Quintessence Dome Lab was an artists residence and exhibition organized by ESPRONCEDA – Institute of Art & Culture, with the support of Institut Ramon Llull and Foro Cultural de Austria, and in collaboration with MIRA Festival, ./studio3 Institute for Experimental Architecture, Helsinki XR Center, MEET Digital Culture Center, and University for the Creative Arts (UCA).
QUINTESSENCE DOME LAB
During four weeks a group of local and international artists and creatives worked together to design innovative projects using advanced technologies like Fulldome projection (SMODE), Virtual Realitx, Sensors of movement, and more. To improve their abilities and stimulate their productions, they participated in workshops managed by professionals in technology, storytelling, and immersive empathy.
The final projects were reviewed by an international jury to be showcased for the IMMENSIVA Quintessence Prize. Those selected were exhibited and live streamed on the 13th of September at the Ars Electronica Festival through Solar Orchard Garden.
Activities
WORKSHOPS
Full Dome Content Creation by EYESBERG STUDIO
The first part of the workshop was dedicated on the theoretical introduction to immersive technology in order to know what types of experiences exist and what are their technical requirements. The artists in residence also analyzed a fulldome work created in Eyesberg Studio to see how this theory can be applied.
Table of contents:
- What is an immersive experience?
- Guidelines on camera movement, colour and contrast.
- Audiovisual creation formats and dome types
- Space sound
- Practical analysis of a fulldome work
- Introduction to the creation of full-dome content
- FullDome content creation with SMODE
From the computer to the show: three practice-oriented days in which the artists saw different types of software, as well as how to create content with Smode. The goal was to put into practice the theoretical concepts learned on the first day to create immersive content and see it projected into the dome. The participants had also a dedicated day to the technical part of the use of the dome, i.e. setting up projectors, warping and blending, wiring.
Design of User Centric Immersive Narratives by garage stories
Hands-on workshop that follows Garage Stories’ own methodology based on the principles of design thinking to provide creators with tools to design their first VR experiences. During the workshop, participants have explored the unique characteristics of the medium so as to build projects with a clear message and a strong value proposition; the outcome has been a first draft of their narrative and the audience journey into an immersive
environment.
360 Immersive Narrative by BeAnotherLab
This workshop focused on the creation of immersive 360 projects within the Library of Ourselves at an artistic and technical level for the creation of Virtual Narratives. Incarnate is based on the conjunction of protocols for the creation of 360o first-person audiovisual narratives and performance techniques that involve the rest of the senses (touch, smell, taste) in sync. It is therefore a mixed methodology between audiovisual and theatrical creation on the one hand, and cognitive research on the other, while innovatively expanding the possibilities and horizons that virtual reality offers.
WORKSHOP TEACHERS
Jordi Massó
EYESBERG STUDIO
Martina Ampuero
EYESBERG STUDIO
Marta Ordeig
garage stories
Be Another Lab
CONSTRUCTION OF THE DOME
Espronceda in collaboration with selected students of the ./studio3 Institute for Experimental Architecture of Innsbruck and the Barcelona-based architecture studio Azcon worked on the development of the project and the construction of the dome in one week. The 6mx6m dome was designed and built with an innovative modular approach aimed at facilitating the assembly/disassembly. Indeed, each wooden panel and lath was of the same size, feature which allows to interchange each part and it permits to easily repair and substitute any damaged part.
The dome was created to give artists in residence the opportunity to develop 360 immersive and interactive projection projects. The artists in residence, thanks to a period of training on immersive technologies, worked in groups, to develop various artistic projects which were showcased at the end of the residence on the occasion of IMMENSIVA Quintessence Prize, on 13th September 2020, and streamed live to Ars Electronica Festival.
ANAMNÍSEIS
Project by Ursual Pfligersdorffer
A journey through a memory about the ocean that shows three connected main aspects of remembring, and the fragmentation through memory loss.
ARE YOU THERE LUA?
Project by Anna Pompermaier, Stefan Maier, and Martin Romeo
“Are You There LUA?” is a playful, combinatory extended reality installation. It offers the users the unique experience of being, though separated by physical distance, simultaneously present and active in the same phygital environment.
WONDERS
Project by Moon Ribas, Felix Schoeller and Ferran Belda
WONDERS is a journey across natural phenomena beyond human perception aiming to generate primordial aesthetic emotions such as wonder, admiration, awe, and the sublime. Pioneer cyborg artist Moon Ribas is equipped with a system of sensors and actuators allowing her to translate natural events into movement. A system of wearable sensors developed by Felix Schoeller captures Moon Ribas’ gestures and transforms them into sounds, which modulate Ferran Belda’s interactive visuals projected on the surface of the dome.
HIERONYMOUS GARDEN OF DIGITAL DELIGHT
Project by Lukas Kochendörfer
Hieronymus Garden Of Digital Delight – interpretations of agis, works with the beauty and complexity of Hieronymus Bosche’s most known work: The Garden Of Earthly Delights. A triphtych painted as a parallel world bound to sphere, that had people emerge in it for centuries as well as being a major well of inspiration for Salvator Dalí and the expressionist movement. By depicting the the Garden of Earthly Delights into layers of percetion, the full dome experience manages to create an spatial journey into abstracted sceneries of the painting connected to its initial narrative. It highlights parts of the painting whilst translating them into the medium of the digital.
SPECTRUM
Project by Agustina Palazzo, Radiorator Project with Betiana Pavón and Mateus Sartori & VPM collective: Joan Nieto and Javier Cañal
Spectrum is an Audio/Visual live performance result from the first collaboration between Agustina Palazzo and VPM collective, and aims to represent the invisible energy that surrounds us, more specifically the artificial and invisible energy of information and communication transmitted through radio frequencies.
GOLDEN MICROCOSMOS
Project by Raisa Pimentel, Anja Calas and Agustina Palazzo
In a poetic almost abstract act, we are going to listen, feel, see the aura, our consciousness, feel the frequency in which we vibrate and experience an audiovisual Dome story, of simple “balms for sore souls”. Every human being is a microcosmos within himself. It is a universe of cells, each with its own individual intelligence. The health of our cells depends on the vibrations it receives from us in the form of thoughts, emotions and feelings.
ABVXHMN ABOVE HUMAN / EPIDEMIC-SPHERES
Project by Anna Pompermaier, Cenk Güzelis, Burkart Schwaighofer
The pandemic generates a diffuse feeling of affiliation. The virus spreads, take territories, and leaves traces. It pulsates, vibrates, interacts in and with the various spheres: private-sphere, public-sphere, economic-sphere, techno-capital sphere, info-sphere, psycho-sphere. ABVXHMN is an interactive projection mapping installation that displays the real-time data of COVID-19 inside an epidemic-sphere.
An Interactive Spherical Projection Mapping Installation
Text: Marco Russo
Voice Over: Will Stafford
Sound Design: YAMAN, Kristaps Austers
SCHRÖDINGER’S CAT
Project by Raisa Pimentel, Cenk Guzelis, Mohsen Hazrati
Schrödinger’s cat is a thought experiment, sometimes described as a paradox, devised by Austrian-Irish physicist Erwin Schrödinger in 1935. The scenario presents a hypothetical cat that may be simultaneously both alive and dead, a state known as a quantum superposition. In quantum mechanics lingo, the cat’s ability to be both alive and dead until it is observed is referred to as quantum indeterminacy or the observer’s paradox. The logic behind the observer’s paradox is the proven ability of observation to influence outcomes. In this interpretation, the observer and the cat simply exist in two realities — one in which the cat is dead, and one in which the cat is alive.
RTT
Project by Mohsen Hazrati
This project is about reflections and mirrors in the context of the Iranian literature and how RTT technique in 3D game engines could translate this concept into experiences.
