DORKBOT : SYDNEY

What: “People doing strange things with electricity“
Where: Performance Space, Track 8, Carraigeworks, 245 Wilson Street, Eveleigh (corner of Codrington & Wilson streets)
When: Tuesday 13th December, 7PM SHARP - 10pm

COST: FREE - RSVP here

This month Sydney’s Dorkbot goes to Performance Space as a part of the Clubhouse Program, to present 4 incredible projects from a variety of super nerds including: Petra Gemeinboeck and Rob Saunders with their installation ‘Zwischenräume’ embeding curious robots into our architectural fabric, Michaela Davies who uses live percussion and sonified data to control motor function in performers via electric muscle stimulation (EMS), Aras Vaichas and his Micro Patch Synthesizer and Balint Seeber and Matt Robert who track planes in 3D by decoding RADAR using high-tech radio. Come along and experience a change in atmosphere and some amazing inventions!

PRESENTERS (in no specific order)

//// Petra Gemeinboeck and Rob Saunders - Zwischenräume \\\\

Zwischenräume (Interstitial Spaces) couples curious robotic agents with our built environment by embedding robots into the architectural skin. Each robot is equipped with a motorised hammer or a chisel, a camera, and a couple of pick-up mics to interact with its environment and network with the other machines. In this mingling of wall and machine, the wall’s anatomy becomes the milieu for the machines to develop and express their desires through knocking, producing cracks, and punching holes. Zwischenräume makes tangible our intimate and complicit relationships with the machinic ecologies we create. It is the first installation in a series of works that explore the performative potential of a machine-augmented architecture and its unfolding anatomical trauma.

The collaborative practice of Petra Gemeinboeck and Rob Saunders explores the materiality of digital processes, their agency and performativity, as well as the audiences’ aesthetic experience as they become bodily involved. Their pervasive, locative and robotic installations have been exhibited internationally, including at the Ars Electronica, Thessaloniki Biennale, MCA Chicago, ICC Tokyo, Powerhouse Museum, Sydney, and OK Center for Contemporary Art, Linz. Both live and work in Sydney. Petra Gemeinboeck is Senior Lecturer in Interactive Media Arts at the College of Fine Arts, UNSW. Rob Saunders is Senior Lecturer in Design Computing at the Design Lab, University of Sydney.

Zwischenräume video docu: http://vimeo.com/15272452
Petra Gemeinboeck portfolio: http://www.impossiblegeographies.net/
Rob Saunders website: http://web.arch.usyd.edu.au/~rob/

//// Aras Vaichas - Micro Patch Synthesizer \\\\

Aiming to be the world’s smallest patching synthesizer, this dual-CPU beast will curl the hairs in the ears of even the most tone deaf musician. The Micro Patch Synth takes Lo-fi to even lower levels by sporting one of the world’s lowest sample rates and low bit depth yet this device still manages to move forward with an amazing array of features for its size:

Features:
* one octave keyboard
* arpeggiator
* two voltage controlled oscillators
* low frequency oscillator
* random and noise generators
* ring modulator
* sub oscillator
* two voltage controlled filters
* envelope generator
* voltage controlled amplifier
* analog joystick
* seven patchable potentiometers
* function key
* rotary encoder
* mono audio out
* USB powered

video documentation

//// Michaela Davies - Subsoma \\\\

Michaela Davies is a boxing instructor, doctor of psychology and artist. Michaela uses sound sources such as recordings of seismic activity as triggers to activate electrodes placed on the performers’ bodies. Their involuntary spasmodic movements make them look like puppets.” Like puppets! This lady is clearly mad as a brush. Where do we sign up?

Davies works with electric muscle stimulation and data audification to question metaphysical assumptions affirming the existence of an intentional inner self, and the physical realm as an expression and reflection of this. Using sonified seismic data to generate involuntary movement via a custom–built EMS device, Davies’ work, subsoma, explores the lack of agency humans have with respect to global systems. This project was supported by National Science Week and performed at the Powerhouse Museum (Sydney, 2010) and CSIRO Discovery Centre (Canberra, 2010).

//// Balint Seeber with Matt Robert - Aviation Mapper \\\\

Ever wanted to intercept RADAR signals from air traffic control and visualise your airspace in real-time on a 3D map? While you’re at it, check how many faults have been reported by the next plane you’ll be travelling on (e.g. do the toilets work?). How about figuring out who is transmitting from any registered antenna in the country? If you have ever wondered about the enormous amount of invisible data buzzing around you, come and learn how it all works!

Seeber and Robert will show how easy it is to analyse wireless communications systems using open source software and cheap radio hardware. The focus will be on how to use Software Defined Radio to create a souped-up Mode S aviation transponder/ACARS receiver with an Internet-enabled smooth-streaming Google Earth front-end.”

More details - http://spench.net/

//// YOU - Show & Tell \\\\

As per usual there is an open session at the end of Dorkbot for very informal and short show and tells. Anyone is invited to bring along something they are working on and show us your stuff! Don’t be shy now.

BTW - Last Dorkbot for 2011

FYI - PERFORMANCE SPACE AYBABTU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

<->Dorkbot Sydney has been nominated for Fbi Radio’s prestigious SMACS - Sydney’s Music, Arts and Culture Award!!! for the “Best Collective” Category. This award recognises that moment when people come together and magic happens. Blogs, agencies, event organisers, art collectives, gallery owners…any group of people doing great work together & making this city all the better for it.

VOTE FOR US HERE!!!

DORKBOT SYDNEY GROUP SHOW 2012 APPLICATIONS OPEN - DUE MONDAY 28TH NOVEMBER

Exhibition to be presented at Serial Space Opening Tuesday 6th March and closing on Sunday the 11th March

Dorkbot Sydney Group Show is an annual exhibition of “people doing strange things with electricity” that will be presented at Sydney Artist Run Initiative Serial Space. For the third year, Dorkbot Sydney is accepting applications from any field, be you artist, engineer, programmer or hobbyist, in any form, electronic, experimental, hybrid or interdisciplinary. Submissions should not be limited to artworks - but should respond to the theme “people doing strange things with electricity”. The Dorkbot Sydney Group Show is something between an art exhibition and a science fair. Some past projects that have been exhibited have involved robotics, installation, interaction, electronic sculpture, screen based works, web based work, audio instruments and performance works.

Dorkbot Sydney Group Show is the one of the only annual exhibitions in NSW that is dedicated to a focus on contemporary electronic, hybrid and interdisciplinary art. It has exhibited a variety of emerging and mid career artists next to engineers and scientists, both local and interstate. The exhibition aims to present the dialogue that exists between science, technology and art, putting experimentation and innovation at the forefront.

For more information on how to apply for this exhibition please download these documents:

1. Dorkbot Sydney Group Show 2012 Information DocumentPDF
2. Application Cover Sheet document link or Doc

tr-IO by Lukasz Karluk + Gentleforce, 2010
Exhibited at Dorkbot Sydney Group Show 2010
Photograph taken by Pia van Gelder

What: “People doing strange things with electricity“
Where: Serial Space, 33 Wellington St, Chippendale
When: Tuesday 1st November, 7pm for a 7:30 start

This month’s Dorkbot Sydney is curated by Serial Space On-Site Resident Andrew McLellan AKA Cured Pink. We will have three “powerful” presentations by experimental artists and machine lover/haters.

PRESENTERS

Andrew McLellan - Cannibalised Machines

For the last few years Andrew McLellan has been aggregating fragmented and crude instrumentation for his noise-performance project Cured Pink. Over the last year in particular, Andrew has been building cannibalised machines from cheap powertools for scenarios that embrace spontaneity, danger and the psychic tendencies of the attending crowd. Andrew will be showing instruments and objects that he is building (and/or hopes to build) during his on-site residency with Serial Space in October/November.

Harry Mills - Situational Amplification

Electronic instrument building which explores situational amplification as well as sound content. The translation of a musical idea into analogue devices, using simplification and primitive network schemes to control feedback and signal paths. The exploration of circuits representing traditions of sonic/visual reproduction and generation.

Lucas Abela

Initially classed as a turntablist, Lucas Abela’s work has rarely resembled anything in the field, early feats saw him stabb vinyl with Kruger style stylus gloves, bound on electro acoustic trampolines, drag race the pope across the Sydney Harbour Bridge, perform deaf defying duet duels with amplified samurai swords, hospitalised by high powered turntables constructed from sewing machine motors, record chance John Peel sessions with the Flaming Lips, become Otomo Yoshihides’ favourite entry into his Ground Zero remix competition; ‘Consummation’ (even though instead of sampling the CD he destroyed it using amplified skewers!).

Today these turntable roots have became almost unrecognisable, evolving into his infamous glass instrument (broken shards being to Lucas nothing more than a giant diamond tipped stylus you can play with your mouth). He has been perfecting the instrument since it’s invention in 2003, perfroming internationally as Justice Yeldham and with his glass/ drums/ piano trio, Rice Corpse.

Lucas has principally been a live audio artist, perfroming live since 1994 after Oren Ambarchi stumbled across his radio performances, and invited him to play the What is? Music Festival. However Recently he has begun dabbling in sound installation with works like Vinyl Arcade, where remote control cars with styli attached are raced over a track made from a mass of disused vinyl records.

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That’s what she said

What: “People doing strange things with electricity“
Where: Serial Space, 33 Wellington St, Chippendale
When: Tuesday 30th August, 7pm for a 7:30 start

This month we have a jammed packed line-up of amazing projects and we will be joined by our special host Aras Vaichas!

PRESENTERS

Ollie Bown - Live Algorithms and Hands Free Concerts

Ollie Bown has been exploring an interest in the subject of agency and autonomy in computer programs in various forms over a number of years, particularly in music. In this talk he gives a summary of some of the systems, musical experiments and workshops he has been involved in creating and curating, along with some of the most interesting work he has found in this area, including his own systems that use recurrent neural nets and decision trees to responsively create musical patterns, the gatherings of the Live Algorithms for Music network in London, and a short concert series in 2010 in Melbourne called “Hands Free”, where computer music composers were invited to send software as proxies for themselves, to perform with human improvising musicians.

Dan Mackinlay and James Nichols - Pattern Machine

Pattern machine is a site specific installation project started for underbelly 2011, incorporating Giant inflatable nematodes, industrial machinery brought to live through projection-mapped animation and multichannel improvised music madness stuff.
For Dorkbot the audio guys from pattern machine will present some of their tools and a short taster performance in glorious mid-fi quad surround.

Project URL:
http://patternmachine.possumpalace.org/

David Lyon - WaterDuino - Open Source Water Injection for Arduino

One proven way of reducing pollution, carbon-emissions and fuel useage in petrol motors is with water-injection. It’s also great if you have a turbo-charged vehicle as it allows engine temperatures to be lowered so that you can run higher boost. With the introduction of EFI cars, water injection fell out of favour. The reason for this is mainly because the computer in the car was too complicated for people to interface with. With Arduino, we can now again easily control a water injection system and make it with low cost.

WaterDuino is an Open-Source project with all the Arduino software that you need to run the system. This presentation demonstrates the project and how to make a system with minimal cost.

Erin Gee - Orpheux Larynx

Fascinated by all things vocal, Erin Gee is a Canadian artist from Montreal who makes music, interactive installations, performances and videos with combinations of flesh and electronic voices. An overriding theme in her work is an exploration in the tensions of human-computer interaction, which she feels are heightened by human narcissism. In this talk, Gee will share some of her past interactive works as well as offer some sneak peeks of her most recent project in Sydney: Orpheux Larynx. This project is a choral work for robotic and human performers made in collaboration with media artist Stelarc and engineers at MARCs auditory labs (University of Western Sydney) and will be presented August 27th at the Powerhouse Museum.
This research project is supported by the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, MARCS Auditory Labs at the University of Western Sydney, and the Thinking Head project funded by the Australian Research Council and the National Health and Medical Research Council.

http://www.eringee.net - Website of Erin Gee
http://thinkinghead.edu.au/ah/ - Website for the Thinking Head project
http://marcs.uws.edu.au/ - Website for MARCs auditory labs @ University of Western Sydney
http://stelarc.org/?catID=20247 - Website of Stelarc

DORK EXTRAVAGANZA!!!

What: “People doing strange things with electricity“
Where: Serial Space, 33 Wellington St, Chippendale
When: Tuesday 26th July, 7pm for a 7:30 start

Come to Serial Space for a midyear nerd-out.

P R E S E N T E R S

GAVIN SMITH

The Light Scythe is an open source tool for light painting. It can write text or images frozen in midair which are captured by the camera with a long exposure. Images are created on a laptop computer and transmitted wirelessly to a 2m long staff filled with coloured LEDs.

Unlike simply photoshopping text in afterwards, images that are lightscythed directly interact with the environment in the photo. The hovering light is reflected off shiny surfaces, diffused through translucent objects and occluded by objects such as fences between the camera and scythe.

Gavin will give an outline of how he created the light scythe, as well as a parts list for anyone who wants to make their own.

If anyone wants to bring their own camera capable of long exposure, we’ll do some experimental light scything in front of the crowd.

ANGUS DEVESON

In the lead up to Robot Serial Killers this august, Angus will be doing a talk on combat robotics. Combat robots is a sport in which two or more radio controlled fighting machines battle it out in a specially constructed arena, attempting to destroy or disable their opponent within a 3min time limit. There are rules however within the scope of them a wide variety of designs have evolved and continue to do so. Combat robotics is the only radio control hobby which focuses on ingenuity, design and skill rather than just who has the most money.

Angus will be talking about the Australian combat robotics scene and some of the technical details of how these machines function and how to make one yourself.

SHOW & TELL

BREAK OUT!!! Show things unexpectedly. Show us what you’ve got!!!!

Has it got any sports in it?

What: “People doing strange things with electricity“
Where: Serial Space, 33 Wellington St, Chippendale
When: Tuesday 10th May, 7pm for a 7:30 start

We’re back for a regular Dorkbot (as regular as that might be!!!!).

PRESENTERS:

Dr Danial Stocks : The Serro

From the bowels of my secret electronic weapons music research program comes The Serro: A microwave powered electronic music effects processor based on a military radar jamming technique. A 1600MHz radar emits a low intensity microwave beam. This is received by the serrodyne transponder a short distance away. In military applications such a device is used to send altered radar signals in order to generate false velocity readings in the radar. In this application an audio signal is sent to the transponder, which modulates the audio onto the radar signal and retransmits it to the radar. The audio data is received by the radar but is altered in nature in accordance with a wave remapping algorithm inherent in the modulation and receiving process, creating interesting harmonic variations of the original. In addition to variation of the nature of the sound by varying the modulation parameters, it is also possible to create changes in the sound by moving the antennas to different positions.

Martin Marier

The sponge is a musical interface made with a piece of foam, a few sensors (accelerometers and FSRs) and an Arduino board. Sensor data is sent to a computer running SuperCollider which translates it into musical parameters. The goal is to make performance of electronic music more playful and to improve the interaction with the audience.

Martin is from Montréal. You can find more info about his work here: http://www.martinmarier.com/

Nick Keys

As part of the Red Room Company’s major project for 2011 poets, or people masquerading as poets, are being paired with clubs & societies, or people masquerading as clubs & societies. This masquerade brings together the committed amateur Nick Keys with the Dorks who do strange things with electricity. So at the next Dorkbot meeting at 7pm on Tuesday May 10th @ Serial Space Nick will be giving an improvised talk about techne, memory & ghosts.

Show and Tell

We invite people to bring along projects they are working on or any other cool things to show in a free-for-all at the end of the night. This is a great time to talk to people about things that are coming up, events and what not. Bring in something you have found, something you have broken and show us what you’ve got!

May the force be with you

What: “People doing strange things with electricity“
Where: Robots and Dinosaurs > 662 Princes Hwy, Rockdale
When: Saturday 26th March, 12:00pm
How: THIS IS AN RSVP EVENT!!! Please email to confirm your attendence!!! There are limited numbers for this event.

This month we are leaving our Dork HQ to invade another! Come along to the Sydney Hackerspace Robots and Dinosaurs to to meet their group and see what they get up to. POWERS COMBINE!!!

“Hackerspaces (also referred to as a hacklab, makerspace or creative space) is a location where people with common interests, usually in computers, technology, science or digital or electronic art can meet, socialise and/or collaborate. A hackerspace can be viewed as an open community labs incorporating elements of machine shops, workshops and/or studios where hackers can come together to share resources and knowledge to build and make things.”

Robots and Dinosaurs are a communal space where geeks and artists brainstorm ideas, play games, work on collaborative projects, and share the cost of some great tools. They have been inhabiting a whole house in Rockdale for over 2 years. They represent a growing community of like-minded makers that often come to Dorkbot meetings and have presented projects at Dorkbot Sydney from time to time. They are open to new memberships so if you are interested in joining the crew or just excited about seeing new inventions come along and share the love and some baked goods too!

Many thanks in advance to the crew at RoboDino for having us at your humble abode!

What: An exhibition of different people doing strange things with electricity
Where: Serial Space, 33 Wellington St, Chippendale (www.serialspace.org)
When: Opening 6-8pm, Tuesday February 22nd
Open 12-6pm, Wednesday 23rd - Saturday 26th February
Artist Talk / Sausage Sizzle - Sunday 27th February 12pm
Who: Luke Calarco, Jiann Hughes, David Kirkpatrick, Ross Manning, Wade Marynowsky, Michael Petchkovsky.
Curated by Dorkbot Syd ‘Overlord’ Pia van Gelder

What: “People doing strange things with electricity“
Where: Serial Space, 33 Wellington St Chippendale
When: Thursday 13th January, 19:00 for a 19:30 “Speakoff”

This month we are happy to have two guests from the other side of the globe!

P R E S E N T E R S

TIM BOYKETT

Laboratory for the construction of Experimental Situations.

15 years of building worlds and ways of investigating them, experimental net audio, mechanical devices and social constructivism. Too many things to fit in a paragraph: http://timesup.org

Narrative Worlds: Living and Lived in spaces - This presentation will outline our experience with “exploration narratives” as a way of understanding an audience’s involvement with an interactive environment, then go on to examine the projects we are currently engaged in: “Physical Narratives” is the name we use. Spaces were the fictional inhabitant has disappeared, the audeience is invited to explore the objects in the space and their arrangement to explore the story of that character.

I will also talk about our developments of living spaces, mechanically enhanced garden systems and irrigation systems that we are using to enhance the harbour environment.

PIPPA BUCHANAN

Pippa Buchanan is project lead for the School of Webcraft, a partnership between Mozilla and Peer 2 Peer University (P2PU). Born in Australia and currently based in Berlin, Germany, she worked in educational software, video games development and as a design educator before becoming involved in non-formal and open educational projects.

http://learninglearning.wordpress.com
http://p2pu.org/webcraft

Drumbeat - How Mozilla is making a better web.Mozilla’s Drumbeat is about increasing the community of people who defend and build the open web beyond participation in software projects. Learn how Drumbeat brings filmmakers, educators, journalists and others together to help shape the future of the web.
http://drumbeat.org

P2PU - a learning (non) institution
The Peer 2 Peer University is an online community of people learning together in an open, collaborative environment. Entering its second year, P2PU is developing partnerships with Mozilla around the School of Webcraft and exploring how peer assessment could change the way we learn.
http://p2pu.org

Looking forward to seeing you all on our first meetup for 2011!