Sunday, September 28, 2008
Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center Relies on Lawo
Stage-directions: "Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s new Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) is rapidly approaching its grand opening — scheduled for Oct. 3-19, 2008. Billed as “an unprecedented platform for exploration where the physical and virtual intersect,” EMPAC is a cutting-edge facility whose mission is to create opportunities for artists, scientists and students that, previously, did not exist. Providing facilities for creative exploration as well as for research in fields such as virtualization and large-scale interactive simulations, EPMAC’s audiovisual core will rely heavily upon technology from Lawo."
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5 comments:
Wow... This just sounds like an insane amount of technology and equipment. Though it sounds like a great opportunity for students to learn, but excessive for a student, at least in the design field. Plus the technology is changing so fast it will be out of date relatively quickly. Just like how we had the largest theatrical network in the country for a (very) short period of time.
I think this space is great...amazing. BUt i disagree with dave. I think given that RPI is mostly a techie school, the technology in the theatre will be kept up with. Little changes won't be major financially then. And it will give the students an opportunity to work with the best, whcih is what they would demand. (I dont know any CS majors who don't have the latest and greatest technology...)
Remains to be seen as expenses for the equipment they are dealing with are not exactly something you can wait to find at a computer show like most cs majors do. It is really interesting that the emphasis of the facility is hardcore fusion of arts and technology. Fully computerized facility in not just audio and lighting, but scenery as well must have made this building cost a pretty penny for sure.
I've got a friend at RPI who is incredibly excited for this new facility to open. Students on the truly technical side of the entertainment industry (as I'm sure they are at RPI) will benefit tremendously from having access to top notch, state of the art gear.
However, putting all your eggs in one basket with a digital system like that seems to be somewhat of a reliability. There wasn't much description of the system in the article, but it didn't allude to any serious degree of redundancy. When I hear that a single device (in this case the 73 HD router) will essentially have control over all A/V in the building, I'm somewhat skeptical. From working perspective, we all would rather have separate, discrete systems per venue rather than one over arching one. I understand the need for integration and networking, but when that one router goes down, they loose everything it would seem. That will be a sad day during some festival when all their spaces are in use at the same town and the router "overheats" and shuts down, or something silly like that.
There mission here claims that they are going to create opportunities for artists that previously did not exist at all. This is a fairly daunting job that they have. There have been plenty of different outlets for artists to do experimental work. With the amount of technology involved, this space certainly has the potential to do something that hasn't been done before. It will be interesting to see what exactly that is.
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