The Experience Intel project is launching in New York this Friday before it heads off on a six month global tour, bringing with it amazing installations, great talks, and awesome performances. And the best news is that it's completely free, opening daily to the public from 10AM from 17-19 May at Gansevoort Plaza, NYC.One of the installations that will be there is a brand new piece by Universal Everything called Gliders. Featuring the studio's playful style and abstract aesthetic visitors will be able to create their own glider using a touchscreen. After customizing the colors and shape you then send your creation off to join a flock of others on a giant, mesmerizing video wall.
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Matt Pyke: One of the many things we thought about was the actual product itself in terms of the Ultrabook and we wanted it to be something that explored touch interaction. And also how you can use the gyroscope to interact with the glider in a more physical way with tilting the screen. I think one of the key ideas we had was this idea of collective performance in a physical environment, so we really wanted to have this real world physics sensation for the work so the audience can relate to it. Because they understand how things fly, and how they behave/interact with each other, and how you use turbulence, wind, and all these other natural forces, and how you can use these graphics from Intel to visualize that.Also, you can look at this big screen, you can spot your creation in it and show your friends “look, that’s my creation!”. But it wasn’t just a personal thing, you were creating something that will become a part of a big mass of creations, so you have a real sense that you are part of a much bigger community. People, strangers that created things the day before, or the hour before—it gives you a sense it was a crowd-sourced creation.
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Yeah, I think so. We really wanted to get this idea of simplicity and elegance across, something where it was more joyful and uplifting. This sort of fantasy where you're able to design your own glider and decorate it how you want—and make it quite a personal expression and then see it released into the wild, come to life. It’s kind of a key thing for us. It goes from this inactive graphic thing on the screen and you bring it to life on the big video wall in the space—we wanted it to be something that took on a life of its own.Why was it important that you incorporated that element of "everlasting-ness". The fact it lives on from city to city?
We’re actually documenting each creation that’s being made, and that can be made, into an online gallery. You can see all of the different pieces being created in New York, Chicago, or Tokyo and I think that will be an interesting portrait of the taste of each community. A New York style, a Chicago style, a Tokyo style kind of thing. Just seeing that unfold over time I think will be really interesting for everybody.
One way is the act of creation on the screen using a touchscreen to draw these forms and decorate it—gestural based input. The other thing that is really nice is when you do launch your glider onto the screen, you can actually follow it on the Ultrabook. You’re like a camera man following your creation around the space. And you see people wiggling, writhing, and spinning in space trying to keep up with their glider.
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I think one thing is this sense of community between people, so that you’re standing next to a random stranger and you start interacting with them and you end up kind of seeing what they’re creating and copying them. So there might be some real face-to-face conversation going on and kind of a mini-competition and dialogue. Another is a sense that you’re contributing to a big collective piece so it's not just an isolated thing, it’s got a social aspect to it in that way.And I think on top of that the pure joy and elation of seeing some really brightly colored decorative things flying through the space in a very aerobatic way. You mentioned a child-like thing earlier and that’s something we try to keep in our work. Kind of a child inside all of us, that simplicity to things. You don’t have to make it all grown up and super sophisticated. It’s more to do with the movement, the color, and the form. The very primitive kind of things, but the things that excite us still.
Mike Tucker: When the visitor first comes into the space the first thing they see is a large screen on the wall with a lot of these creations sort of flocking together. The larger screen is being run on servers. We have a giant Intel desktop that’s driving the larger screen, and that’s connected to a big wi-fi router and when the visitors come in they’re handed one of the Intel Ultrabooks and all of the PCs are connected on the same wi-fi network with the server screen.
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During the creation process you’re essentially creating a 3D model and it’s basically a series of lines and points. When you get to the second step and you’re painting it, you’re painting in these triangles and we just keep track of all these triangles, all the lines and all the points.
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Artistic Director - Matt Pyke
Developed by Mike Tucker, Andreas Müller, and Tim Gfrerer
Sound - Simon Pyke
3d - Chris Perry
Producer - Keri Elmsly@creatorsproject