Robots Edition

Intro and synopsis 3-4 lines

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Residency 1

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Residency 1 •

First contact : 10AM

  • The levels of control Spot operates on - manual, automated canned skills and the choreography mdoe through the SDK. 

  • Modalities raised questions on agency and control - who or what was leading the movements of Spot.

  • Hijacking game

MONDAY Day 1

Made a future note - how do we engage people who are more wary of spot.

Goals

  • First contact

  • Get comfortable with Spot and its technicalities

What stood out

  • Jessica - trying to keep breathing, watching v and trying to imagine confidence = anxious, spot is scary because it can move, untethered, 1 in the space > 2 

  • Varsha - want to count number of joints and move every part of it, less threatening than kuka arms, spot is slower,

  • Varsha - excited, curious, want to push boundaries, confidence 

  • Jessica - anxious, closed in body language, also buzzing slightly

Introduction to Choreographer: Work through the gestures; get comfortable with using the software; get comfortable being around Spot; try putting gestures together.

Remember the first time spot walked into the room.

  • Elijah’s notes on this.

Learnt about the different types of control - manual, learnt/automated, choreography through the SDK and computer. Is there a hierarchy to the types of control. 

Hijacking

Learning about how spot senses the terrain 

Different components of the hardware

Safety mechanism in the robot - nto available when it is in dance mode.

First Contact : Highlights

Discovered

End of day

Unconsciously anthropomorphizing Spot - telling sign of how quickly humans build relationships with non-human entities moving in the space alongside.

Deepening Understanding

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TUESDAY < ADD TIME 10:00 AM >

Continuation of Choreographer: Get familiar with what gesture sequences Spot can/cannot do; try making phrases or “dances.

Goals

Deepen understanding of choreography software and create versions of Max’s choreography

1.

Does the “user-friendly” choreographer interface democratize access or is it an illusion of simplicity. If simple, then why dance?

Role reversal in approaches - Varsha newfound caution with the software while Jessica more confident. Until we collectively experiences first glitch. Elijah notes - “everyone curled in on themselves”

2.

Highlights

Comfort levels fluctuate like a graph - within the lab and outside perception of Spot. What is presumed safety versus reality - how human s get used to a normal.

3.

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By day’s end - we had remade Max’s choreography, documented our process

WEDNESDAY < ADD TIME 10:00 AM >

A day of play

Play with New Material: Try to replicate on Spot a dance phrase; explore music and BPM.

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Transitioned from structured exploration to improvisational play - furthering embodied research within the context of Spot

Translation

Trio A

  • Took us back to research on the No Manifesto - rejecting theatrics and emotionality [write more about significance]

  • Translated a historically significant post modern dance piece to ourselves and Spot - examining limitations of mapping human choreography onto robotic systems. 

  • Hijack game evolved 

    • Anxieties lowered as trust in controllers increased

    • Called this the me game where control would switch between participants. Each transition revealed distinct movement signatures

    • Are tools extensions of a person? Are they ways to connect to each other? [what is the Paul dourish concept of extension of an extension?

A Shift

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THURSDAY < ADD TIME 10:00 AM >

Try to Dance with Spot: Explore improvisational methods with Spot; Try dancing “like” Spot

Highlights

  • The Me game 

    • Experiment in control, observation and embodiment

    • Participants altered control of Spot - observed how challenging it was to distinguish between human and machine agency - eg when Max controlled it - the lines blurred between control

    • Moment of complex triangulation - Max watching human participant, participant watching Spot - initiated intricate feedback loop of observation and response. Are we witnessing a duet or trio? 

  • Human aesthetic shift when mirroring robotic movement 

  • Bill T Jones - Floating the Tongue 

    • Framework provoked to consider translation between nonverbal movement and spoken tongue

    • What aspects of movement/performance should be prioritized - voice, cadence or physical form?

    • Following Jones methodology, we developed a structure with phases moving from movement to narrated movement to allowing narration to affect the movement. 

    • What is the dialogue between thought and action

  • Sydney joined us later that day

    • Conversation centerd around Spot as a boundary object - a container for the poerfomative desires of whoever is controlling it. 

    • Metaphor for the projects exploration of human movement and intention manifesting in technological invention [not sure if weve said this before?]


FRIDAY < ADD TIME 10:00 AM >

Implement

Take what we’ve liked and deepen it for documentation and discourse.

PICTURE OF WHITEBOARD

Creating and Preserving our Archives

Morning

  • Dedicated to documenting the week’s explorations and solidifying conceptual frameworks

  • Recorded everyone’s version of TrioA

  • Filled out the Chunk spreadsheet

    • Transformed record keeping into personal engagement