Tuesday 26 October 2010

More from Virtual Picnic @ The Bluecoat Liverpool 23/10/10


Here are more photographs from our Virtual Picnic as part of the Picnic In Arcadia event at the Bluecoat Liverpool last Saturday:






See more photos here

Picnic in Arcadia at the Bluecoat, Liverpool 23/10/10


Last Saturday, we held a highly successful Picnic In Arcadia at the Bluecoat, as part of the Liverpool Biennial 2010, which encompassed several elements.

Our picnic consisted of three elements Virtual Picnic, Tea ceremony with Augmented Reality and Shang-Pool Arcadia in Second Life.

Virtual Picnic

Using pattern recognition and sensors to enable a meeting of worlds, the real and the virtual.

Paul Sermon and Charlotte Gould from Salford University have developed the innovative virtual picnic entitled 'Picnic on the Screen' which lets members of the public appear inside a virtual world which they can interact with.

The interactive public video installation aims to explore the creative and cultural potential of large public video screens.

On Saturday, the installation of the virtual picnic involved a link up between participants in Liverpool and Shanghai:












See more photos here

See Shang-Pool Arcadia in Second Life here

Shang-Pool Arcadia is launched in Second Life


Shang-Pool Arcadia was successfully launched in Second Life last Saturday as part of the Picnic In Arcadia event at the The Bluecoat in Liverpool.

You can now join us in Second Life from the link below after you have registered with Second Life:

Shang-Pool In Arcadia in Second Life

Here are some snapshots from last Saturday's event:





Thursday 21 October 2010

Setting Up For Picnic In Arcadia @ The Bluecoat 23/10/10


Here's a few behind the scenes photos of the team preparing for the Picnic in Arcadia
Event
this Saturday at the The Bluecoat in Liverpool.




Tuesday 19 October 2010

Shang-Pool @ The Bed-In The Bluecoat Liverpool 23/10/10



Marking the anniversaries of Lennon's birthday and assassination, the Bluecoat is recreating John and Yoko’s famous 1969 peace protest. Each day a bed in our Hub will host a new action by performers, artists and others.

Unless otherwise stated the Bed-In takes place within the core hours of 11 am to 3 pm (weekdays) and 11 am to 4 pm (weekends). Feel free to drop in to take part in them at any time




The Shang-Pool Arcadia Project will participate in the Bed-in on 23rd October 2010 when we place the bed in our virtual park.

Check out the live feed on the day if you cannot join us in person:

Watch live streaming video from thebluecoat at livestream.com

Stanley Park


We chose to model Stanley Park in Liverpool for the Shang-Pool Arcadia Project because the recent regeneration of the park revived a jewel in Liverpool's heritage that struck a chord with the aims of the project.



Stanley Park is a 45 hectare (approximately 111.19 acre) park in Liverpool, England, designed by Edward Kemp, which was opened on 14 May 1870 by the Mayor of Liverpool, Joseph Hubback. It significant among Liverpool's parks on account of its layout and architecture. It has a grand terrace with expansive bedding schemes that were once highlighted by fountains. It has the 1899 Gladstone Conservatory (recently beautifully restored and renamed The Isla Gladstone Conservatory), a Grade II Listed Building by Mackenzie & Moncur. 50 - 60% of the land consisted of open turfed areas, suitable for sport, with most of the rest being laid out as formal gardens and lakes. Kemp designed a horse-riding track ('Rotten Row'), though it did not catch on, and was restyled as a cycle track around 1907.



Some of Stanley Park will be incorporated into the area of Liverpool Football Club's proposed new stadium. Liverpool FC plans to move to a new stadium in Stanley Park. However, the expected change of ownership of the club during autumn 2010 is reportedly set to result in the Stanley Park project being scrapped in favour of expanding Anfield.

Stanley Park is known for being the land between Merseyside Rival football clubs; Everton and Liverpool.

The park has an Evangelical Church located on the corner in between the two football teams. It is named "Stanley Park Church" and is over 100 years old.

The park is named after Lord Stanley of Preston.
Wikipedia

You can read more about Stanley Park here.

Friday 15 October 2010

Picnic in Arcadia at the Bluecoat, Liverpool 23/10/10


Picnic in Arcadia
@ The Bluecoat, School Lane, Liverpool
23rd October 2010
10.00am to 4.00pm
Free


The Picnic launches the beginning of the Shang-Pool project, a developing colaboration between Universities, Colleges and Schools in the UK and China.

Shang-Pool Arcadia explores linking of real, virtual and imagined spaces as meeting and thinking places to explore notions of Arcadia.

Picnic in Arcadia is our first Liverpool Biennial event. This links the Bluecoat in Liverpool with the New Folk Museum in Shanghai and with our virtual Stanley Park modeled in Secondlife as a connected space for you to visit and explore.

What do we do on the 23rd?

We will be laying out picnic cloths in our virtual Stanley Park. These can be focus points for meeting on the picnic day. Before then we can email, skype and meet in Secondlife to plan the day....

How ?

You will need to download Secondlife on to your computer........Its free!
Create or choose an Avatar.


Later you can change the appearance and dress of this virtual character to express something about yourself.

Get used to moving around. You can walk run or fly. Also practice finding and going to places.

.... bring some food or drink to the picnic...Arcadian..food. You can make this object using the 3-D modeling package in Second-Life, ( on line tutorials )

...if this is a bit too difficult just come and say 'hi'. Before you come though learn a few words of Chinese or English...


Contact us for the co-ordinates of the Park which the participating students and staff will be able to visit from 19th October:

shangpool@gmail.com

When we have completed our first virtual Shang-Pool Arcadia it will be accessible on line by people as avatars from anywhere in the world. Shangpool Arcadia will be on line from October 19 2010.

Shang-Pool Arcadia Project Overview



This is a collaborative project established between Liverpool John Moores University, and the University of Shanghai. Drawing on expertise and research from both science and art faculties within these universities the project will take aspects of parks and urban spaces in Shanghai and Merseyside and create virtual and augmented Arcadia’s which explore the park as an idealised landscape.



This will draw on the traditions and perceptions of nature and its relationship to the city in both Chinese and British cultures. We will explore the notion of the idyll and nature as a place of recreation, contemplation, nourishment and of meeting. It also links with schools on Merseyside and in China through a network directed by Upton Hall School FCJ, Wirral. Virtual worlds of pergolas, shrines, bandstands and pavilions set amongst pristine lakes and hills will be built within Open Sim.



This world would be designed and built by staff and students from the participating Universities informed by the imagination of children from Schools in the UK and China.




This is an ambitious project which has been divided into three sub-headings. Picnic in Arcadia, Voyages in Arcadia and Gazing in to Arcadia. The technical research is centred around the convergence of virtual, augmented, Interactive, telematic and telepresence technologies in the creation of mixed reality experiences. In discussion with Liverpool Biennial the research will also seek to align itself with the Biennials ongoing projects centred around areas of urban regeneration within Merseyside as well as considering similar projects in Shanghai.

It also partners itself with Fact with its extensive international networks and technical facilities and experience.

These virtual worlds will become places of meeting, exploration and imagining but uniquely they will also be projected within real places and experiences at a series of events within Parks and spaces in Liverpool and Shanghai between 2010 and 2012.



At these times First Life and Second Life boundaries would blur as the virtual projections align with actual buildings and places in Shanghai and Merseyside. Avatars and people in Shanghai and on Merseyside would meet and simultaneously experience ....picnics shared across continents....tea poured from China…real and virtual boats navigating lakes and waterways....message lanterns rising into virtual skies...wishes cast into virtual pools....whispering from park benches thousands of miles apart and people doing the kind of things people do in parks.

For more details about the project visit our website Shang-Pool Arcadia Project.