Out of This World Schedule

An interactive, delegate introduction, mapping event with Kelly Andres:

Prairie Media Arts Mycelial Network
A casual facilitated session with a couple icebreakers to introduce people to one another followed with an introduction to the mycelium network map. Conference participants can add their personal or professional connections, skills, and interests to the prairie media arts ecosystem, a map that resembles a mushroom mycelia system. The map will be available throughout the conference for continual interaction. It will grow as we learn, share and connect to one another over the weekend. Additionally, an Instagram account will be set up for attendees to share their photos and ideas.

Welcome from St Paul, Elders plus announcements.

3D graphics are the building blocks for countless forms of contemporary media production including special effects, previsualizations, virtual set development, game development and many other computer graphic applications. This talk will offer an overview into the world of 3D graphics including popular software, rendering techniques, physics simulations and other practical applications to wrap your head around this new dimension of creativity.

Step into the eXtended Reality projects of Artists in Residences Laura Anzola, Clea Karst and Evan Pearce. Developed over a period of four months, the AiRs researched the significance of the UFO Landing Pad through the history and stories of St. Paul, culminating into three immersive experiences utilizing VR and AR technologies. Equipment is limited, so a sign-up form will be used on site to book your experience in the VR Salon at Portage College.

Augmented and virtual reality offer new avenues to storytelling, education and artistic expression. Join the discussion around the many applications of these exciting new technologies while gathering a general understanding of how they work and where they are heading. Oh and the metaverse too!

Featuring Laura Anzola, Clea Karst, Evan Pearce with Curator Matt Wright moderated by Vicki Chau Three artists in residence developed eXtended Reality (XR) projects inspired by the UFO Landing Pad in St. Paul. Working remotely in Calgary, Edmonton and Medicine Hat. This panel will explore the successes and challenges of working with XR technology.

Michelle Wong is a filmmaker, director, producer, activist and educator who will share her experiences as our Keynote Speaker. Along with a screening of Do Wok A Do, a whimsical short drama based on her childhood upbringing in St. Paul Alberta, Michelle will talk about the lifelong impact St. Paul has made on her storytelling both past, present and future.

Filmmaker and multimedia artist aAron Munson explores the roots of our inattention through an artist talk that will present recent and current works while discussing the exploration of attention and how it has reshaped their artistic process. The talk will invite the conference attendees to reflect upon what it means to have agency of attention in a system that has commodified and managed attention through the modes of technology with which we communicate.

Multidisciplinary Artist, award winning, internationally known, Member of the Siksika Nation. Stimson travelled with the Canadian Forces Artists Program to Afghanistan in 2010. In 2017, Stimson created, Trench a five-day durational performance on the Siksika (Blackfoot) Nation. The performance commemorates the approximately 4,000 Indigenous soldiers who served in the First World War.

Artist Talk: Experiences as a War Artist to Performance Artist to Visual Artist and back again.

Friday July 1

5:30 - 6:30 pm (dinner served at 5 pm)

Royal Canadian Legion #100

Step into the eXtended Reality projects of Artists in Residences Laura Anzola, Clea Karst and Evan Pearce. Developed over a period of four months, the AiRs researched the significance of the UFO Landing Pad through the history and stories of St. Paul, culminating into three immersive experiences utilizing VR and AR technologies. Equipment is limited, so a sign-up form will be used on site to book your experience in the VR Salon at Portage College.

By Tyler Klein Longmire
< br> CoViz_2021 is an experiment in computer vision and real-time rendering of live motion-capture data. Using scavenged hardware, a beefy computer, custom CGI, and the free Unity game engine, I wanted to create a fun and accessible party favour, where the users’ movements get mapped onto outlandish characters in a 3D, cartoon world. Up to four people can dance together in front of the Kinect camera, and their movements are translated onto their cartoon avatars in real-time. They move when you move, dance how you dance. For a brief moment, you’re a digital puppeteer. It’s glitchy, it’s imprecise, but that’s all part of the fun.

Book launch of Landscape of Moving Images: a compendium of prairie cinema.

The anthology documents artist’s work and independent film histories from Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. Covering a range of topics from individual artistic practices to the institutional histories of artist-run centres and queer film festivals, this publication assembles some of the perspectives and histories that give shape to prairie media arts.

Edited by Melanie Wilmink (independent scholar & curator) and Solomon Nagler (artist and Associate Professor, NSCAD University), this publication balances critical essays with the sensual and aesthetic qualities of the work under discussion.

Landscapes of Moving Image is an important record of independent prairie cinema and presents critical discourse and personal storytelling intertwined together within this beautiful book object. Each of the 500 copies of the publication includes multiple unique inserts and the overall design by Jayme Spinks uses creative layout and typography to engage the reader with the subject matter.

Instructor: James Kuehn. MSc. Digital Media Design

This workshop will walk you through a playful approach to using augmented reality for your artistic practices. We will consider how AR can be integrated as an added representational level with other mediums that engages your audience in new ways. Case studies of working Canadian artists using AR will be presented. By the end of this workshop, you will have produced your first augmented reality experiences.

What to bring:

No coding! No deep technical skills are required.
Laptop with internet connection and a web browser [chrome or firefox]
Charged phone or tablet [iOS or Android]
We are limited to 12 participants.

A survey of artist’s projects and experiments that explore the interconnection between living phenomena and digital technology. From early cybernetic gardens, bio-art, and 3D printing with living spores. The presentation will provide a foundation for thinking with concepts such as feminist theorist Donna Haraway’s “naturecultures” and how the merging of technology and the living can enact potential for different inter-species encounters.

Game engine software, such as Unreal Engine and Unity, are changing the way media artists create, plan and deliver their work. From video games to interactive installations to virtual production in film and television, realtime engines are allowing artists to do the unimaginable with a fraction of the budget once required. Learn the basics of game engines and how these powerful software environments are changing the way we see reality.

Hop on the rollercoaster and take a wild ride through the ever-changing world of NFTs. This discussion will cover the basics of NFTs - what they are, why the excitement, and the many ways they can be used (beyond JPGs.)

This is no hype session! We will present critical reflections on the NFT ecosystem and start an ongoing discussion that can develop during the rest of the conference.

Grant writing round table sessions led by Peter Hemminger.
Pitch your idea to get feedback and suggestions for funding.

Step into the eXtended Reality projects of Artists in Residences Laura Anzola, Clea Karst and Evan Pearce. Developed over a period of four months, the AiRs researched the significance of the UFO Landing Pad through the history and stories of St. Paul, culminating into three immersive experiences utilizing VR and AR technologies. Equipment is limited, so a sign-up form will be used on site to book your experience in the VR Salon at Portage College.

Learn the fundamentals of projection mapping during this hands-on workshop that will cover everything you need to translate your videos or animations from the screen to the real world.

Workshop will cover:
- Creating content for projection - tips on how to create content that fits the shape and context of the object you’re projecting into.
- File formats - best formats for real time playback
- Mapping - different software options for mapping and playing back your content
- Basic equipment needs including projectors, cabling and video distribution.

What to bring:
- Laptop - Mac or PC with Mad Mapper Demo installed
(https://madmapper.com/madmapper/software)

There will be a limited number of projectors available for participants. Please consider bringing your own if you are interested in practicing your mapping.

A multidisciplinary media artist, performer, and award-winning musician, Cheryl L'Hirondelle is of Métis/Cree, French, German, and Polish descent. Her work is tied to her cultural heritage.

Step into the eXtended Reality projects of Artists in Residences Laura Anzola, Clea Karst and Evan Pearce. Developed over a period of four months, the AiRs researched the significance of the UFO Landing Pad through the history and stories of St. Paul, culminating into three immersive experiences utilizing VR and AR technologies. Equipment is limited, so a sign-up form will be used on site to book your experience in the VR Salon at Portage College.

The Quickdraw Animation Society's Giant Incandescent Resonating Animation Festival is a celebration of independent animation; a showcase of inventive, beautiful, mind-altering and unexpected animated films from Canada and around the world. The Best of GIRAF17 - last year's festival, includes award winning short films that push the expectations of what animated films can be. These are not just for kids, they are films from around the world that explore unique perspectives on family, life, relationships, identity, abstract emotions, shape, and form. You'll see films animated from cyanotype photography, digital 2D animation as well as stop-motion techniques.

Music and Live Visuals with St. Paul Fiddle Performer Daniel Gervais.

Conference Wrapup with Kerry Maguire, Writer-in-Residence