Personal Submissions

The SURF research image competition was a competition that ran during Spring 2010 and invited all researchers in Swansea University to submit interesting images created or inspired by their research. I personally made six contributions to the competiton, each structured as part of a central theme. The description of each comes from a common prologue, followed by specific remarks about the image in question, the original circumstances of the photographs used to create the final image and finally a common summation to bookend each description.

Update: Transform Our World was chosen as one of ten runners up, behind the first place image and two joint second place images. All six entires were included in the overall exhibition. The exhibition is currently on display in the Digital Technium on Campus!

With advances in the scaling down of projectors and the ever accelerating computing power of mobile phones, research is underway to create incredible reactive systems that can transform places and spaces with tightly honed projections that recreate environments at the command of the user.

"Transform Our World" shows off the power of projection to change a space, not just for the owner of the projector, but for everyone. Opening windows to other places, resurfacing objects and automatically working around existing items in the scene to create a dynamic illusion helps imagine the strange beauty of digital sorcery.

The image is a composite of a Swansea University coffeeshop and trees around Swansea bay, as demonstration and inspiration for the future of our research. For now, it was produced with image editing software. In the future, it may not have to be.

With advances in the scaling down of projectors and the ever accelerating computing power of mobile phones, research is underway to create incredible reactive systems that can transform places and spaces with tightly honed projections that recreate environments at the command of the user.

"Be Anywhere" depicts a simple room transformed into a breathtaking landscape by a projection that takes up the entire wall, yet noting and presenting the real objects hanging on the wall without interference, transporting the room to a magnificent vantage point.

The image is a composite of a Swansea University coffeeshop and Mid-Wales woodlands, as demonstration and inspiration for the future of our research. For now, it was produced with image editing software. In the future, it may not have to be.

With advances in the scaling down of projectors and the ever accelerating computing power of mobile phones, research is underway to create incredible reactive systems that can transform places and spaces with tightly honed projections that recreate environments at the command of the user.

"Conjure New Places" evokes the transformation of a tabletop into a rippling lake through projection, demonstrating the capacity of the right visual art at the right place to present unexpected beauty in the most mundane of settings.

The image is a composite of a Swansea University research office and a lake in South West Wales, as demonstration and inspiration for the future of our research. For now, it was produced with image editing software. In the future, it may not have to be.

With advances in the scaling down of projectors and the ever accelerating computing power of mobile phones, research is underway to create incredible reactive systems that can transform places and spaces with tightly honed projections that recreate environments at the command of the user.

"Display Anything" presents the capacity for the alteration of a simple surface into a work that mingles visual intensity with functionality, replacing the pure beauty of places and things with elegantly functional displays at the touch of a finger.

The image is a composite of a Swansea University restaurant and schematic graphical art, as demonstration and inspiration for the future of our research. For now, it was produced with image editing software. In the future, it may not have to be.

With advances in the scaling down of projectors and the ever accelerating computing power of mobile phones, research is underway to create incredible reactive systems that can transform places and spaces with tightly honed projections that recreate environments at the command of the user.

"Every Day Is Different" conveys the idea of being able to make a single place different, each and every day, expanding the room into great distances and bringing out artificial creatures to live within it.

The image is a composite of a Swansea University coffeeshop, a landscape view of Rhossili and swans from Broadhaven, as demonstration and inspiration for the future of our research. For now, it was produced with image editing software. In the future, it may not have to be.

With advances in the scaling down of projectors and the ever accelerating computing power of mobile phones, research is underway to create incredible reactive systems that can transform places and spaces with tightly honed projections that recreate environments at the command of the user.

"Open The Sky" is designed around the idea of being able to look up and see the sky, no matter where you might be, or which sky you might chose to view, be it a realtime view of the sky above, or the sky across the other side of the world, or a favourite evening safely stored.

The image is a composite of a Swansea University building and the sky above a beach in South West Wales, as demonstration and inspiration for the future of our research. For now, it was produced with image editing software. In the future, it may not have to be.