Audio Augmented Reality in times of social distancing
Halsey Burgund and Francesca Panetta have been working in Audio AR for over a decade. Much of their work is geo-located: site specific work where participants can hear audio relative to physical space as they move through it. But what does that mean and how could that work in times of social distancing? Fran and Halsey have been working on coronadiaries.io to collect geo-located stories around the world as the pandemic unfolds, and to provide these stories as a resource to producers, artists and journalists to use in their work. They will talk about some of their previous projects and how they have had to adapt their work in this new world order. They will also talk about audioar.org, a site they are developing which aims to bring together a growing community of makers, and to provide a home for resources.
Francesca Panetta is a Creative Director in the MIT Center for Advanced Virtuality. As an immersive artist and journalist, she uses emerging technologies to innovate new forms of storytelling that have social impact. Previous to MIT, she worked at the Guardian for over a decade where she pioneered new forms of journalism including interactive features, location-based augmented reality, and led the Guardian’s in-house VR studio.
Halsey Burgund is a sound artist and technologist whose work focuses on the combination of modern technologies – from mobile phones to artificial intelligence – with fundamentally human “technologies”, primarily language, music and the spoken voice. He is the creator of Roundware, the open source contributory audio AR platform, which has been used to create art and educational installations for cultural organizations internationally. Halsey is currently a Fellow in the MIT Open Documentary Lab.