Trip Report: INTERSCULPT 2003
October 13 - 18, 2003
Stewart Dickson
dicksonsp@ornl.gov


Venue:  FNAC Digitale
77-88 Boulevard Saint Germain-des-Prés
Paris, France

INTERSCULPT has been held biennially since 1993. It is organized by l'Association Ars Mathematica, a nonprofit organization based in Paris. I have been involved, via the Internet in Ars Mathematica since the beginning. INTERSCULPT has been an international event since 1995. I have attended INTERSCULPT in Philadelphia, 1995 and Tempe, AZ (Arizona State University) in 1999. I have never attended the Paris venue before.

On Tuesday, October 14, 2003, I met Alexandre Vitkine, co-founder of l'Association Ars Mathematica. I have met Mr. Vitkine previously, via teleconference between Philadelphia and Paris in 1995 and at a conference on Art and Mathematics held in Maubeuge, France in 2000. Mr. Vitkine was a contemporary of John Whitney, Sr. Mr. Vitkine created analog electronically-generated animated films circa 1963 using electronic signal generators. <http://arpam.free.fr/vitkine.html>

At FNAC Digitale, Mr. Vitkine demonstrated cutting mathematical curves and surfaces using a Charlyrobot 3-axis CNC mill. Software: Gfao3d <http://www.charlyrobot.com/> Mr. Vitkine is 93 years old. He showed up every morning at 10:00AM and worked until 8:00PM each evening.

I met Dominique Gonzales, 52 bis, rue Anatole, Villejuif, France. Ms. Gonzales was the English-French interpreter for English-speaking presenters, such as myself. I spent considerable time familiarizing Ms. Gonzales with my presentation and answering her questions on the French meaning of various technical English words I used.

I met and spoke to Mr. Jean-François Bonnet, Manager of Information Technology and Audiovisual Media at Ecole Central D'Electronique, Paris, who was in charge of several students who were assisting in audiovisual and computer network setup for INTERSCULPT 2003 at FNAC Digitale. <http://www.ece.fr/> <bonnetjf@ece.fr>

I met and talked to Eric Mangé, Communication Manager for FNAC Digitale concerning technical requirements for my presentation. Mr. Mangé also told me about science fiction author, Bernard Werber, who collaborates on the series of cultural events held periodically at FNAC Digitale, such as INTERSCULPT 2003. Mr. Werber holds monthly public salons at FNAC Digitale at which he discusses various possibilities for the future of humanity. <http://arbredespossibles.free.fr/>

I met and spoke to Christian Lavigne, founder of l'Association Ars Mathematica, the Intersculpt organization and Program Manager of INTERSCULPT 2003. <http://www.intersculpt.org> <http://www.pimkey.com/~interscu/am.htm> Mr. Lavigne was concerned about the viability of the International Sculpture Center (New Jersey) Computers and Sculptors forum. Active since 1992, the ISC Computers and Sculptors forum seems to have become dormant compared to Ars Mathematica (France) and Fine Arts, Science and Technology/UK (FAST/UK).

Mr. Lavigne told me that representatives from the Savannah (Georgia) College of Art and Design <http://www.scad.edu> were present at the October 10 opening of INTERSCULPT 2003 at FNAC Digitale. SCAD had a strong presence at SIGGRAPH 2003 in San Diego. SCAD is starting a school in La Coste, France. The SCAD representative(s) at INTERSCULPT seemed interested in CyberSculpture.

Mr. Lavigne told me that the French Ministry of Research has subsidized the travel for the foreign presenters at INTERSCULPT 2003. <http://www.recherche.gouv.fr/> I had dinner and spent the evening with Christian Lavigne and his wife, Saly in their apartment a 1 Cour de Rohan, in the Latin Quarter, about two blocks from FNAC Digitale.

On Wednesday, October 15, I met Assistant Professor Vinay Pathek, Department of Computer Science and Mr. A. Raj Chatterjee, Manager of a Manufacturing Laboratory, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, India. I met the two gentlemen at 10:00AM in the lobby of the hotel in which they were staying and guided them to FNAC Digitale, about three blocks away. Professor Pathak and Mr. Chatterjee showed me computer-printed 3-D reproductions of two different, famous statues of Buddha and Buddha's Lamp, important Indian cultural artifacts which had been digitized using a non-contact, structured-light 3-D digitizing device.

I met and spoke to André Morriseau, Information Technology consultant to the French Ministry of Agriculture. Mr. Morriseau has developed and maintains the on-line Internet/Web facilities for the French commodities market (Meat, Poultry, etc.). Mr. Morriseau explained to me some of the details of the systems he has developed.

I spoke by telephone to Mr. Fréderic Ortun, an on-line, internet content developer. I answered some of his questions on my digital sculpture. I had dinner and spent the evening with Christian and Saly Lavigne in their apartment.

On Thursday, October 16, I met and spoke to Keith Brown, Lecturer at the College of Art, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK. I have known Professor Brown since 1995. Mr. Brown is founder of FAST/UK and a co- founder of MIRIAD: The Manchester Institute for Research and Innovation in Art and Design, a multidisciplinary consortium at Manchester Metropolitan University. <http://www.miriad.mmu.ac.uk/>.

I met and spoke to Robert Michael Smith, New York Institute of Technology. I have known Mr. Smith since 1992. I met again and spoke to André Morriseau. I met and spoke via videoconference with Paul Higham, artist from the UK, living in New Orleans, Louisiana. I met and spoke via videoconference with Mr. Mohammed Kourouma, Instructor of Sculpture at the Fine Arts School of Dakar, Senegal, West Africa.

I spent the day at INTERSCULPT 2003 at FNAC Digitale. In the morning, I supervised opening the exhibit and starting the video projection. Christian Lavigne did not arrive until 2:30PM. I had dinner and spent the evening with Robert Smith, Keith Brown, Christian and Saly Lavigne in their apartment.

On Friday, October 17, I met and spoke to Mr. Rinus Roelofs, sculptor and CAD instructor, who lives in Holland. <http://www.rinusroelofs.nl/> Again, I was at FNAC Digitale at 10:00AM to open the exhibit. In the afternoon, the INTERSCULPT 2003 Presentation Program began in earnest.

Professor Ian Gibson, Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Hong Kong, on study leave in Singapore, gave a presentation via videoconference. Professor Gibson has studied how VR and CAD user interface either speeds or impedes creative use. <http://hkumea.hku.hk/staff_igibson.htm>

Form-Z <http://www.autodessys.com>, for example lacks an intuitive user interface. Form-Z has too many 'tools' and parameters. The user is interacting with the tools and not the model. The goal is to correlate computer interface with real-life human skills.

Professor Gibson showed examples of the FreeForm modeling system, which employs the SensAble PhaNToM haptic robot arm. <http://www.sensable.com> For concept modeling, this system offers improved interaction but sacrifices accuracy (which is perhaps not needed for the application), Still, however, the system presents too many menus. Also, single-handed interaction was seen as a drawback -- two-handed interaction is preferred.

FreeForm employs a large-scale volumetric deformation tool, which allows no sharp edges in the model. When the deformation mode/tool is active, the volumetric model is displayed as a point cloud. This representation becomes visually confusing when modeling a large dataset.

The example in drawing is that the artist uses the non-preferred hand to adjust the orientation of the paper while the preferred hand does the drawing, In Professor Gibson's research, he has developed a user interface in which a Polhemus magnetic, six-axis tracker is used to orient the model, while the SensAble PhaNTom is used to do the deformation on the model. <http://www.polhemus.com/> Professor Gibson's lab is currently studying future systems which might employ the Reachin <http://www.reachin.se> or ToolGlass immersive user interfaces.

It was hard to tell, because the next presentation was in French and there was no French-English interpreter, but I believe that a Mr. O. Cunin presented the work of Serge Cobel, Didier Bur and Alain Fuchs at the Centre for Research in Architecture and Engineering at the Nancy School of Mines, France. <http://www.crai.archi.fr> <mailto:fuchs@crai.archi.fr> The topic was Scanning and Reproduction of Architectural Artifacts.

An example was shown regarding the Library at Ankhor, Cambodia. The example included a modeled terrain, ground plan for the building layout and a Level-of-Detail-like demonstration of "growing" the buildings from the ground up. The French word was "re-restitution", which I took to mean "reconstruction", "conservation" or "restoration".

Mr. Cunin showed the work of Pierre Crozat - a computer-rendered simulation of a mechanical model for building the Egyptian pyramids.

Mr. Cunin showed work which used the Mensi SOISIC 3-D ranging laser scanner on a reconstruction of the Temple at Delphi, Greece. <http://www.mensi.com>

Arnaud Descombes presented slides with no words in them on dZO Architectures, which I took to be a professional firm which employs numerical design. Mr. Descombes showed a study in the proportions of stained glass rosette windows, a project for the Nam June Paik Museum and the Sarajevo Philharmonic hall, Bosnia.

A. Raj Chatterjee and Vinay Pathak showed their work in "Preserving Heritage in a Digital Way". Their work includes scanning, reverse engineering, rapid prototyping and a knowledge-based information system for preservation and access to India's 5,000-year cultural heritage.

Examples Prof. Pathak and Mr. Chatterjee showed included artifacts such as Asoka's Pillar from Kausambi, Capitol of Vansa and home of Buddha (born 563 AD). Buddha's lamp was scanned from a 18 cm high original. The other statues of Buddha were larger. Prof. Pathak and Mr. Chatterjee reported on the dimensions, data parameters and time required to process the reproduction of the artifacts.

I had a question regarding the absurdity of proposing to preserve 2000-year- old artifacts using technology decades old and with a likely lifespan of only decades. Mr. Chatterjee's response was to use current technology to reproduce the artifacts in a permanent material, such as stone. I e-mailed Prof. Pathak and Mr. Chatterjee references to work done at Sandia National Laboratory on etching text onto nickel plates and tempered glass CD-ROMs.

Ms. Catherine Nyecki presented her work with Marc Denjean - "MU herbier" - a project for interactive CD-ROM. She described the piece as a "sensorial microscope". Her method was to design palettes of dozens of "microscopic virtual sculptures". These became a "tactile alphabet of the senses". The user interface was described as a "piano à image". The result was a series of 100 short, interactive films accessed via this user interface.

Paul Higham presented a verbal description, via videoconference, on his INTERSCULPT exhibition at a gallery in the center of New Orleans.

Christian Lavigne presented his proposal for a CREATRON - Center for multidisciplinary research, education and practice in the treatment of digital objects. <http://www.creatron.org>

I had dinner and spent the evening with Rinus Roelofs, Keith Brown and Michael Smith in an English pub that was across the Siene, (North) and a few blocks West of Boulevard St. Michel.

On Saturday, October 18 at 1:00PM I visited Professor Bernard Morin in his apartment on 7 rue Falguiere, near the hotel where I was staying in the Montparnasse district of Paris. Professor Morin is a mathematician, former lecturer at the Princeton Institute for Advanced Studies and who has been blind since childhood,

We discussed improvements he would like to see in the models of the Morin surface I created and presented to him in 2000. <http://emsh.calarts.edu/~mathart/Tactile_Optiverse.html>

At INTERSCULPT, Simon Diner presented the myth and reality of "le Nombre d'Or", which I took to mean something like the golden section. The details of this lecture were fairly incomprehensible to me, but I imagine that the presentation was also fairly disorganized and possibly slightly bizarre to the Francophone audience.

Rinus Roelofs gave his presentation on numerical sculpture.

Raymond Aschheim <Raymond@aschheim.com> gave a presentation on "Polytopics: High-Dimensional Visualization". <http://www.polytopics.org/IS2003> Mr. Aschheim gave the best unified overview I have seen in recent memory on mathematical representations in dimensions from 0 to 11.

I gave my presentation on the Tactilization of Cyberspace. There were no questions from the audience.

Keith Brown gave his presentation on "Integral Imaging: Toward 3-D Broadcasting" This is work in collaboration with DeMumford, which has culminated with an INTERSCULPT 2003 installation at the Museum of Science and Industry, Manchester.

The Integral Image projector consists of a system of stereo projector and large-format beam-splitters. Future versions of the projector will employ high-resolution displays, such as the SpaceForm 01 and the IBM T221 plasma-screen monitor. DeMumford envisions medical applications employing the Integral Image projector.

Christian Lavigne presented his recent work through the Ars Mathematica, Toile Metisse and INTERSCULPT organizations to bring computer sculpture to Dakar, Senegal, West Africa. At the School of Fine Arts in Dakar, the students have a desire to learn about computers, however, the school administration considers itself modern in having a FAX machine. The school cannot find a computer for the students to learn from. There is no government support for education in Senegal.

Mr. Lavigne brought a computer and 3-D modeling software to the School of Fine Arts in Dakar and introduced the faculty to 3-D digitizing, 3-D sculpture and Rapid Prototyping. Mr. Lavigne showed a video he produced which recorded his experiences with the art faculty in Dakar.

In the video, one of the professors expressed the opinion that electronic music is "cold". The question was raised, "What about electronic art?" The conclusion was that a good tool in the hands of a bad artist, still produces bad art.

Mr. Lavigne brought with him to Dakar several examples of sculpture produced through rapid prototyping of computer-generated designs. Among the pieces he showed the faculty in Dakar were the Green Snakeskin Trefoil Torus knot (3-D printing by Z Corp <http://www.zcorp.com>) and a Hypersphere (laser micro-cavitation in glass) of my creation and pieces by Rinus Roelofs and Christian Lavigne.

When the African art teachers first sat down in front of the computer, the first thing they had to learn was the hand-eye coordination of moving the cursor on the screen by moving the computer mouse, and to learn to draw in a 2-D computer drawing program.

Christian Lavigne led the artists through the process of executing designs they had drawn on paper and brought with them in Form-Z. <http://www.autodessys.com>

When the computer designs were complete, Mr. Lavigne transferred them via FTP (computer modem and internet) from Dakar to Materialise in Belgium for Remote Rapid Prototyping (Telesculpture - remote manufacturing). <http://www.materialise.com> Small (3 in. high) examples of the African computer sculpture work were on display at FNAC Digitale. The African Artists have not yet seen these works. Mr. Lavigne is working to get larger versions of these pieces made, which he will send to the artists in Dakar.

There was a brief teleconference with artists at the School of Art in Dakar.

Robert Michael Smith (NYIT) presented work he has done in the 3-D Studio since 1990. <http://www.a-factor-e.com/smith/portfolio>

In 1993, Mr. Smith was involved in the production of a CD-ROM game featuring 3-D actors in 3-D environments, called "Millennium Auction".

At the International Sculpture Conference, 2001 in Pittsburgh, Mr. Smith presented a visual projection of virtual sculpture at a ten-foot scale via an immersive, direct projection into the viewer's eye. Mr. Smith later told me that the company which developed this technology has become defunct,

Mr. Smith showed his sculpture executed via rapid prototyping, including N-C milled marble at a scale of about 24 inches.

Mr. Smith also showed a link to a concurrent INTERSCULPT 2003 exhibition at Southwestern University, Georgetown, Texas, organized by Mary Visser. <http://www.rpsculpture.org>

On Sunday Morning, October 19, Robert Smith and I traveled by Metro and RER to Charles Degaulle Airport where we both boarded the same flight to Newark, New Jersey. I continued on to Atlanta then flew, again to Seattle, WA to attend the IEEE Visualization 2003 Conference. I brought with me my Concrete Mathematics examples, which I showed at a Rapid Prototyping for Visualization Birds-of-a-Feather meeting at 2:30PM Thursday afternoon, October 23.