Kids from a day camp come and play with large red balloons provided by “99 Red Balloons: A game of flying perspectives” in San Jose, Calif. The game is a part of the Inter-Society of Electronic Arts (ISEA) ZeroOne 2006 art festival.
San Jose’s Cesar Chavez Plaza was covered with \r\n”maverick flying red messengers” on \r\nAug. 9. The game was partly inspired by William Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and is \r\nmeant to be played outside. Because of the aerial \r\nviews captured by the wireless camera, it is likened to a dream-like state.
The balloons used in artistic expression by Jenny Marketou are filled with helium, and \r\nsuspended using a 30-foot-long tether.
New York artist Katie Salen (on left) developed the rules for “99 Red Balloons.” The game is ideally played with nine teams and 18 balloons. Each team is led by a “Spy Fairy” and “Aerial Navigator.” The Aerial Navigator has a tech-free red balloon to attract the public, while the Spy Fairy has a balloon equipped with a wireless camera. The game’s objective is to re-create the game of hide and seek and document what is improvised and found.
About half of the balloons in the art display include a small, wireless camera. Jenny \r\nMarketou, the artist who developed the art project, has been interested in the development \r\nof surveillance for many years.
On Net Surveillance Systems, Inc. provided the technology used to capture and archive \r\nimages retrieved by the wireless cameras used on the red balloons. They can get feeds from \r\nup to four cameras at one time, though Marketou claims to have had a more efficient \r\nexperience with analog rather than wireless systems.
Both Jenny Marketou and Karen Salen claim to have seen some really interesting images from \r\nso high in the sky. Marketou, while interviewed, commented on the response people have \r\nwhen seeing themselves from the birds-eye view angle. When shown, most captured on aerial \r\nvideo are surprised since they have never seen themselves from that perspective.
Bill Detwiler is the Editor for Technical Content and Ecosystem at Celonis. He is the former Editor in Chief of TechRepublic and previous host of TechRepublic's Dynamic Developer podcast and Cracking Open, CNET and TechRepublic's popular online show. Previously, Bill was an IT manager in the social research and energy industries. He has bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of Louisville, where he has also lectured on computer crime and crime prevention.
