Progress Blog for the
Burning Man 2011 Interactive Art Installation by Mister Jellyfish
and Crew
Most recent posts are on top of the page.
Made possible in part by grants from Burning Man, Reno Burners LLC,
the Nevada Arts Council, a Nevada agency, and the National Endowment
for the Arts, a national agency, and by donations from people like
you-- thank you!
July 31, 2011: Wow. Full court press and our
crew is up to the tasks! With only three weeks until we ship
the installation to Burning Man, things are ramping up here a
Jellyfish Labs. We suffered a hard drive failure and even
though I THOUGHT I made multiple backups, it turns out I've got to
re-record a day's worth of audio. How many times do we have to
relearn THAT one?!
Lots of tasks are being picked off by the crew and
we are starting to see a bit of white on the white board.
Above is the mold almost completed by GW Jax to cast the new rubber
face for Georgie Boy. The faux soda and ice machines are
completed to render a cozy little control room for all the
electronic guts. Dan's finishing up the electric stage
curtains, Munz the robotics, Nikki and the sign letters and el wire,
Chris the pulpit, Dave the smoke machine... it's all coming together
in lovely ways!
June 21, 2011: Last week's NadaDada event was a
great success. We had total proof of concept with most of the
systems and animatronic movement online in the same downtown place
from which part of the original inspiration came... the El Ray
Motel. Huuuuge thanks to our hard working crew who set up,
spent the night, hosted, took down, got drunk and flirted with
Georgie Boy. Bettie June from Burning Man HQ dropped by to
show her support and that of her two year old son who proceeded to
lay down the "what's what" of the piece to us-- absolutely
precious! Here's a few pics by Bkos and Nathan Heller:
Click here to check out this audio
demo of Dave Cherry playing Georgie Boy's state hand Vinnie Sandbag.
At the end of the show, Lightnin' brought her pro
photo rig to the "strike party" and shot amazing portraits of the
crew members. Here's Georgie Boy with our own "Meeks".
The man gets more female attention than anybody and he doesn't even
have skin yet!:
June 7, 2011: Another rained-out work party, "yet we press on for
the love of the theater!". Well, that's how Georgie Boy would
finish the sentence. Look at the disdain on his robotic face
as Posha applies her finishing touches to his fainting couch:
We're in the "full court press" for the Nada Dada event which will
be Georgie Boy's gala debut inside a real downtown Reno motel room
June 16-19.. Here's the details on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=221094544574877
It will be a "lite" installation as there's no way we could fit
everything into the tine room, and the event itself was part of the
inspiration of the piece so it's great to come back around to it.
Stop by for some box wine and Cheeze Whiz, won't you?
Here's Posha's custom outfit for our four-member barbershop "Motel
Rat Chorus" that will sing backup to Georgie during select awful
show tunes:
May 27, 2011: Ah, Springtime in Northern Nevada! We never
really get one, you know. Winter pretty much gives spring a
miss, then we spend the rest of the warmer months dodging
thunderstorms. If you don't like the weather around here, look
out a different window. It's that cold, windy bite that
motivated us to follow our lead framer, DJ Musa, to partially
construct Georgie Boy's motel room, then roll it into my garage,
close the door, and crank up the heat as we decorated it with his
"pretty things". The room (and faux coke/ice machine control
room) were framed to the exact dimensions of out new trailer that is
being retrofitted to become part of the installation led by Mr.
Fixit at his little shop of pleasures.
Nice rug, Chris!
Boxes are arriving and the work is getting thick and fun.
Let's build a show queen!
May 12, 2011: Thank you so very much to Ken Daniels, a renown Burner
who delivered this gift of lumber to the project-- Much gratitude to
you from Georgie Boy!:
May 11, 2011: Lots of fine progress, and a milestone
achieved on the project. After combing through Craigslist
twice a day for two months, I finally found and acquired the right
flatbed trailer to convey and support the life-size diorama that is
Georgie Boy:
Thanks to the out-of-the-box or rather, (or separate-box) ideas of
our own Dan and Mr. Fixit, Musa will frame up a separate box out of
lumber and faux brick panels so we can simply roll it out of my
garage and hoist it on to the trailer when it's done. This
allows us to build the "room" in earnest, with elements removed for
the Nada Dada event in June:
We've also had our share of setbacks, with a key crew member, GW Jax,
suffering a personal tragedy that has forced him to cease his
valuable contributions to prosthetics and robotics. We wish
him well and press on as good Burners should. Thus we are
using much of the same skin components that come with the Wowwee
Elvis bust and doing everything we can to significantly shape his
new "look" to that of Georgie Boy. Lightnin' and Miko removed
his hair, plucked his eyebrows and lashes, and rosied him up with
blush and yes, this is going to work very well indeed. Munz
has taken over the robotics implementation for Geogie Boy's canine
companion, Smoochy Pooch. I love how our crew deals with
setbacks with creativity and grace.
Posha joined me at the Nevada Opera rummage sale to acquire some
very important pieces including:
Red velvet theater curtains
Steamer trunk
Stage light
Rubber sheeting for roof
Here's a great pic of Annie and Lightnin's refinishing the
latter's cut-down dresser facade for Georgie Boy's back wall--
mahogany and gold, dahlings!:
While they were at that, Dan wired up the pneumatic control of
one of the four Motel Rats that will be dressed as a barbershop
quartet by the skilled seamstress work of our own Posha:
April 20, 2011: The great news is, the Georgie Boy art
installation has been "placed" at Burning Man. Look for his
dilapidated dwelling at the center of the 3:00 plaza. All of us on
the crew are delighted with this placement that provides just enough
separation from other attractions while still supporting that
"downtown motel" feel we are going for.
In other news, well...
It's worse than his sorded days "off Broadway"-- Now that he has
spent all of his successful Kickstarter money on things like skin
and silk pajamas, Georgie Boy is slumming it over on Paypal:
If you missed his fund raising debut gala on Kickstarter, please
click the link above to contribute an amount no matter how small (or
large-- oh my!) to this outrageous Burning Man 2011 art
installation. Your generosity will go toward buying Georgie Boy's
furnishings-- "pretty things" that he supposedly had moved to his
seedy motel room from his former New York penthouse.
Another great breakthrough here at Jellyfish Labs! Psilogod
was here last night and together we played with a new DMX lighting
interface and some professional stage lighting gear. By the
end of the evening, we were able to completely control the lighting
sequences from within the MIDI music software that is controlling
all of the movements of the robotic characters in the art
installation. This completes the puzzle of possibilities as we
can now have full automated control over everything that happens,
just as though an entire stage crew were running the sequences live.
I am so very, very happy about this as it is the final proof of
concept for us to move forward!
March 29, 2011: Another fine work party last weekend with
magnificent progress on several elements. Chris F. fabricated
a superb actuator from bicycle parts to actuate Munz' cable linkage
to Georgie's ankle. What does it all mean? Georgie Boy
can now dangle a satin slipper from his supple foot. El Keith
and Musa designed and framed the Wheel Of Fame that will show the
lighted spinning of letters and categories in the big sign with the
game is played. Here's a picture of Annie and Musa priming it
for good paint adherence and light reflection:
March 20, 2011: We're full-speed-ahead now ramping up for the Yuri's
Nigh Fundraiser on April 9th to paritally fund this project.
Here's a link to it on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=173188629362824&ref=tsWe've
got a great pace going on the Georgie Boy project, with half the
scheduled work days as our previous Ein Hammer art installation.
This allows for plenty of time to build the stage set, and rehearse
the show for Yuri's Night.
Posha was over at our most recent work party, grabbing some fabrics
donated by Lightnin' who's doing some recouping right now-- feel
better soon, Liz! El Keith did a fine job cutting a perfect
four foot circle out of smooth plywood baking for the Wheel Of Fame,
and we'll be building it to look like the same drum-shape as the
letters in the big sign, using the CNC machine to cut out the
letters, then back-light them. Here's a pic of Chris F wrenching
away at Georgie Boy's ankle "Mind the silk, dear boy!":
The Pawn has made stellar progress, already having build the Wheel
of Fame game into his Visual Basic 6 program that is already talking
to the Ableton Live music program that will make all of the robotic
commands as though they are musical notes, keeping the control in
the realm of us amateurs so we can make things move or change
without having to bother The Pawn for each little thing.
When I asked Dan to kindly "clean up" the solenoid array board I
made for the previous Zsu Zsu project that we use to control the
pneumatics and robotics he took it home, took it apart, and
redesigned the whole thing into a much better layout. Here he
is at his fine accomplishment:
February 21, 2011: Lots of work got shifted over the the Yuri's
Night fundraiser to benefit the Georgie Boy project. Had a
great turnout of a dozen volunteers and crew members to build the
state set.
Fundraiser poster for the project fundraiser on April 9th by the
talented Dave Cherry:
February 7, 2011: I feel so lucky I should have a big letter "L"
tattooed on my forehead... no wait... When I'm getting off the
phone with a talented genius like GW Jax or sweeping up after a work
party in my garage with our local bevy of talent and brilliance, I
feel wealthy beyond money. Check out this video shot by our
own Chris Fuqua:
It shows how we are using pneumatic actuation to enhance Georgie
Boy's sobs and elations and more importantly, you can hear the
laughter in the background of our fine crew members Annie, El Keith,
Nikki, Dan, The Pawn, Sir Adaven and Yours Truly. As we've
learned that these projects are as much a journey as a destination,
it is my fondest hope that we will continue to laugh our asses off
all the way to the playa-- a deciding point in selecting this
project.
Today I've got the house to myself so I'll get some "quiet on the
set" to record more scripts between Georgie Boy and his pet
pomeranian, Smoochie Pooch. I find that my Joe Pesci voice for
the latter comes out more accurately if I transpose the pitch up one
half-step.
January 14, 2011: Ordinance away! Thanks to Nila and Killbuck,
I just transmitted the Georgie Boy art grant application to the
Black Rock Arts Foundation to see about funding for the NadaDada
Motel event in June-- wish us luck! Will be submitting the one
to and for a Burning Man grant at the end of the month. This
is really good as it requires me to drill down to key concepts of
the art that comes in handy later when crew members ask me to
explain what the heck is in my brain.
January 9, 2011: Lots accomplished over the last couple of
months. Acquired Georgie Boy's fainting couch and he looks
hilarious reclining on it with Zsu Zsu's female mannequin body
attached Almost done retrofitting the DC relay console.
More:
11/15/10: First meeting of tech crew: assigned tasks; selected
programming language and audio software platforms.
11/24/10: Created crew chat forum, began writing scripts; acquired
fainting couch.
12/12/10: Fabricated hinge mount for robotic Georgie Boy bust on
fainting couch; designed signage.
12/26/10: Retrofitted DC relay array, test-mounted mannequin arms
and legs.
1/10/11: Launch meeting for Yuri's Night Reno fund raising event in
April; projected revenue estimate.
1/15: Completed Sketchup design
Finishing up the grant proposals for Burning Man and the
Black Rock Arts Foundation (BRAF). Killbuck is kindly taking
these images, adding his sign design below and applying his artistic
wizardry to make them look like they are on the playa both night and
day.
He'll also be taking the altered images below to
create those used in the proposal for the NadaDada Motel event in
Reno, Nevada during the third week of June, 2011:
Here's the initial image from the previous conception stage (rear
wall paper too distracting):
Tomorrow night we'll have our launce party and brainstorming
event for the Yuri's Night fundraiser on April 9th that will assist
in funding the project.
December 17, 2010: Big gratitude to DJ Musa, Bernie and Lightnin'
who came over to help install Georgie's upper torso to the fainting
couch today. We had to cut into the shoulders of Zsu Zsu's mannequin
arms and those on the bust of Elvis, and we'll be using our former
French drama queen's lower half as well as the satin pajamas drape
nicely on her legs.
Once we start the Kickstarter.com fundraiser and thanks to a
cheap source in Hong Kong, here's an idea to reward the
contributors... "Buy A Vowel". As you know, the interactive "game"
is to spin Georgie Boy's "Wheel Of Fame" to restore his name back in
lights. We can order up a shit-ton of cool little key chain
transmitters and mail them to the individuals who support the
project.
Then, they show up on the playa with their little transmitter,
walk up to the Georgie Boy installation behind people playing the
game to light up the sign, and they pull out the cool little James
Bond antenna and press the button AND IT LIGHTS UP A VOWEL EVERY
TIME SO PARTICIPANTS CAN "WIN" THE GAME FASTER! There is no better
way to make people feel special than to hand them the "keys to the
kingdom", and the sheer anticipation will drive people crazy up
until the event.
Here's a video of my daughter posing as the main character on the
fainting couch to demonstrate his arm movements. She does not
smoke or drink (as far as I can tell):
December 6th, 2010: It may be overkill, but in addition to the 24
channels of 110 A/C relays we have controlled by the computer, I'm
making a sturdy box of 48 more 12-24 DC relays as well using the
boards Professor Munz designed. Some can be used for input as
well. I used Google Docs to do a block diagram of the control
structure you can click to view here:
November 28th, 2010: Where does a month GO?! Or a Broadway
career, for that matter? Poor, dear Georgie Boy, will you ever
again see your name back in lights? Well...
We've been making great strides in the planning and technical
realms now that we've had our first meetings including The Pawn,
Dan, Evilis, GWJax, Audrey and Oz. Together, we've chosen the
software platform (MS Visual Basic) and Evilis, Aleks and The Pawn
are crafting the code that will allow our audio/robotics sequencer
to control the relays that will fire the pneumatic actuators for
larger things like Georgie's arms as well as the stage lighting.
Bernie and I hung out today and purchased a fainting couch found
on Craigslist that Georgie will recline on. I'm sorry to
disappoint my teenage daughter who wants it in her room. It's
backwards from my original drawings/concept but as soon as I change
it in Sketchup we should be better able to visualize it. Here
it is:
October 26th, 2010: Because we've been playing with the Georgie
Boy character for some time now, there's actual footage of him
(non-robotic) when he did guest appearances in my previous art
installation "Zsu Zsu: The Crybaby Drama Queen":
October 25, 2010: This is my favorite time in a Burning
Man project. Most of the crew is hibernating and getting some
well-deserved rest after this year's ambitious Ein Hammer project.
Some, however, including myself and a couple of new crew members,
are chomping at the bit to start turning the tiniest screws of the
most technical components as we commit to basic elements that can be
built during the upcoming cold winter months.
Our newest crew members include Evilis, who created an
advanced technical hack of the Wowwee Elvis Alive robot who's facial
movements can now be controlled by a PC using the popular MIDI
language. (Musical Instrument Digital Interface).
Click here for the first of Evilis' articles
on the hack.
This is huge for me as I used to write songs and jingles
in MIDI and the idea of controlling robotics with it brings it into
my realm of capabilities as I match my voice tracks to it using this
graphic interface. It will allow lots of time early in the
project to get subtle facial movements in sync with Georgie Boy's...
ahem... acting.
Also joining the crew is GWJax, builder of The Elvinator
which turned the same robotic Elvis bust into a creepy version of
The Terminator robot from the movie of the same name:
Click here to see The Elvinator Project.
Both of these chaps are infamous in their own right, with
charming southern accents that let you know they're not from around
Reno. Evilis generously donated two of his hacked Elvis heads
to the project, shipping one to me so I can hook it up to my
computer and start shaping the George Boy character to it's
movements, the other to GWJax who will painstakingly modify the look
of it to that of the George Boy character. He'll be using as a
base a cast of Jonathan Harris, the actor who played Dr. Zachary
Smith in the original Lost In Space TV series:
Another important selection that GWJax was
instrumental in was that of the base for Smoochie Pooch, Georgie's
pet dog. As we agreed there is no commercially available toy
robot dog that comes close to the look we wanted, we decided to go
with a fluffy Pomeranian that has a defiant stance and a face that
looks pissed off. Since the voice I'll be creating for it is
inspired by Joe Pesci in the movie Goodfellas, we could not resist
this little guy:
October 15, 2010: It occurred to me that I can't just offer some
push buttons to play the vignettes and that the participant
interaction should be more fun. Easy, familiar games have
always worked for me in past interactive art, so here's a new
idea...
What's the one thing the Georgie Boy character
misses since his fall from Broadway? His name up in lights!
Therefore, we'll have a Broadway style show marquis with his name
spelled in dotted letters like a green room vanity mirror.
Special thanks to Lightnin' for suggesting LED's mounted inside ping
pong balls to diffuse them.
Participants can hit the big, lighted "spin" button to
sequence the smaller letters of Georgie Boy's name surrounding the
names of the vignette categories. When the spinning letters
come to a stop, the corresponding large letter is lit, and a
vignette from the corresponding category is played as the
animatronic Georgie Boy interacts with his dog, Smoochie Pooch.
When his name is finally fully up in lights, Smoochie sings him a
song, with lots more animatronic stuff coming to life in his Motel
room in an overly happy, creepy, dream-like sequence of delusional
delight.
There's lots of influence from our 2008 project,
Zsu Zsu here. I think the crowd cheering and hoping for a
particular letter will prove entertaining and engaging.
October 4th, 2010: "Georgie Boy: Fallen
Queen of Broadway" is a concept my brother and I have been kicking
around for years. It will be a life-size diorama cut out of a seedy
Reno motel with a robotic Georgie Boy lounging and lamenting his
fall from fame as his equally robotic Pomeranian dog "Smoochie
Pooch" mocks him in a New York accent reminiscent of Joe Pesci.
I'm constantly poking fun in our Burning Man projects. With Ein Hammer is
was us Germans. Zsu Zsu mocked the French. Apokiliptika lampooned
the Russians. Now it's time for some good old flaming gay male
parody.
When my brother and I first came up
with the Georgie Boy character, it was after hearing Howard Stern's
interviews with George Tekei ("Sulu" from the original Star Trek
series). Just his laugh had us doubled over and we started leaving
voice mails for each other, trying to emulate that guttural cackle
of his.
This was before I had a creative outlet in Burning Man, and my brother
and I used to drive up to the hills above a truck stop here in the
Reno area, and key up his CB radio on channel 19 "the trucker
channel". We had an array of characters we would do in an attempt to
rally the trucker's anger at us, and none was more effective than
that of Georgie Boy. There was something about his questioning their
hetero self image by inviting them to travel up the "elevator shaft"
to his penthouse for a snifter of something sweet that made the
truckers want to literally KILL us! I made a website that is
surprisingly still up where you can hear samples of our trucker
torture at:
http://krankytheklown.tripod.com/index.htm
Anyway, the character of Georgie Boy quickly morphed to include the
influences of Jonathan Harris' portrayal of Dr. Zachary Smith in the
original Lost In Space series as well as, Prince Hapnik played by
Jack Lemmon in our favorite movie, "The Great Race".
INTERACTION:
I really want to nail down the participant interaction on this project,
and so far the ideas have included a console with a start button and
large rotary knob that allows selections including:
* Arguments
* Laments
* Show Tunes
* Flashbacks
The last of which can be played through the black and white motel TV
inside the room. These would include his glory years on Broadway as
well as the medical video of his recent colonoscopy. I would
looooove to pay tribute to the Monty Python And The Holy Grail scene
and have musical swells of show tune beginnings with Georgie Boy
getting ready to sing, only to be squelched by his dog who hates
those songs as much as I do.
It occurred to me that I can't just offer some
push buttons to play the vignettes and that the participant
interaction should be more fun. Easy, familiar games have
always worked for me in past interactive art, so here's a new
idea...
What's the one thing the Georgie Boy character
misses since his fall from Broadway? His name up in lights!
Therefore, we'll have a Broadway style show marquis with his name
spelled in dotted letters like a green room vanity mirror.
Special thanks to Lightnin' for suggesting LED's mounted inside ping
pong balls to diffuse them.
Participants can hit the big, lighted "spin" button to
sequence the smaller letters of Georgie Boy's name surrounding the
names of the vignette categories. When the spinning letters
come to a stop, the corresponding large letter is lit, and a
vignette from the corresponding category is played as the
animatronic Georgie Boy interacts with his dog, Smoochie Pooch.
When his name is finally fully up in lights, Smoochie sings him a
song, with lots more animatronic stuff coming to life in his Motel
room in an overly happy, creepy, dream-like sequence of delusional
delight.
There's lots of influence from our 2008 project,
Zsu Zsu here. I think the crowd cheering and hoping for a
particular letter will prove entertaining and engaging.
