Cycle 1

Naiya Dawson

For my cycle 1 project I started to play with and create patches that I can have as my foundation for the rest of my cycle projects. I used the live drawing actor in isadora to create what you see in the images and videos above. Working with live drawing was very fun because there are so many ways you can manipulate the actor and add different effects to it. I first worked on how to set up the live drawing actor then I took some time and went through the different affects I could add to see what I would like. I used affects like swirl, color, kaleidoscope and more. After I found all the effects I liked I worked on taking a video of the live drawing so I could present my work with out actually having to move the mouse and create the live drawing on the spot. Taking videos of the live drawing in isadora was successful because I was able to layer some videos and see the drawings I was able to create. I used the capture stage to movie actor to create the videos and then I create a new isadora patch so that I could just have the videos in each scene. This helped me optimize my work and make it easier to present.

Thinking about the start of my cylce 2 project I want to take what I have and make it interactive. I want to start working in the motion lab to get ideas on what I can do and how this will be projected. I have also been thinking about adding music and seeing if there is a way I can have music interact with live drawing or maybe the videos of the live drawing.


Cycle 1: Depth Sensor and Choreography

Regarding the cyclical projects for the rest of the semester, my goal is to create video projection in Isadora to support my MFA thesis project which will be presented in February 2025. I am choreographing a group ensemble piece that is centered upon the idea of intercultural encounters. I currently am viewing the piece as a moving palimpsest which refers to a manuscript where text has been effaced and rubbed out to write new text. This allows for ghosts or hauntings of previous text to be seen and witnessed alongside something new. Metaphorically, this reads to me as intercultural encounters where people’s life experiences intersect, conflict, merge, and bubble.  

I have been obsessed with the idea of a moving projection that tracks slow subtle movement and wanted to try this in cycle 1. I initially had a lot of ideas for the video that I wanted to project from a top-down projector. It ranged from textural video to gestures to excerpts of my dancers moving in the space. Due to the short amount of time that we had for cycle 1, I chose to focus primarily on developing a patch in Isadora that utilized a depth sensor as a form of tracking. Regarding the video that was projected, I ended up working with a clip of plastic overhang waving in the wind. In Taiwan, these rows and rows of plastic are utilized as an outdoor car cover or for an outdoor swimming pool.  

I spent a large chunk of my time playing with video effects. I knew that I wanted to abstract the image and desired to create a sort of otherworldly feel from the projection. Other time was spent figuring out how to use a depth sensor and have the projection track a body in space. The exploration started with a simple shape tracking to eventually having the whole projection track a body. Below is a video of the different scenes that I created. 

Choreographically, I imagine that the sensor will be tracking dancers from the top (bird’s eye view), so focusing primarily on their heads as they moving in the space. I have been working on a section of choreography that draws from ideas of processions. This emerges from my memories of watching temple processions in the streets of Taiwan but take a more hybrid creature approach. The video below is an example of what this looks like at this moment in the creative process 

In our feedback session, I was glad to hear that the abstraction of the video was landing with viewers. I found it fascinating that it felt kind of microscopic to people and was still tethered to ideas and aesthetics of this world. This reframing was very helpful for me to think about the intentional hybridity that I want to play with aesthetically. I really appreciate the feedback on softening the edges of the projection and playing with how color might fade in, grow, and fade out throughout. Looking towards cycle 2, my goals include taking the depth sensor and projection into the Barnett Theatre and seeing what it actually looks like from a top-down perspective, while still continuing to adjust the video effects. In cycle 2, I think it might be helpful to share a performance of this so that I can see what the full effect truly is in space with sound, projection, and dance. 


Cycle 1

Cycle 1

I went through a few different ideas for this project and had a hard time settling on something due to the amount of directions I thought this project could go in. After a few days and some research, I decided that I wanted to explore the medium of 360 degree animation. From a technical standpoint, I thought it would be interesting to learn and left a few different options open for interactivity as well. Then came the challenge of deciding what the animation was going to be about. In my thesis work, I’ve been battling with the idea that storytelling is what I really want to focus on, so this project needed to be more focused on storytelling as a medium than previous projects.

Initially, I started out by figuring out what the benefits of making a 360 degree animation were that a traditional film medium didn’t possess.

  • The ability to move from one screen to another
  • The immersiveness of the space – like you are really there
  • The abundance of details simultaneously included
  • Forcing people to move

And the limitations

  • Lost details
  • Not everyone gets the same exact story or experience
  • What is most important to focus on

In this case, the limitations weren’t necessarily bad things, but both lists were things to consider and try to find ways to design stories around.

My first idea was to do a series of vignettes. The story would take place in a town square and would be focused on the lives of people around the town. It would show planes flying around and interacting in the air, people dancing, musicians playing music, people having a conversation, a booth selling food, ants stealing the food, etc.. The idea here was that of a story centered around capturing a location rather than any one particular person’s experience. I used these ideas in the final project idea, but they originated here in this form.

My second idea was centered around the idea of perspective and what it would mean to show two sides of the same story simultaneously. I thought it could be interesting to show the hero and a villain both working on their side of the same conflict at the same time. The idea here was that depending on who the audience watched more, their opinion on the conflict would be swayed. Due to time constraints and a variety of logistical reasons, I didn’t think this was very feasible in the amount of time left in the semester, so I opted for something else.

There was brief consideration of adapting this idea into a story about two paths crossing from different storylines. Each half of the room showed the life of a different person until they ended up crossing paths and bumping into each other. Then the story would continue on and show the aftermath of the meeting.

My next idea was centered around the idea of time. I thought it would be cool to utilize the immersive environment and showcase the shifting of time and how a space changes when in it. I did a couple of projects in my undergrad centered around lost things and I thought it could be cool to continue this thread. I also used ideas from this in the final idea that I settled on.

The biggest challenge I’ve been facing for the past couple of years is figuring out what kind of storyteller I want to be and the kind of stories that I want to tell. I need to start doing a better job at exploring what is important to me and finding ways to reflect that in my work. With that in mind, I moved onto my final idea for this project.

My grandmother started getting sick right after Thanksgiving last year. After her passing in August, we visited her house to do some housekeeping things and saw that all of her Christmas decorations from the previous year were still up in her house, despite the fact that we didn’t get a chance to actually celebrate Christmas there due to her being in the hospital. It was a super surreal and haunting moment walking into that house. I took pictures of everything and documented the way she left everything the best I could so that I could look back on the memories. Recently, we started clearing out the house and sorting out her affairs. I’ve received a lot of things back that I had originally given to her as gifts and also a lot of things that I loved playing with and looking at when I visited. It’s made me think a lot about both the strength of memories that can be tied to physical things and the fleetingness of physical assets. There’s nothing quite like receiving back a bear that I gave my grandmother twenty years ago with my voice memo telling her I love her in it.

This parallel of objects containing memory is one of the biggest things I want to explore and capture. For myself, I’d like to recreate my grandmother’s living room (with some potential abstractness in the design to better fit the theme) and showcase these fading memories and the past.

Project idea:

  • Time capsule of my grandmother’s living room/house.
  • The concept of living memory, living ghosts, and nostalgia.

Memories to include:

  • Playing and drawing on the carpet. (child’s drawings, tic-tac-toe, etc.)
  • Playing on the piano
  • Sweeping the fireplace broom
  • Dinner at the dining room table
  • Riding lawn mower outside window
  • Making paperclip necklaces
  • Playing board games

Other features:

I want to make a story without people/actors and focus only on the memories living on through objects in the house.

In the beginning, all of the different objects moving around the house and memories being showcased will be present. As the animation goes on, different things will fade away. At the end, there will only be the still, silent house (set up for Christmas) that has been left behind in her wake.

Intentionally, due to the 360 degree design of the animation, not everyone will see every memory or focus on every detail that is happening in the space. This is meant to symbolize the uniqueness of memory and the loss of it as time goes on. The idea is that everyone’s experiences in the space will be slightly different and unique but still represent a holistic experience of memory. Collectively, everyone may be able to talk about what they witnessed and remember, but alone, they are unable to capture everything.

I also spent some time learning about the technical side of things for cycle one. I explored how to use animation software to make a 360 degree animation as I had only ever seen them made with live action 360 cameras before. The process wasn’t nearly as difficult as I was anticipating and was able to do so with a few careful setting changes.

Here is a link to a test I made with a few assets I had lying around from another project. 


Pressure Project 3

Recently an area of my art-making has been rooted in archival research. I’m curious about our human instincts to keep records and return to memory, and I wonder about the role remembering plays in the human experience. For this project I used sheet music that I found while exploring a community digital archive called “Watsonville is in the Heart.” This community project is maintained by the descendants and relatives of the “manong generation,” which is the term used to talk about the Filipino men who immigrated to California and worked as migrant farmers in the early 20th century. I have a personal connection to this, as my great-great uncle Dionisio Duque was among that first wave of immigrants. I don’t have a lot of information about him or his life during this time, so doing this kind of archival investigation feeds some of this curiosity.

Here is the original sheet music. This music was hand-written by a man named Arsenio Lopez; he and a few other gentlemen would play music at cultural events and parties together. This song, “Dahil Say-yo,” is a famous Filipino love song (called a “Kundiman”).

Arsenio was a saxophonist, and so is my brother! So the next step of my sound piece involved asking my brother if he could send me a recording of him playing this song. After he sent it to me, I added some record snaps and pops from freesound.org and played with some distortions to try and make his recording sound a little tinny. Because the music notation had words included, it made me think that this song needed a vocal element as well. I did a few recordings of me singing and humming in different octaves, and then added those into the track. I made the humming quite faint and only come in at the beginning and end, and added some reverb and other slight alterations to the highest octave vocal track. I wanted the highest octave to sound sort of haunting and distant, and this is the track that continues for most of the piece. The lower octave voice joins in halfway and sings with her.

As the source material felt important to me, I wanted to include it in some way. I decided to make a diptych with the sheet music and did my own “annotations,” taking some inspiration from illuminated manuscripts. The piece to me is about reaching for something, and the moments where something reaches back to you. I included tracings, transfers, drawings, and collaged elements of his and his wife’s hands.

At our presentation, I was so pleased that a lot of my thoughts and concepts came through for the group. I was especially interested in the conversations that came out about lullabies, and how the songs we sing to our children are especially important carriers of memory and culture.


Pressure Project 3:

Pressure Project 3:

For this project, I chose to work on a sound design and composition piece centered around a narrative poem by the contemporary Persian poet, Ahmad Shamloo. Shamloo’s poetry had a profound influence on me growing up, and I consider it a personal cultural touchstone. Poetry plays a significant role in both my country’s culture and my own personal development, which is why I selected it over other cultural elements for this project.

I utilized a recording of Shamloo himself reciting his poem as the foundation for my work, aiming to create a text painting that captures and visualizes the atmosphere of the story he narrates. I recorded and designed all the sounds specifically for this project. Below is a screenshot from the Ableton project I used to mix and master the audio.

The story of “Parya” by Ahmad Shamlou is centered around three fairies called Parya who lives in a small, conservative village. Parya are free-spirited and imaginative child, qualities that make her stand out in her traditional and restrictive environment. The narrative unfolds as Parya encounters various social constraints and prejudices that aim to suppress her individuality and aspirations.

The villagers, including her own family, are depicted as being bound by old customs and superstitions that limit the roles and expressions of women and girls. Parya’s attempts to explore her identity and pursue her dreams are met with resistance and misunderstanding. Despite this, she shows resilience and continues to nurture her inner world of dreams and hopes.

As the plot progresses, Parya’s struggles become symbolic of the broader fight against societal oppression. Shamlou uses her character to critique not only gender inequality but also other forms of social injustice. The story of Parya ends on a emotional note, reflecting the harsh realities faced by many in similar situations, yet it also carries a message of enduring spirit and the need for societal change.


Pressure Project Two:

Pressure Project 2: Enchanted Chest

For the Magic Door Project, I decided to focus on a small, personally treasured chest rather than a conventional door, aiming to imbue it with a sense of magic. This transformation involved equipping the chest’s door with interactive features that engage both visually and audibly as it is opened, creating an immersive experience facilitated by the software Isadora.

Utilizing a MakeyMakey kit, I established a connection between the chest’s door and Isadora, setting the stage to activate the project upon opening. The moment the chest is opened, it comes alive with the sounds of traditional Persian music, enhancing the atmosphere and setting a culturally backdrop. Alongside the music, a narrative unfolds, detailing the art of Negargari—a traditional Persian miniature painting—which is aptly depicted on the exterior of the chest itself.

Visually, the project leverages a camera to generate dynamic images that respond to the opening of the chest. These images, including a depiction of the chest itself, are then projected, further enriching the user’s experience and blending the tangible with the magical. This interactive installation not only showcases the chest’s aesthetic but also transforms it into a portal to a world of Persian art of Negargari.


Pressure Project 3: A Sonic Quilt of Taiwan

As a choreographer, much of my creative research and artistic practice emanates from my identity as a Taiwanese-American. My choreography is deeply concerned with ideas of hybridity, multilingualism, and interculturalism. I see intercultural encounters existing within each and every interaction with another individual or environment.  

This past summer, I had the opportunity to return to Taiwan for a 6-week research trip. During this trip, I created a daily practice of capturing artefacts of Taiwan through video, photo, and sound. I am particularly drawn to sonic artefacts due to their ability to completely just place me in a fully embodied sensory memory. In all honesty, upon returning to the US in June, I had procrastinated listening to and digesting what all these sonic artefacts meant to me. This pressure project 3 felt like the perfect time to listen to and layer these artefacts into a quilt of what Taiwan sounds like to me.  

Because I had captured sound recordings daily, I spent a considerable amount of time identifying which sounds I wanted to integrate. The first sonic artefact that I instinctively wanted to utilize was an audio recording of my mom and two of my aunts in conversation. I was deeply drawn to this recording for many reasons. I can track a different closeness with each of them and I have, at various times throughout my life, lived with and depended upon each of them. There is a strong feeling and memory of home in this recording; it immediately evokes early memories of sitting around the living room table, eating snacks, and hearing a wash of languages over me. In the sound recording, they are speaking in both Taiwanese and Mandarin Chinese, sometimes switching between languages every other word. I am not very fluent in Taiwanese, but have always been so enthralled by the rhythmic quality of the language and its seven tonalities. I initially desired to split up the audio track by speaker but found this process quite difficult due to my mom and aunts interrupting and speaking over each other. 

I chose to interrupt the sequence of the conversation with recordings of birds chirping at the Sun Yat-Sen Memorial in Taipei, the sounds of cicadas on the mountains near Taipei National University of the Arts, a local temple playing rhythmic cymbals and gongs on a procession, and the theme song of the grocery store Px Mart. As I was selecting each of these sounds, I was reminded of the most quintessential sound of Taiwan through a garbage truck playing Für Elise to signal that it was time to take out the trash. At any time of day, throughout all of Taiwan, you can hear Für Elise played through the sound systems of a garbage truck to let people know it’s time to bring their trash out. I chose to layer all of these sonic artefacts together to build a cacophony. This layering is legitimately how Taiwan sounds to me—that at any moment, you can hear ancient cymbals and brass instruments against the electronic humming of Für Elise, the zooming of mopeds, and people speaking in multiple languages.  

In our in-class feedback, it was super interesting to hear how people resonated with feelings of home, comfort, and traveling in and out of different locations. I deeply appreciated how people identified that there was clearly a different meaning for Für Elise in the context of these sonic artefacts, perhaps evoking a memory of ice cream trucks in the US. I always personally experience an activation of the imagination when listening to these sounds and was encouraged to hear that others had a similar experience—that they were able to imagine for themselves what visuals or memories might accompany the sounds.  

Lastly, we briefly touched upon why I chose to use Isadora to edit the sound together and it prompted a very interesting reflection on ways of making and how different programs and software support different ways of making. It reminded me of our class conversations about Software Takes Command and how different software embody a myriad of values based upon their design and how those values might ripple down to us as users. This prompted a lot of self-reflexivity on my biases in making and what is rippling out into the work that I create. I value non-linearity in making. I frequently will take movement apart and put it back together again in a different sequence in an attempt towards meaning-making. This approach was supported through using Isadora. I felt incredible freedom to start in what ended up being the middle or climax of my sonic quilt with layering different sounds before I chopped up the conversation recording and added the beginning and ending.


Pressure Project 3

So for Pressure Project 3, I wanted to include several video game soundtracks and sound effects that I have listened to and has sort of resonated with me throughout my life. I started off by playing the Sonic the Hedgehog OST because that game was one of the first games I ever played back when I had a PlayStation 2. I played three songs that I remember quite fondly and stuck with me the most. The first song is from the Green Hill Zone which I think was from the first Sonic the Hedgehog game. The second song is the Mystic Cave Zone 2 player mode which I thought was a very catchy theme and one that I liked a lot. The third theme is from the Spring Yard Zone from Sonic the Hedgehog 1. This one was quite memorable for me as well and another one I really liked.

For the second group of sound effects, I chose to do Helldivers 2 because it is a game that I currently play. The first sound clip you hear is from when you land onto a planet with the Helldivers 2 theme playing in the background as your Helldiver dives onto the planet inside their drop pod. Then you can hear the Democracy Officer say “Let them come. Let them brawl. Let them face the insurmountable might of the Helldivers.” This voice line is one of my favorites from him and gets you motivated for the mission that awaits you. The second clip is from actual gameplay where a squad of Helldivers fights off against a horde of Terminids.

For the third group of sound effects, I chose to do Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 because that game is one of the more recent games in my Steam Library that I play with my brother and cousin. The first sound clip is from an Eternal War PVP match, where it has the music that plays when it shows the map fly around cutscene. Then it shows the class selection screen and then you hear the voice line from the faction leader that says, “Bring order to the Chapter brothers.” This voice line only plays if you are on the Adeptus Astartes team. The enemy team are the Heretic Astartes but that depends on which team you are on. The clip then plays in-game sound effects of PVP combat and voice lines from the characters.

For the fourth and final group of sound effects, I chose to do Buckshot Roulette multiplayer, which is an upcoming mode for the game Buckshot Roulette that will come out on October 31st (this Halloween). This game mode is something that I am really excited for as I have played the original single player mode and I am familiar with the gameplay (I can’t wait to play this with other people). Also, I really love the soundtrack for the game as I like the kind of music that plays in the background while you are playing the game. The soundtrack is composed by Mike Klubnika, who is also the solo developer and creator of Buckshot Roulette. The soundtrack for the multiplayer mode comes out the same day multiplayer mode releases, and I am excited for both to come out.


Pressure Project 3

Naiya Dawson Sound Project

My idea for the sound project was to find different sounds that represent me in different ways. I tried to find sounds on the site Freesounds.org that match the music and rhythm that I was envisioning in my head. I started with gathering and downloading all of my sound files and then I organized them in a way that was interesting to me. I then used garage band to edited and overlap my sounds together.

For my sounds specifically I started off with a rain/water fall sound. The sound of rain and water has always been something I enjoyed and something that helps me relax. I then added in a jazz music sound, african drums, afrobeats, and a ballet class sound to represent parts of my dance background.


Pressure Project 3

For pressure project 3, I tried to think of something centered around sound that was really important to me growing up that I would able to find resources for or representation sounds for. Something that really stood out in my memory — and what I eventually settled on — was my time in my highschool marching band. I spent all of my free time and really grew up in band, so it seemed like a good topic for an assignment about sound and culture.

I realized when doing this project that I don’t have nearly as many videos and sound recordings of my life as I would like. My photos app on my phone, social media channels, drives, and physical storage are filled to the brim with pictures capturing my life, but there are barely any videos of anything. In the current age of technology, I’m so saddened by this. It’s so easy to press record on my phone and capture things and yet there’s not a lot from this time in my life and others to work with.

With this in mind — and determined to not switch ideas or give up — I contacted some old friends and asked for anything they had, as well as scoured the internet for things that other people in the community had posted openly around eight years ago. I was able to scrounge up a fair amount of videos, so then it was a matter of making meaning out of them.

My intention with the project was to capture the feeling of being in marching band and the community that went on behind it. Most of what anyone ever see’s with performance groups is the final stage piece — polished and clean for public consumption. The final performace is a bit part of it since it’s what we work toward for months at a time, but it’s not everything. It doesn’t really capture the people that make up the performace, how we interact with one another, and the work that goes into the end vision.

To do this, I tried to mix and match videos of performace with the band goofing off and bonding. I tried to keep away from any chronological order with my source videos and tried to balance putting silly stuff next to serious stuff. I also book ended the project with the ‘standard’ announcement that all bands here at a performace and the more personal send off that our band did at the end of every practice. This mix of universiality of personal memories was also important to me in this project.

One note I have from the project was I wish it didn’t rely so heavily on the visuals. For something so centered around music, it was hard to find audio that made sense without the context of the visual to go along with it. I suppose I could have centered the audio more around a feeling than events and people, and that might have made more sense in a solely audio context, but in the moment I couldn’t justify getting rid of visuals when the medium on marching band is also highly visual. If I were to go back and do it again, I would work more towards a piece independent of video though.

Regardless, I had a good time doing this project and living in my memories for a little bit. It’s always nice to look back and feel nostalgic for awhile. 🙂