Still needs tinkering – which I’ll be doing in the next iteration of the Sandbox at Eyebeam.

Today, with the help of the amazing Jamie, I began building the holding mechanism and sanding the plexiglass hemisphere for the proof of concept prototype.  The spandex (see last post) was too complicated in terms of trying to build a parabolic tent. I think this is going to work.

I ended up buying a several yards of steel grey spandex.  Excellent projection surface, poor representation of 1980′s fashion.

I’ve decided to scale down the first iteration of  the M2A project to a modular desktop-size immersive pod (see photos of sketches).  This will likely be done with plexiglass tubing and spandex (thanks to brainstorming with Ted and Kaho).

The key will be the quality of the images so I started playing around with projection options for the visual content from the M2A.  Marko and I spent a lot of time talking about the most optimum route for the pill-cam video of the GI tract.

These are what large scale projections look like from stills of the video.  I”m encouraged by their clarity after blowing them up so large (see Jon’s canoe at the bottom of the screen of the first imagefor scale!).

M2A™: The Fantastic Voyage is an immersive installation that repurposes wireless gastroenterology devices (including the M2A™ capsule and SmartPill) that record images and information from the gastrointestinal tract in concert with artificial food scents, sound and behavioral neuroscience  to re-imagine and re-contextualize our food systems within the influences of corporate culture and industrial food production.  The project looks at the trajectory of Highly Processed Foods (transformed in a large-scale/industrial food processing facility including the addition of non-naturally occurring chemicals and compounds)  versus Whole foods  – minimal to no physical or chemical changes.

I spent the better part of the month of August doing a residency  at the Andes Sprout Society (www.andessproutssociety.us/).

My intention there was to do research on a body of work entitled The Pharmacology of Taste – which looks at the role of technology on our food system.  Set in the bucolic Catskills amongst verdant vegetation, rabbits, farmers, goats and other artists (www.refarmthecity.org/), I laid the groundwork for several projects.

The first, M2A™: The Fantastic Voyage, repurposes gastroenterology technology, explicitly wireless devices, to look at the way specific kinds of food moves from the gastrointestinal tract.  Along with gastro-enterologist Dr. Braden Kuo from Harvard University and Massachusetts General Hospital we are comparing protocols between processed foods and whole foods. I spent a lot of useful time beginning to plan the meals the subjects will take with the wireless pills by way of understanding what foods grow in the region during each season. The different kinds of food will affect the pH values within the GI tract of the subject.(See Photo of Data Graph from Smartpill device)

I also did some hands on investigative work (with the help of Erwin Karl) using a DIY bomb calorimeter – ,  the device used to measure the heat of objects through their combustion.  The end value is the amount of calories contained in that object.  From food to clothing to plants to technological devices – this initial research was designed to provide a new lens on the way in which our culture measures what we put into, onto and around our bodies.  This was inspired by a conversation with Dr. Jessica Mudry at Concordia University who is writing a book on the calorimeter. (See photos)

The end result of that experiment is that a commercial brand of tortilla chips almost burnt the farm down (chemicals and additives = highly combustible) and fresh garlic, dried beans, organic cookies and broccoli don’t burn.  Hmmmm.