With no prior exposure to any kind of vision processing and in
only two hours, one graduate student configured two IEEE 1394 cameras
and wrote a VI that identified and physically located the relative position
of the orange soccer ball used in RoboCup. Other universities around the
world accomplishing the same task spend years with many students working
on the code, but with our development efficiency, one student spent one
week to create DARwIn’s soccer playing behavior control that qualified
DARwIn as the first and only U.S. humanoid robot for RoboCup.
For more information, contact:
Karl Muecke
Virginia Tech
Room 6, Randolph Hall
Blacksburg, VA 24060
Tel: (540) 231-2396
E-mail: kmuecke@vt.edu
Geraldine's Band, recorded at the Gyspy Hut, Cincinnati Ohio USA, June
20th, 2007
two brothers
hearts big as sky
kneeling by booksides
palming their frowns
reading notes handed
down from above, set to ink
set to song, set to timbres
sonorous and deep
nonsensical and sweet
and roughly upbeat -
"to sink the second emperor
you gotta rise above the first" -
a girl watched them
hidden from view
she said to me, People will surprise you.
See a poet in the man,
a boy in the child?
her new-found playmates
with heartstrings of gold
plucked by angels one June afternoon.
God smiles at her:
"Yes, child, there are others
who love like breathing
and play with magic eyes deep
to touch others' souls"
they signed on for the journey,
kindred spirits on the path
the others don't understand
but it's alright
they don't have to.
come, bring smiles all around
and gentle healing voices,
strive to make something new
of broken things
and Trust - Trust.
eventually, we'll all get there.
Tom Meier is a legend in the hobby. He has been a professional miniatures
sculptor for over 30 years, starting with Ral Partha and now with his
own line of miniatures proudly presented by Thunderbolt Mountain
BENJAMIN BRITTON
Associate Professor of Fine
Arts, University of Cincinnati
Telephone: (513) 556-4045
Fax: (513) 556-2887
Benjamin Britton is an artist who exhibits interactive artforms. His
new media journey has taken him from rooms controlled by touch screens
and joy sticks to rooms controlled by the intimate headmounted displays
made for virtual reality interaction.
Virtual reality comes in many sizes and flavors. The VR Cave at Lascaux
installation takes advantage of an "immersive" display system.
That is to say, two small monitors, motion sensors, and headphones, that
are strapped onto the head for the "immersive" experience in
the computer program. The motion sensors send movement commands to the
computer controlled installation. The virtual reality computer then translates
the motion of the head, looking up or down, turning left and right, into
real time computer animation movement that mimics the direction that the
headmounted sensors have turned.
What is remarkable about Ben's VR cave is the very high quality, 16 million
color, full motion renderings. There are thousands of paintings in the
VR cave and the detail is there to see them. Most VR games, non-dedicated
desktop vr, and VRML are conceptually exciting but grainy to watch. The
crispness of the playback from the Lascaux playback system occurs because
it takes advantage of the latest in high quantity, high speed texture
memory with dual pentium technology and high resolution image maps.
Virtual reality has been surrounded by as much hype as the Internet;
and, with just cause. Touted as a powerful learning tool and applied in
simulators by everyone from the military to the medical profession, VR
does engage all of the senses in a replication of real life experiences.
Because of the powerful quality of this full "immersion" VR
has been labeled everything from religion to drugs, from panacea to pornography.
What Timothy Leary celebrated as LSD's ability to break down barriers
within the mind, VR does without the chemical side effects.
LASCAUX is a richly rewarding experience and has provided Ben a visit
to the cave of Lascaux , a once in a lifetime opportunity. "LASCAUX
(vr) is an artwork not a commercial project," said Ben Britton. "The
French Ministry was interested in my art because it respects the cave
at Lascaux. They do not want to see the cave lose its spirit and message
through commercialization. They consider that the cave contains a rare
cultural treasure."
And what is that treasure? "I reconfirmed my interest in paleolithic
sanctuaries (of which the cave at Lascaux is one) about 5 years ago while
I was working on an environmental documentary. I had been researching
the Ice Age and came across information about the cave. The idea of recreating
the cave became more and more engaging to me, and I have been working
on it ever since. I suppose that the cave has become a spiritual phenomenon
for me. In a time when the media would have us believe that life is hopelessly
doomed, that things are getting worse, the cave stands as a message that
says: humankind will survive and prosper."
The Lascaux project recently had its world premiere at the InfoART Festival
in Quang Ju, Korea, sponsored by Nam June Paik & the Korean government
and co-curated by Cynthia Goodman and Kim Hong-hee. Ben's Artist Statement
in the catalog is as follows:
"Humanity is terrified of the future, holds civilization in contempt,
and is alienated from the natural world. We must realize the relationship
of our society today with human society of the most ancient past and most
distant future. To be a human being is to be trapped in the river of time
with countless other living forms with whom one can communicate; and,
finding that the beauty of this inescapable fact is essential for making
life on this plane worthwhile. To connect our culture to the cultures
of all time is the purpose of LASCAUX: to take part in the virtually endless
tradition of life."
Currently, Ben has a dream that would complete his tour and production
for the VR cave. "LASCAUX needs a permanent home. I will continue
to demonstrate the project in hope of generating enough support to find
a permanent installation. Hopefully, somewhere in France," said Ben.
While the real cave exists, it is now closed to the public. The thousands
of paintings are sealed behind a vault-like door made (in the style of
the Myceneaean period) during the 20th century. Unfortunately the natural
traffic of visitors after its rediscovery in 1946 brought bacteria and
moisture into the cave. It was determined by the conservators that closing
the cave to the public was the only responsible course of action to prevent
the inevitable deterioration of the paintings.
Dale McGrinn has created masterful works of art for numerous
patrons around the globe. His talent seems to have no bounds. Whether
from your imagination or His. May the painting you receive bring
awe" and admiration for generations to come.
Dale was an assistant to R_ when I was working for him. It's great to
see him up on the web.
Jan Brown Checco, classical artist in Cincinnati, Ohio
Born in 1952, Jan studied fine arts and design at Miami University in Oxford,
Ohio, and at the Art Academy of Cincinnati. Her reflective, challenging
body of work grows out of an illustrative representational experience and
subjects are frequently figurative and narrative.
A four-year residency in Paris, France, and one month of intensive study
in Florence, Italy, have had important impact on her artistic development.
She is fluent in drawing mediums, watercolor, acrylics, oils, egg tempera
and fresco. Jan is deeply committed to the promotion of Cincinnati's visual
arts scene. An arts advocacy speaker, writer, and organizer, Jan has helped
to develop art festivals, public art projects, group exhibitions, and art
education programs.
"It
is very important to
know that color changes
according to the ground
on which it is painted. I
always paint a dark red
coat under everything that
must be green like trees
and meadows. I paint the
ground of bricks and tiles
dark green and the ground
of skies warm yellow-
orange. This is the negati-
ve of the finished painting."
Leon Engelen
In June 1995, Bill Petrie had
just returned from one of his frequent trips to Greece and was working
to finish his new art studio building on his farm in Kentucky. On the
morning of June 23, a ladder slipped from beneath him and he fell
to the concrete floor seriously injuring both knees. Neighbors drove him
to the nearest town, where the local doctor gave him a box of sample medication
thought to be an anti-inflammatory. The medicine the doctor handed to
Bill that Friday morning was actually a drug called Glynaise, a medicine
to lower blood sugar in diabetics. On Sunday morning, Bill was found in
his bed in a hypoglycemic coma and flown to the University of Kentucky
Medical Center. He died two weeks later, July 9, 1995.
Of all the painting I do, portraits
are my favorite. Frequently, when I am in the middle of a series of landscapes,
I will break and do a portrait because I "need" to.
A good portrait carries with it
something that was interesting enough to have another human being lavish
hours of loving toil to commemorate the sitter. Portraiture is very different
from photography, if for no other reason than the high possibility of
failure inherent in the doing.
As much as I love portraits, I
will not do commissions. Only faces that I choose to paint. If I didn't
have ultimate control of how the sitter looked, I could not paint their
likeness.
Scroll down and click "Search
Registry," click "click here to begin," click " Ohio
Online Visual Artist Registry," Enter "Lohre" in the search
box and click "Search."
