Round Trip: from the physical space to the virtual one and back

Working towards the first work in progress show, it is the first time I am confronted to putting in practice the process of recording a physical space, with the intent of producing a spatial installation in an exhibition space, and using a virtual environment to make the transition.

This opened questions such as:

- How much of the virtual space is present in the installation? In the process, is it also a recording from that space, even though it is absent from the final experience?

- Is the virtual space really absent? It is in unity that the sound is spatialized, the user has the illusion that the sound is following their position in space when it is actually mapped for a unity audio listener.

- Cant the virtual space be an exhibition space?

- What do we gain from coming back to a physical installation?

- What are the constraints inherent to the 3D space? Those direct largely the possibilities of the installations and are being discovered on the go.

One of the aims of this experiment is to start thinking about how to use networks, the invisible that is directing and shaping our environment, as a material. To produce physical installations out of intangible features.

In this case, it is about recording sound from a square, place Saint Sulpice, mapping it in unity on a 3d model of G05, and bringing this soundscape back to the actual space of G05. All three spaces are present in each step of the process.

When recording, g05 speakers direct the way the archives are taken, the number of sounds that can be taken, and the way the square should be sequenced. Constraints appear when using unity too. Virtual speakers are able to easily simulate a surround sound system, but they will still output 2, stereo channels, which doesn’t allow to handle each speaker separately in the space as planned in the virtual one.

For all the questions it is allowing to raise, that first experiment is being very useful and aliments theory in a concrete way.