empyrean, Melinda Rackham's online multiuser VRML world, recently won the Sound-Space Award at the Stuttgart Filmwinter,( http://www.filmwinter.de ) annual festival of expanded media in Germany.
Incorporating sound design by Mitchell Whitelaw with additional scripting and 3D modelling by Horst Kiechle, empyrean was developed with support from the College of Fine Arts, UNSW and Vislab Sydney.
Rackham has also released a video documentary of the avatars eye view of being immersed in the virtual environment for those who don't want to deleve into the technicalities of VRML, produced during her recent Australia Council Residency at Banff Center for the Arts in Canada.
Both the world and a Real videoStream can be viewed online at http://www.subtle.net/empyrean
______________
sound-space Award
sound-space is a collaboration project by Wand 5 and feuersee software
Gmbh. sound-space presents interactive sound works in the
three-dimensional space of the internet. The pieces can be experienced
together through the multiuser modus.
Jury
Kathy Rae Huffman, Director Hull Time Based Arts, UK
Nick Polys, Mmember of the Web3D Consortium, VirtuWorlds, New York
Michael G. Wagner, CEO Geometrek, member of the Web3D Consortium, Vienna
1. Prize amounting DM 5.000,-
"Empyrean" by Melinda Rackham (Australia)
2. Prize amounting DM 2.000,-
"Looking for Carbon" by Gregoire Cliquet (France)
sound-space jury statement
Empyrean by Melinda Rackham is a 3D universe that questions the nature
of virtual space. Her dramatic and sensual visuals are peppered with
fragments of words, ideas, and poetic statements. Sounds float through
the virtual reality providing an aural experience of navigation and
dimensionality. This dimensionality is created from some of humanity�s
deepest questions: what is truth, beauty, and void. Rackham�s visual
style, use of sound, and her deep existential inquiry into the
colonization of cyberspace made her the sound-space jury's unanimous
choice.
Looking for Carbon by Gregoire Cliquet pushes the concept of
collaborative sound. In Looking for Carbon-users choose an avatar and an
identifying sound which manifests their presence in the virtual space.
In this multi-user environment, the users are the focus of the action
rather than visuals. The sounds combine and interact with other user's
sounds creating a playful, cumulative audio flux.
Melinda Rackham
floating alone in the e_scapes
immersed in finite emptiness
hungry voids of nothingness..
http://www.subtle.net/empyrean
