around to meet up with us. If the parties they do are anything like the video above we have something fun awaiting us.

Arbertura2

I have the delightful pleasure of joining in with the 2nd edition of Arbertura. The one night festival takes place in the enchanting city of Lisbon, Portugal and is curated by SHARE compatriot Elsa Veira and co-founder of VJ Theory Ana Carvalho.

As per the e-flyer above the event is free. Amongst the performers is Lance Blisters, the band I have been working with since 2004. We will be joined by 8 bit mad man GOTO80 visually accompanied by the bottomless energy of Raquel Meyers.

In addition to the performances, SHARE open jam and after party there will be a modul8 workshop that I will conduct as well as several round table discussions about the where all this audio visual culture is at.

For full info check out the site or get updates from the blog.

I will be arriving in Lisbon on the evening of the 18th. Can't wait!

JAB:Visual at Caribana

JAB:Visual at Caribana Festival from ilan katin on Vimeo.

Bobo and I did a gig near Nyon, Switzerland. Since I did not have any of the music that was performed that night I slapped in a track by Snakefinger who is my recent favorite thing to listen to.

There was very little to do with the projection in the tent and almost no pre-production time for it but I managed to bring my own projector so that we could move it around now and then on the ceiling of the tent.

Shot the whole thing using the video function in my little Sony Digicam and threw it together in in Final Cut.

New t-shirts

Boris took some time out to press some new t-shirts before we head out to London. Continuing with the color schemes used in the Mapping t-shirts from this year. Big. Bold. Electric.

We are accepting pre-orders.

Modul8 v.2.5.6 boo boo fixer

In quick response to some of the complaints showing up in my support mail and the forums the team has just released a quick update from v.255 to v.256 to address the following:

- A rare usage of the Python keyword "setValue" that would result in a crash.
- Flash playback in modul8 crashing PPC and Intel based computers.
- Modul8 crashing when using two displays.

To download the update you can access the 'Download modul8 update' command from the 'modul8' menu. If you receive an error trying to do this then just email me at support at modul8 dot com and I'll send you a fresh link. Not to be confused with fresh drink... we're not quite there yet. ;)

Modul8 Team off to Southwark, London

Long time friends and occasional collaborators Exyzt architectural collective are currently in Southwark for the London Architectural Festival building a 'a vibrant point of community and cultural engagement during its transformation.'

Along with me, Exyzt were one of the first artists invited to the Mapping Festival. They delivered a narrative performance using a live camera, a large custom graphical map and small paper dolls. In 2006 Boris received an invitation to their MetaVilla installation in Venice.



This is where the collective began extensive use of still camera sequences tracked, stabilized and made into delicious music videos that document the daily activities of the project and the various sub projects that unfolded within. For modul8 and multi-projection the collaboration of Boris on Grrrrridwave is one of the most visually inspiring uses of this technology in conjunction with structures that exyzt creates.

The Mapping Festival of 2007 saw the return of Exyzt with their 'Re-Mapping'

Most recently the likes of Frz and Pier built the EdC for Etienne D'Crecy. Built specifically for Transmusicales festival in Rennes, France.

And now on to London.



Similar to the MetaVilla concept the compound features a common kitchen, sleeping quarters, toilets and a sauna.

Boris Edelstein and I will be there in full force augmenting the environment with a fleet of projectors. Yet to be announced is the presence of Mapping Festival mistress Justine Beajouan and other surprise companions. For more local VJ flavor we will be graced by the energies of Toby Spark.



From what I can see from the flickr stream it appears there are students on hand so the there is likely to be a lot of show/tell and sharing of ideas. With a unit of VJ's on hand and seeing how this always has a strong element of community involved I am really excited. Not to mention that this is my first trip to London and the British isle.

The installation will be open to the public on the weekend of July 3rd (yesterday!) through the 6th and then again on July 10th through the 13th. The address is 100, Unions Street, SE1 ONL, London.

Check back for udpates~!

v.2.5.5 bumps?

Reading about some troubles people are having with modul8 v.2.5.5. A common one turning up is caused by the use of the 'inside-us-all' FreeFrame plug-ins. Another more serious problem is related to basic 1 monitor/projector output.

Luckily for all of us the team has solved the latter while the former may be in the hands of users to ask the authors of these FreeFrame plug-ins what may be the problem. If you are having a problem of any minor or major importance please do send us an email to support-at-garagecube-dot-com so it can be included in v.2.56. Quickly! We are looking to get this out by the end of the week.

Even more Lemur + Modul8 love.

M8 VJ v7 from CyberPatrolUnit on Vimeo.

Modul8 and Lemur user Bryant (aka Cyber Patrol Unit) has been diligently working away on his interfaces. The video above demonstrates the breadth of his accomplishments thus far.

He shares as well. His Lemur layouts are available for download from the JazzMutant web site. Apparently these have been downloaded 400 times. That is really impressive not just in terms of Bryants work attracting users but the mere fact that there are that many people working with this combination.