Software for Dancers: tools to support the choreographic process

Summary Report and Recommendations

Written for the Dance Department, Arts Council of England.

15 July 2002

By Scott deLahunta

[Writing Research Associates, Research Fellow Dartington College of Art]

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Report Contents:

Aims and Objectives
Background/ Schedule
Outcomes
•	No 1: Public Seminar
•	No 2: Published Articles
•	No 3: Recommendations
Ohio State University Think Tank
Budget Report
Appendix

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AIMS AND OBJECTIVES:

“Software for Dancers: tools to support the choreographic process” was a London-based action research project.

Project Aims:

A) to develop concepts for new software tool(s) to support and augment the choreographer’s creative process. 

B) to use this focus to provide the stimulus to reflect critically on the:

1) recognition and transformation of materials and methods in the process of art making, whether computational or choreographic

2) conditions for collaborations between choreographers and digital artists / programmers

Project Objectives:

A) to organise a public seminar to present the results of the research project

B) to publish at least two articles stemming from the research project

C) to generate a list of recommendations

BACKGROUND/ SCHEDULE:

This research project came about through the convergence of projects already in development within Writing Research Associates, Sadler’s Wells Theatre/ Random Dance Company and the Dance Department, Arts Council of England (ACE). Consultation and support was provided by the Collaborative Arts Unit (CAU), ACE, which has a history of investment in the use and development of software by artists working in interdisciplinary contexts. Primary funding came from the ACE Dance Department, with in-kind contributions of space and facilities from Sadler’s Wells and Random Dance Company and participant fees from the associated companies of the four choreographers. The Artists' Development Initiative at the Royal Opera House provided the Clore Studio for the final public presentation of the first research phase. 

“Software for Dancers: tools to support the choreographic process” was conducted between April and October 2001. The primary research team comprised London based choreographers Siohban Davies, Shobana Jeyasingh, Wayne McGregor and Ashley Page working in collaboration with digital artists/ programmers from the UK and Germany: Guy Hilton, Jo Hyde, Bruno Martelli, Adrian Ward and Christian Ziegler. Two researcher/ writers, Sanjoy Roy and Saul Albert, were invited to participate in the ten research days 24 September to 6 October 2001. The overall project coordinator was Scott deLahunta with project assistance from Hazel Coggins.

An initial orientation session was organised from 24-29 June 2001. The first half of this week consisted of introductory meetings held at Sadler’s Wells Theatre in London with the research team. The second half of the week included visits to the Robotics and Artificial Life Laboratories at the University of Sussex (Phil Husbands and Inman Harvey URL: http://www.cogs.susx.ac.uk/ccnr/) and the University of Nottingham’s Mixed Reality Laboratory (Steve Benford URL: http://www.crg.computer-science.nottingham.ac.uk/) as part of broadening the base of the discussion and exploring the possibility for collaborations.

The main session took place from 24 September to 6 October 2001 and involved three levels of activity: a period of intensive Research Days running from 24 September to 3 October that involved working meetings of the primary research team. These meetings were held at Sadler’s Wells Theatre and were primarily discussion and demonstration based. There was an emphasis in the first half of the meetings on developing a collective understanding of our core task, to conceptualise rehearsal software tools, through 1) demonstrations of various types of creative software tools by the digital artists/ programmers and 2) descriptions of the choreographic process of the four choreographers. A variety of modes of investigation included: a trip to a rehearsal of Ashley Page’s at the Royal Opera House, an iMovie training day and one on one working sessions. Sanjoy Roy and Saul Albert conducted interviews and compiled writings to be distributed. In the final three or four days, the digital artists/ programmers began to develop screen-based visualisations of the emerging ‘prototypes’.

The continuous focus on the core task provided the stimulus to reflect critically on the recognition and transformation of materials and methods in the process of art making, whether computational or choreographic and on the conditions for collaborations between choreographers and digital artists / programmers. The outcomes from this collective thinking process (in particular the public seminar and published articles) were designed to contribute to the evolving discourse related to these two areas of practice more than they are intended as a starting point for actual software tool development.

Two Focus Days on 4 and 5 October followed the Research Days and a final Public Seminar took place on 6 October. For the Focus Days and the Public Seminar, the primary research team was enlarged by the participation of three groups of performing artists also working on developing software tools for use in rehearsal and live performance: Mark Coniglio and Dawn Stoppiello, Troika Ranch (New York City); Michael and Volkmar Klien and Nick Rothwell, Barriedale Operahouse (Vienna and London); and Bruno Martelli, Ruth Gibson and Kirk Woolford, Igloo (London).

OUTCOMES REPORT:

OUTCOME NO. 1:

Public Seminar

The Public Seminar was held on 6 October 2001 from 2 to 5 pm at the Clore Studio, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London. The seminar consisted of a presentation of the context for this research; three lecture demonstrations from the performance groups who were invited to participate in the Focus Days followed by a detailed description of the three software rehearsal tool concepts developed by the primary research team followed by a discussion with the public. 

The seminar was attended by approximately fifty individuals and included amongst other disciplines representation from the fields of contemporary dance and devised theatre, digital and media arts, music and architecture and computer science and engineering. A website to help publicise the research project and the Public Seminar is archived here: http://huizen.dds.nl/~sdela/sfd/. Advertisement was targeted using email lists, direct contact via email or otherwise with key individuals and word of mouth. This was to ensure the project would present its outcomes to a keenly interested and somewhat informed public. A detailed list of attendees is included in the appendix.

The seminar was composed of three sections as follows:

[I] Context for the Research: Scott deLahunta gave a short presentation articulating some of the historical and cultural contexts from which the project had emerged. See the Appendix for a written statement that was handed out to all attendees.

[II] Lecture / Demonstrations: The three outside groups who participated in the Focus Days and the Public Seminar (Troika Ranch, Barriedale Operahouse and Igloo) showed the following software tools they are developing for use in rehearsal and live performance.

ISADORA (Troika Ranch): a new interface that enables dancers to work directly with digital media synthesis (video, sound, text and graphics) via an easy to use / voice recognition interface. This software is designed and written by Mark Coniglio (composer/ programmer) and Dawn Stoppiello (choreographer) of Troika Ranch, a New York City based performance company. For more information see URL: http://www.troikaranch.org/ and http://www.troikatronix.com/.

CHOREOGRAPH (Barriedale Operahouse): ChoreoGraph is described as a software tool that "supports rule-based, non-linear creative processes". This version of the software is being developed in conjunction with the choreographing of Duplex, a duet that will be based on the ChoreoGraph system. The choreographic components for the piece are mediated via an algorithmic core that provides a realtime visual display for the dancers, and cues and plays the components of the musical score, according to a set of nonlinear constraints that form the overall choreographic structure. This work was commissioned by Ballet Frankfurt and premiered on 6 and 7 March 2002 in Frankfurt, Germany. Stimulus funding has been provided by the Collaborative Arts Unit, ACE. For more information see URL: http://www.barriedale-operahouse.com

PERFORMANCE TOOLS (Igloo): Igloo, a London-based performance and technology company, creates and develops their own small scale, re-useable software tools for particular performances. These range from the ‘scratch dancer’, pre-recorded video of dance movements that can be manipulated backwards and forwards through moving the mouse to ‘asci effect’ which uses the computer to analyse video image in real time and map graphical effects to it. For more information see URL: http://www.igloo.org.uk/

[III] Software Rehearsal Tool Concepts: The three main ‘rehearsal tool’ concepts/ prototypes developed by the primary research team were the Annotation Tool, the Choreography Notebook and the Inspirational Tool. The first two of these were illustrated by prototypes developed by Adrian Ward and Christian Ziegler using Apple Script and Director. The third was explained by the use of a downloadable L-systems modeller (available here for Macs: http://shakti.trincoll.edu/~bhorling/lsystems/).

ANNOTATION PLUG INS/ making modules for pre-existing video software:

Apple Macintosh’s well-known user-friendly video editing tool i-Movie provides a lot of the functionality a choreographer needs in terms of editing and manipulating video for use during the rehearsal process. Annotation plug Ins would provide additional functionality specific to a choreographer’s needs to allow comments of various types to be easily added to the video material, e.g. sketching or drawing directly on the video image, appending verbal instructions. Perhaps to have at hand algorithmic (rule based) editing tools would enhance the usefulness of a programme like i-Movie for choreographers significantly. This sketching tool could be connected to a mouse or to a graphics tablet (picking up on Bruno Martelli’s original simple sketching concept to be developed in Director).

CHOREOGRAPHY NOTEBOOK/ a collective digital organisation tool:

This concept is to provide a timeline/ organisational/ information management type of multimedia tool particular to a performance making process (one can think outside of dance here). Database and indexing structures would be as crucial to the choreography notebook as would digitisation (input) processes and interface design. Both Christian Ziegler and Barriedale Operahouse are working on this type of concept. The ChoreoGraph described above is intended eventually to include these types of capabilities. In addition, Nik Haffner (former Ballet Frankfurt) has held discussions with William Forsythe (and Christian Ziegler) regarding the making of a software tool that would support the documenting and archiving of an ensemble creative process in such a way that everyone has access, a “democratic distribution of information for everyone involved in a production, every dancer, every technician”. There is a paper online which Nik Haffner has written and in which he and Christian Ziegler both discuss this possibility: http://www.frankfurt-ballett.de/nikmedia.html.

INSPIRATIONAL TOOL/ the computer as a creative partner:

Whereas the other two software concepts can be seen as primarily useful during the rehearsal process itself, the inspirational tool is conceived of as something that stimulates the imagination possibly during the pre-rehearsal process when one is exploring starting points. This was also the ONE idea that relied on what the computer could uniquely contribute to a creative process as different from the augmentation to an existing creative process the other two concepts are intended to provide. The computer is very good at generating unexpected and complex visual patterns based on rather simple instructions. One area in which this capability has been explored is in Artificial Life (AL) where biological systems are modeled in the computer. To explore this idea, we experimented with the Lindenmayer System that is used to study the evolution of plant systems (another possibility would be Markov Chains a tool for linguistic analysis). The idea would be to create small software tools for experimenting with relationships between rules and emergent structures.

OUTCOME NO. 2:

Published Articles

Two articles stemming directly from the project were written and submitted for publication in key dance/ performance journals. The intention was to write one that would be accessible to the dance field and one that would emphasise software related aspects. The first was published in Dance Theatre Journal, Vol. 17: No. 4 (contact Dance Theatre Journal through the Laban Centre website: http://www.laban.co.uk for a copy of the issue). This article, "Technological Process", by project participant Sanjoy Roy is a lucid and succinct description of the project and includes most of the main conclusions reached by the research team set in the context of the project. The second, entitled “Software for Dancers: Encoding Forms” by Scott deLahunta, has been published in the ‘Translations’ issue of the journal of Performance Research, Vol. 7: No. 2, June 2002 (contact Routledge/ Taylor & Francis to order a copy of the issue: http://journals.tandf.co.uk/). This essay engages with the question "what is software?" as a reflection on and extension of the Software for Dancers research project based in London in Autumn 2001. It defines and seeks interrelations between aspects of software arranged under three headings: software as a language; as a tool; and as a material.

Both of these articles are available on line at http://huizen.dds.nl/~sdela/sfd/.

OUTCOME NO. 3:

Recommendations

As described above, three specific ‘rehearsal tool’ concept/ prototypes (Annotation Tool, the Choreography Notebook and the Inspirational Tool) emerged from the group’s collective research process. However, it was not the intention of the project that these particular ideas would necessarily be taken to the next stage of development by this team. Therefore, rather than suggesting the development of a particular software rehearsal tool, the following recommendations aim to support the continued development and nurturing of the conditions from which a variety of types of software for dancers might emerge. Overall, these recommendations favour ways forward that are diversified, collaborative, developmental and process oriented. The outcomes of the “Software for Dancers” research project can function as a framework within which to consider further proposals and projects along these lines.

[It is relevant to provide a brief update on the state of two of the softwares demonstrated/ discussed during the Focus Days and the Public Seminar: Isadora and ChoreoGraph. These two projects, originally developed to support the specific needs of the artists involved, are currently aiming towards providing more widely useable software tools for the dance community. At the time of finishing this report, Isadora is available on line (at http://www.troikatronix.com/), and it has a growing community of artist users (e.g. choreographers, sound/ installation artists, VJs and other media artists, etc.). ChoreoGraph is still in the process of seeking funds for further development; details can be found in the conversation with Barriedale Operahouse published online at: http://huizen.dds.nl/~sdela/sfd/barrie/.]

RECOMMENDATION NO 1:

INVESTMENT IN RESEARCH

Software specific research/ development and dissemination platforms

Firstly, choreographers, digital artists and programmers should be encouraged and supported to collaborate further on the investigation of software for dancers with an emphasis on the creative process (as different from the finished work or performance), interdisciplinary (choreographer/ coder) collaborations and on the sharing of research and code. This work has already (as evidenced by the involvement of Troika Ranch, Igloo and Barriedale Operahouse) been happening as a growing number of performance makers are building and/ or using software tools as a part of their creative practice; often along the interdisciplinary borders of the dance field. The “Software for Dancers” research project helped to draw this work closer to the centre of the dance field/ community, but a more developed support framework that would enable future artist led initiatives along these lines (process orientated, interdisciplinary, collaborative, etc.) is needed to help to sustain this orientation.

Secondly, to create the most generative conditions for artistic software development, it is essential that the various funding bodies and organisations involved work together to develop appropriate strategies and policies related to the development and dissemination of creative software tools. In Monaco in December 2000, there was a meeting involving software specialists Mark Coniglio, Bruno Martelli, Robb Lovell, Kirk Woolford, Guy Hilton and Richard Povall to discuss a variety of issues including evolving standards, programming practices, intellectual property rights and open source and also funding support/ strategies for this expanding area of the practice (excerpts from the transcript are available here: http://huizen.dds.nl/~sdela/sfd/monaco). From this discussion it became clear that there are issues related to software development that could be better understood and supported by funding bodies in general. Important contributions to this area of discussion can also be found in the outcomes from the April 2001 CODE (Collaborative Ownership in the Digital Economy) conference: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/CODE/. Organised by the Collaborative Arts Unit, ACE in collaboration with Crucible at Cambridge University, the conference firmly established the parameters of the current debate around software development and shared ownership, covering topics ranging from code as artistic material to new models for licensing creative work.

RECOMMENDATION NO 2:

INVESTMENT IN LEARNING

Digital Literacy for Choreographers: workshops and training

This recommendation is for more direct investment in choreographers learning and using digital video editing software and hardware in the studio. One of the early conclusions arrived at during the Software for Dancers project was that over the counter portable digital video hardware and user friendly video editing software is readily available and more than sufficient to support the rehearsal process. However, choreographers tend not to have achieved the necessary level of ‘digital literacy’ to work with this relatively simple technology. Apple Macintosh’s iMovie may be ‘user friendly’, but still requires the user to be very familiar with a range of technologies from video compression to storage capacity and video editing interfaces.

In addition, it is recommended that those artists already developing software be supported to give workshops or set up laboratories related directly to the usage of these softwares in the creative process. Any of the three software related projects currently in development (i.e. ChoreoGraph, Isadora and/ or the Igloo Performance Tools) could be presented in this type of context. Dance organisations that support creative process would be ideal for such workshops, e.g. Essex Dance Agency, Chisenhale, etc, but it is also suggested that they could be organised in collaboration with digital media arts organisations such as Lighthouse in Brighton, IDEA in Manchester, etc. Such workshops or laboratories would be important for continuing the legacy of ‘Digital Dancing’ in London and the UK (please see the introductory essay in the Appendix).

RECOMMENDATION NO 3:

INVESTMENT IN ART-SCIENCE-INDUSTRY RELATIONSHIPS

Cross-Disciplinary Research

This recommendation goes beyond the specific aims and objectives of the “Software for Dancers” research project, but is an important extension of its reflections on the conditions for collaboration across different fields of practice. The orientation visits to the Robotics and Artificial Life Laboratories at the University of Sussex and the University of Nottingham’s Mixed Reality Laboratory (MRL) as part of the June session introduced the possibility of collaboration between the choreographers and computer scientists/ engineers. This recommendation is that such initial meetings be encouraged as they may lead to collaborative projects of significant cross-disciplinary value.

Context: The rapid development of technology is challenging its developers (computer scientists and engineers) to find creative human centred projects to feed back into the research process. Wireless and wearable, miniaturised and portable, collaborative software platforms, interactive (smart) buildings and spaces, distributed and ubiquitous computing; R&D in all these areas is highly receptive to creative collaboration with practitioners from the field of performing arts. The foundations for such collaborations are already in place in the United Kingdom as evidenced by several past and current developments including: the establishment of the sci-art consortium; the creation of NESTA; Year of the Artist residencies; the Collaborative Arts Unit (CAU/ ACE) fixed term funding for cross-disciplinary organisations such as Arts Catalyst and other CAU initiatives and co-funded projects including the Cambridged based New Technology Artists Fellowships.

[ END OF RECOMMENDATIONS ]

OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY THINK TANK:

From 25-27 January 2002, a related project took place at Ohio State University (OSU) in Columbus, Ohio, under the umbrella of the new “Interactive Performance Series” in OSU’s Dance and Technology program. The International Think Tank on “New Performance Tools: Technologies / Interactive Systems” was a weekend research laboratory that brought together a small group of professional artists with established practices to explore the practical and conceptual implications of working with interactive tools, instruments and computer-controlled systems within performance conditions and exhibition-installation contexts. Organized by Johannes Birringer and Scott deLahunta as a collaboration between the Interactive Performance Series (OSU) and Writing Research Associates, the Think Tank was funded primarily by the Office of International Affairs and the OSU Dance Department. Originally conceived of as a follow up to “Software for Dancers: tools to support the choreographic process”, the OSU Think Tank evolved into a parallel initiative in North America, with links to South America. There is a substantive report online at: http://www.dance.ohio-state.edu/workshops/ttreport.html.

APPENDIX:

Public Seminar: written statement/ contextualising introduction:

Software for Dancers – Introduction

In January 1967, computer scientist/ artist A. Michael Noll (one of the first to explore and espouse the convergence between computers and art), wrote an article in Dance Magazine entitled "Choreography and Computers", in which he described a software program he was creating that would indicate stage positions of stick figures and could potentially be of use to choreographers. In the same issue, Ann Hutchinson-Guest (an authority on dance notation) wrote "A Reply” to A. Michael Noll's speculations, in which she writes that the computer will “never replace” the facility a choreographer has for composing movement with the dancer. However, she does concede that the computer might assist in the overall outlining and editing of a score for a dance.

Since that time, we have witnessed the development of digital technologies along a trajectory that can best be described as largely unexpected in the main instances, i.e. the take up of the home pc in the mid 80s and the sudden explosive growth of the internet in the mid 90s. As compared to the society of the 1960s (referred to in the above paragraph), digital technologies are now integrated to an extraordinary extent into our daily lives. In many areas of arts practice, there has been an equivalent pickup of digital technologies both in the ways in which the technologies are used in the creative process (e.g. composition of music, still and moving images) as well as in the generation of a range of arguably ‘new’ artistic practices where we see the blurring of boundaries between maker and viewer, audience and user.

Digital technologies have also infiltrated performing arts practice to varying degrees with artists exploring access to the internet as an alternative performance and communication space, developing interactive systems by which a performer’s movements are taken as input and mapped to various outputs, working with sophisticated motion capture and animation technologies either as part of an interactive system or in the production of an animated video or film. Frequently, these projects involve artists trained in the fields of dance and theatre practice developing close collaborations with digital media artists. The creativity and knowledge the digital media artist may bring to the project will vary. They are often particularly skilled with music, graphic, still and moving image composition software tools – there is also a good chance that they have additional skills in scripting or programming their own software. In other words, as a part of their arts practice, they are able to customize existing software tools or even fashion their own from scratch.

Since the early 1990s, the organising of short, intensive workshops has provided important opportunities for performance and technology collaborations. One of the first, the Shadow Project workshop in Jackson Hole, Wyoming in 1991 was organised by Thecla Schiporst and John Crawford, followed by similar workshops at San Francisco University in 1992 and 1993, 1994 and 1995. In the UK, Terry Braun and Illuminations Interactive organised the Digital Dancing workshops every year from 1994-1998. Several of the participants in Software for Dancers have taken part in Digital Dancing workshops.

As interest in integrating dance and technology has grown, in the areas of both practice and critical discourse, as computers have increased in speed and memory capacity and accessibility, as more artists have developed programming skills as a part of their practice, and as methodologies for collaborative arts practice are evolving; Software for Dancers was conceived as a project to explore the relationship between the practices of coding and choreography. The central task devised to facilitate this exploration called for the organization of a research team that would develop concepts for a software rehearsal tool(s) for choreographers. 

Interestingly, despite all the developments in technologies of the last 34 years, conceptually Software for Dancers has had to take as one of its starting points the dialogue started by A. Michael Noll and Ann Hutchinson in 1967. But equally, because of the developments in the last 34 years, Software for Dancers has been able to rigorously test a set of concepts in the context of an incubator for an exchange of information about creative processes irrespective if they are computational or choreographic processes. It is some of the results of this investigation we hope to share with you.

Public Seminar: 

List of 47 attendees:

Alice Angus
Christopher Bannerman
Synne Behrndt
Ghislaine Boddington
Terry Braun
Susan Broadhurst
Carol Brown
Emilyn Claid
Gill Clarke
Susie Crow
Phillip Davies
Alex Davin-Smith
Ann Dickie
Alison Duthie
Kaite Ellwood
Bronac Ferran
Portland Green
Simon Hide
Catherine James
Ben Jarlett
Marie Hermo Jensen
Joey Julien
Brandon LaBelle
Giles Lane
Alessandra Lopez y Royo Iyer
Sophia Lycouris
Joanna Mayes
Jennifer Mclachlan
Carolina Melis
Sophia New
Kia C Ng
Anne Nigten
Bee Ong
Joanna Parker
Erik Rehl
Daniel Belasco Rogers
Isabel Rosa
Sarah Rubidge
Martin Russell
Nic Sandiland
Jeanette Siddall
Anne Sobotta
Maria Softsi
Gregory Sporton
Luis Molina Tanco
Dennie Wilson

Statement of Interest, but unable to attend:

J. Davin-Smith
Josh Hill
Joukje Kolff
Petros Lafazanidis
Anna Lucas
Kari O'Nions
Mike Weinstock
Richard Widgery

Acknowledgements:

Thanks to:

Saul Albert
Steve Benford
Roman Bezdyk
Phillip Burton
Hazel Coggins
Mark Coniglio
Sue Davies
Bronac Ferran
Ruth Gibson
Kristina Hart
Inman Harvey
Guy Hilton
Phil Husbands
Joseph Hyde
Shobana Jeyasingh
Michael Klien
Volkmar Klien
Sophia Lycouris
Rebecca Marshall
Bruno Martelli
Wayne McGregor
Jennifer Mclachlan
Anne Nigten
Ashley Page
Philippa Rooke
Nick Rothwell
Sanjoy Roy
Bruno Silva
Alistair Spalding
Dawn Stoppiello
Adrian Ward
Kirk Woolford
Christian Ziegler

Project Related URLs:

Software for Dancers (http://huizen.dds.nl/~sdela/sfd)

Adrian Ward (http://www.adeward.com/)
Arts Council of England (http://www.artscouncil.org.uk)
Ashley Page (http://www.royalopera.org.uk/)
Barriedale Operahouse (http://www.barriedale-operahouse.com/). 
Christian Ziegler (http://www.movingimages.de/)
Igloo (http://www.igloo.org.uk/). 
Joseph Hyde (http://www.theperiphery.com/)
Random Dance Company (http://www.randomdance.org)
Sadler's Wells Theatre (http://www.sadlerswells.com/)
Saul Albert (http://twenteenthcentury.com/saul/) 
Shobana Jeyasingh (http://www.shobanajeyasingh.co.uk) 
Siohban Davies (http://www.sddc.org.uk)
Troika Ranch (http://www.troikaranch.org). 
Wayne McGregor (http://www.randomdance.org)

CODE (Collaborative Ownership in the Digital Economy): http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/CODE/

Ground Work Report (http://www.dartington.ac.uk/~s.delahunta/ace/gw/)

Ohio State University Interactive Systems Think Tank Report
(http://www.dance.ohio-state.edu/workshops/ttreport.html)

Robotics and Artificial Life Laboratories at the University of Sussex
(http://www.cogs.susx.ac.uk/ccnr/)

University of Nottingham’s Mixed Reality Laboratory 
(http://www.crg.computer-science.nottingham.ac.uk/)