February 27, 2007
February 26, 2007
Documentation of Xavier User Test
Click on an image to view all....
February 02, 2007
First Experiment
Today, with the help of some very awesome volunteers, I executed my first experiment. We walked from school to the lower east and took pictures. I decided to put no restrictions on the methods in which the pictures were taken (there are no real restrictions in the real world). The only requirement was that everyone use their regular camera AND their camera phone. Here are all the results.
I then asked everyone to write me a short email addressing the following questions:
*Was there an observable difference in how you felt shooting with your camera and your phone and if so what was it?
Did you find that there was a difference in what you chose to shoot with each device? (ie was finding things to shoot with your phone more difficult/easier?)
Which device do you most use to take pictures when you are out with friends? walking around the city? onuuuijghj vacation?
Which set of pictures overall do you like more, the ones from your phone or the ones from your camera (or do you feel the same about both))?
If you didn't like the ones from your phone, do you think you would like them better if the phone had a better camera?
*How is photographing in an urban environment, specifically on the street, different then photographing in other situations?
Read on for the responses.
January 25, 2007
Project Number one
I think it is easier for me to think of this project right now by splitting it up into smaller projects. So I have decided to make project number one for myself (due theoretically in the next two weeks). I want to gather up a bunch of ITP students (I have a couple of volunteers but I will hopefully get more through a nice email to the student list) to go out for a few hours of shotting in NYC. The people who choose to come must have two things, a camera (either digital or film...although digital is much easier...either point and shoot or SLR) and a camera phone with either an MMS plan that will allow them to send the pictures to an online space or bluetooth so they can send them directly to my computer. Ideally these people would also be interested in taking pictures, not trained photographers (although they can be) but not ambivalent to the whole process either. The plan is simply to go out and take pictures, shooting each image with the camera and the camera phone. I am not sure what exactly will come of this but I do believe that there is a fundamental difference somehow between the use of each, a difference that is physical, social and psychological...perhaps. I will post the results. Hopefully, I can make this happen next week.
January 20, 2007
What is freeFormed?
Originally written for the Identity in a Networked World graduate student symposium:
FreeFormed.org is a web and mobile phone based project conceived by five master’s degree candidates in the Interactive Telecommunications Program at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Collectively, we took notice of the trends in online social networking and media sharing and felt that there was a significant problem, not only in the structure and architecture of many of the more popular media based sites which often promote lack of searchability and connectivity, but also in the social networking world, which currently appeals to a very specific demographics and where emphasis is placed more often then not on the quantity of relationships rather then the quality or the significance. We also took note of the trends in mobile posting and mobile development and felt that while many sites were doing interesting things, there was still a gap between the technology and its function within the online community.
FreeFormed is an experiment aimed at bridging that gap by encouraging the use of mobile phones in the development of online circles of conversation, emphasizing media as the point of connection rather then arbitrary self-serving definitions of identity. We are not opposed to the current popular sites working in this vain, we use them ourselves. We simply think there may be other ways to facilitate connectivity and a sense of community online that have the potential to produce different results then what we see now.