Browse Books

Reviewer: Bernice T. Glenn

Mixed reality performance is an experimental format offering possibilities for new types of games, entertainments, cognitive research, and theatrical performances. The format is the subject of research by universities and performance groups worldwide. It is a hybrid creation, taking place between the real world and virtually created environments, in which artists and technologists design a performance for the viewer to experience. For example, a mixed reality performance that took place at the MiTo festival (Milano, Italy) in September 2009 involved musicians from different continents playing in such an environment. Excerpts of the performance can be viewed online (http://www.youtube.com/watch__?__v=4zo8H8TI1qE and http://vimeo.com/6817057). Authors Steve Benford and Gabriella Giannachi describe the different genres in which mixed reality performances take place with examples from the Nottingham University Mixed Reality Laboratories and others. The book draws on a ten-year series of projects in interdisciplinary studies among artists and technologists. The authors describe the development of a theory for these types of performances, based on the hybrid structures they occupy. A lengthy introduction acquaints the reader with the definitions, structures, and components of mixed reality performances and the authors' theoretical analysis methodology, which they label "trajectories." Mixed reality is performed on a continuum ranging from purely physical, real environments at one end to purely virtual environments at the other. In between these two extremes are physical environments augmented by digital information, contrasted with virtual environments overlaid with physical or real world information. Mixed reality offers both creators and viewers a complex hybrid environment for complex performances. Mixed reality performances may occupy and interact with both physical and digital environments and objects, and they may combine real, virtual, and augmented realities differently at different points during a performance. The audience may become one of the actors in a traditional performance, or the performances may occur on ordinary city streets with passersby becoming unknowing players. A mixed reality performance may also include time and spatial shifts, often occurring simultaneously in linked performance spaces. Because the mixed performance reality is so complex, mixing performance roles, spaces, clock time, and viewer/performer interactions, the authors, for their analyses, developed a theory of so-called trajectories, intertwining paths that can explain and disclose their interweaving of routes, social, and space-time structures. To support their argument, the authors show how varied forms of trajectories have been used in traditional theatrical performance plotting, architecture, maps and wayfaring, and visual arts including motion pictures. Each chapter in the book is devoted to a particular aspect of mixed reality performances, with one or two detailed examples. Chapter 1, "Hybrid Space: Between Real and Virtual, Local and Global," focuses on "Can You See Me Now," a game based on location in which players are chased through a virtual city by four performers using the global positioning system (GPS) to capture them. The authors explain how trajectories are derived from the performance. Chapter 2, "Synchronizing Time: Past, Present, Future, Replay," describes "Day of the Figurines," a very slow-moving game. A player chooses a figurine from one of the 100 available options. Players are refugees who learn to restore and maintain health by eating or drinking certain foods and by telling others to do so. Text messages are used to pick up and move objects, receive help, and so on. An example game is mapped between story times, plot time, interaction time, perceived time, and the actual clock time it took to perform. Chapter 3, "Assembling Interaction: Ecologies of Tangible and Traversable Interfaces," continues the description of "Day of the Figurines," focusing on its interactive aspects. A second example, "Desert Rain," uses a physical set consisting of six "rain curtains," where a virtual world is displayed within actual water spray curtains. In this game, six players are sent on a mission within the virtual world, and are led by an actor into a dark room, where they receive a magnetic card with a picture of the target they have to find. After receiving instructions, each player is taken to an individual cubicle equipped with a footpad, which controls the rain curtain. Each player is given a headset and microphone to wear. Players find that by moving their weight around on the footpad, they can move through the virtual environment to locate the other players/targets whose avatars they can "see." Two other case studies, "Flypad" and the "Shape Living Exhibition," are used to describe additional aspects of virtual and physical interactions in a mixed reality interface. Chapter 4, "The Experience of Mixed Reality: Spectating, Authoring, and Orchestrating," describes the creation and structure of theatrical and performance roles in three case studies. In "Fairground: Thrill Laboratory," a wearable digital system transforms fairground rides into performances. Players in "Rider Spoke" explore city streets on bicycles, recording stories and then hiding them to be found by other players and listening to stories hidden by others. Participants in "Ulrike and Eamon Compliant" are guided remotely through an urban environment by unseen characters that issue instructions. In Chapter 5, "Trajectories through Mixed Reality Performance," the authors define properties of trajectories, explore reasons to use trajectories as a medium of definition and analysis for mixed reality performances, and propose their use as a concept framework to guide researchers and artists in the field. While the field of mixed reality performance is in its toddler phase, artist and technology groups continue to engage in new collaborations. Their explorations involve possibilities for games, theater, cognitive research, player, and spectator interactions, all taking place within complex hybrid environments. Professionals in digital media, user experience, theater presentations, games, mapping and wayfaring, and museum presentations, among others, will find this book rich in possibilities for thought and ideas for future projects. Online Computing Reviews Service