Written and co-directed by Tony-award winning director and UCLA theater professor Mel Shapiro, the Blogger Project interweaved elements from Homer’s Iliad, the Iraq War, and Internet-based communication within a simulated gaming world on stage.
Like the Blogger Project‘s text, the visuals resulted from a unique collaboration. For the experimental production, REMAP gathered a team of professional alumni and student researchers—from Computer Science, Theater, Animation, Cinematography, and Architecture—to explore how to harness the power of a modern game engine (Unreal 2) for a dynamic flow of media. Original video segments shot by Vanessa Holtgrewe (MFA ’06) and found images were placed into Epic Game’s Unreal engine to create a navigable 3D collage. This became the ‘world’ from which each scene’s visuals were taken. The raw material was composited by MFA Animation students Maija Burnett and Meghann Artes, and layered onto an otherworldly architecture created by researchers Sheila Starace (visiting from the University of Rome) and Vids Samanta (Computer Science ’05). Computer Science doctoral student (and Design|Media Arts MFA ’04) Eitan Mendelowitz, Theater alum Jonathan Snipes (’05), and REMAP Director Jeff Burke created software to enable playback of the video footage within the 3D world, and allow the game engine’s perspective, movement and media to be controlled remotely in real time by an operator.
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Co-directed by Jim Dennen.
Cast: Brian Allman, Shawn Colten, Jason Greenfield, Lovensky Jean-Baptiste, Kyra Morris, Theodore Perkins, Jamaica Perry, Nicole Reding, Amy Rush, Sergio Savinovic, Matt Weedman.
Scenery by Francois-Pierre Couture. Lighting by Jennifer Bloom. Costumes by Sarah Le Feber with assistants Leighton Aycock and Rachel Moran. Sound by Jason Tuttle. Stage Manager: Bonnie Anderson. Production Manager: Jeff Wachtel.
Media by the REMAP team—Design / Video Concept & Direction: Jeff Burke. Director of Photography: Vanessa Holtgrewe. Software Architecture: Eitan Mendelowitz, Jonathan Snipes, Jeff Burke, Vidyut Samanta. World Design: Sheila Starace, Vidyut Samanta, Eitan Mendelowitz, Jeff Burke, Kaitlin Drisko. Compositing: Maija Burnett, Meghann Artes, Vanessa Holtgrewe. Video Production Coordinator: Ryan Dorn. Video Systems Technician: Matt Usi.
The process and production were made possible through support from the UCLA Department of Theater, UCLA Academic Technology Services (Margo Reveil), Epic Games (Mark Rein), BJ Orchid and Orchid Affair.
UCLA Department of Theater—2006.