the Comprex Refractor

the Comprex Refractor alters entry sequence of an existing public space by juxtaposing elements of one space upon another. in the context of the ITP Show, the user experienced the show (via audio) while waiting for entry, and experienced entry (via video) while present at the show.
the Comprex Refractor was conceptualized and realized by eric socolofsky and shawn van every.

.:concept:.
the Comprex Refractor grew out of thoughts about what gives spaces their unique personalities. visual and aural fedback are among the most important information channels through which users qualify the spaces they inhabit. by swapping visual and aural feedback in a pair of spaces linked by program (two spaces not necessarily physically adjacent, but adjacent on the timeline of entry), the physically disjointed spaces are given a slightly higher level of cohesion.

.:description:.
this is a description of the piece as first installed, for the 2003 ITP Fall Show. the two enclosures were installed in the lobby of the Tisch School of the Arts and in ITP's lobby, on the fourth floor of Tisch, respectively.

as users enter the first, downstairs lobby, they are greeted by a simple box with a speaker and a camera (fig. 1, A). the camera records video of the users waiting for the elevator, and sends the video to a monitor sitting on a similar box in the second lobby, upstairs (fig 1, B). there is a delay in the video feed so that the first thing the users see when they get off of the elevator upstairs is video of themselves waiting for the elevator downstairs.

fig. 1 - the two halves of the Comprex Refractor

while standing in front of the monitor upstairs, the users' comments about the video, as well as ambient noise of their surroundings, are being picked up by a microphone, which sends the audio (realtime) back downstairs. this means that users walking in on the ground floor are hearing the sounds of people seeing themselves on video upstairs.

experientially, users first hear the space they are about to inhabit, and then they see themselves in the space they just vacated.

the two boxes are built to look as though they were misplaced - the box upstairs is finished to look like it belongs downstairs, and vice versa.

the software that handles the video and audio transmission, as well as the video delay, is quicktime for java. we attempted to use processing, but quicktime for java proved far superior in frame rate and, ultimately, usability, as it is built to handle exactly this kind of data (streaming audio and video).

we attempted to run the project over NYU's wireless network, but the amount of traffic on the wireless network during the show caused such high latency and low frame rates that we had to revert to ethernet. the goal behind using wireless was to make the piece modular and easily transportable in order to facilitate installation in any number of different locations. with a better connection and enough bandwidth, the Comprex Refractor could in theory be located in any pair of spaces that occupy seperate positions in the same entry sequence (fig. 2).

fig. 2 - example installation plan of the Comprex Refractor

one problem that we were not able to address due to time constraints was an issue of visibility. crowds were relatively sparse downstairs, and people noticed the speaker with the sounds of the show. however, the webcam was fairly well hidden, and few visitors hammed it up for the camera (or even noticed it!). this was intended, but proved to be a bit of a liability; upstairs, the crowds were thick and tended to bottleneck directly in front of the monitor (which was intended), but without actually noticing the monitor (which was not). perhaps if they were looking for a response to their actions in front of the camera downstairs, or if what was, in the show, a relatively modest monitor, was more noticeable and not blocked by people, the piece would have made more of an impact.