guerilla projection?

[gnomatron]

I can only find one thread on here relevant to guerilla projection, so here goes;

I'm in the UK, scotland specifically, and I want to do a bit of guerilla projection.

I'm thinking of driving round town one night and projecting images on various buildings, probably just a few minutes to half an hour at any given location, out of the side of a car. Possibly also some stuff from a moving car.

It's an art project/for my own amusement; not advertising or logos or anything like that.

I know obstructing the public highway could be an issue, so I'll avoid projecting over the road, but what else should I do? If I don't tell the council/police am I likely to get my projector taken off me if the police take an interest?

[USE]

it depends on the plod that stops you and what mood theyre in, they might think its funny, they might have had a row with their wife and take it out on you. remember to always be polite to pigs (not calling them pigs is a good start) as they can totally remove your liberty. generally if you treat them like a human they appreciate it and are more likely to listen.

watch out for peoples windows, i would go for a corporate building at night, as they have big walls and few people there late at night. you know your area best, where will you will get an audience? where are people dicks and will kick up a fuss? etc etc. good luck dude!

[gnomatron]

yeah, gonna go on a bit of a wander and scout some locations sometime soon. I'll keep your advice in mind, cheers!

[freakowen]

speak to baron on here - he did some absolutely mint projections round Leeds the other week :)

[deepvisual]

take a look here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dK-Jci0oZaU) and see how the grown ups do it.

[baron]

thanks for the kind words owen :)

we did both mobile and static stuff from my vw van, flying a cruise missile round and exploding it

pm me to discuss it further, but you'll need hefty battery power and an expensive pure sine wave inverter to do it properly

we have an inverter genny which we ran with the sliding door wide open :eek:

will post a video when we get it soundtracked....

and more to come for april fools day!

[optibreak]

take a look here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dK-Jci0oZaU) and see how the grown ups do it.
cheers for that link - awesome work!

[gnomatron]

interesting link! You'd think that sort of thing would be quite likely to get into serious legal trouble, but they seemed to get away with it.

I'm not sure how "properly" I want to do this - it's a first attempt, as it were, with no particular aim beyond amusing myself, so I want to try and do it cheaply!

[glassbeadian]

On March 20th we executed a guerrilla projection action at ground zero NYC. We got good media coverage from a number of news outlets, but fox news decided to lie about what happened.... Here is the video enjoy.

http://www.glassbeadcollective.org/projects/projection/index.htm

YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAWAs_BKgvU

Vlad T
Glass Bead Collective

[many2]

Way to go guys :) Congratulations
When Fox news lies about you, it is because you are doing something meaningful ;)

[guerrilla]

I'm thinking of driving round town one night and projecting images on various buildings, probably just a few minutes to half an hour at any given location, out of the side of a car. Possibly also some stuff from a moving car.


I am courently doing this for fun, and to sell advertising. Make sure you direct wire a DC/AC inverter to your battery, use 8 AWG wire or thicker, 1500 watt or greater. Steady DC power is a must since you don't want to trip the circuit cutting the projector fan(s).

I started with a 2000 lumens projector, moved up to a 5000 lumens which covers just about an entire building. Every thing is packed into my Mazda MPV van, including two laptops, two DVD players, Edirole V4, Kaoss Entrancer, and Motion .dive Toyko console. I also use Resolume, and Arkaos. Arkaos works great for advertisments, or 640x480 images.

Check my website out below in my signature. Let me know if you have any questions.

There is a video sample section on my website but it needs updating, working on the videos over the next couple weeks.

[vjpixylight]

definately going to be getting into this as well! finally sprung for a 2000 watt pure sine inverter, and will want to get it going ASAP.
As far a guerrilla projections go, wouldn't also be keen to have a FM transmitter accompanying the projections?
I can see using it to send the audio bits to cars that want to get the full A/V experience:)

[aiwaz]

here is some work we did for Interference inc in nyc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMAY6Q7nA-c

[baron]

some really cool stuff in here

guerilla and aiwaz - clearly a business model around this, I know of someone planning a similar business in the uk

glassbeadian - thats a HUGE set up you had there, very cool

vjpixylight - adding the a to the v guerilla style is the tricky bit!

this weekend we were projecting flying saucers in the park for april fools, to make it look more realistic, we created some big backprojection screens from muslin and flew them from the trees like a giant sail

will post some pics n clips shortly!

[videoswitchboard]

Pixy:

yes: FM transmission is the way forward.

Rod from Beam (http://beamproductions.co.uk/) (Bristol) did that from the top of a car park with double stacked Christies and a Barco on its side (portrait)- huge!
not really guerilla as it was part of an official event though:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/89869792@N00/92533518/
http://sparror.cubecinema.com/cubelog/category/projections/
(scroll down to middle of the page)

:lick:
dav

[vjpixylight]

nice pics dav:)
The guerilla in doing guerilla vid projections would surely be the FM transmition(being it is illegal and all) and having it would bring the message one is trying to convey with the Guerilla visuals much more attention. Of course it would have to be all done tongue in cheek, but it would be great for some political/anti-war A/V guerilla video insurgency...

[Waxtastic]

info & video (http://originalhamsters.com/blog/2007/01/guerilla-projection-on-new-years-eve.html)

Here's my guerilla projection from new year's ever. This wasn't planned at all. Just created something on the spot that would work well with the building.

In case you're wondering, nothing too exciting happened at midnight. It just started to snow some snowish particles that I had set up to automatically trigger at midnight. Didn't get that on the video because I was outside in another place when it happened.

[baron]

here's a pic from our april fool projections, quite convincing, no?

video to follow

http://i86.photobucket.com/albums/k107/baron3000/saucer2.jpg

[baron]

here's a video of us flying a cruise missile around the streets of leeds (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KX0gdVxEUOU&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fprofile%2Emyspace%2Ecom%2Findex% 2Ecfm%3Ffuseaction%3Duser%2Eviewprofile%26friendid %3D91778894)

[reeditchaos]

whats the smallest sine convertor u think i would be able to get away with to run a 2000 lumens projector.....not up to scratch on my power knowledge..

[baron]

whats the smallest sine convertor u think i would be able to get away with to run a 2000 lumens projector.....not up to scratch on my power knowledge..

probably about 700w, but do the sums, doesn't your beamer tell you what voltage it runs on and the amps it uses? times the 2 together, that's it's power useage - maybe you have lower voltage mains supply in oz and your beamer will draw less power, I'm not sure

invertors often refer to peak power loads, this can only be sustained for a short period of time, you want to look for a constant power supply of 700w, so it will probably have a peak of 1500w

[gnomatron]

Here's a very quick guide to electrical power; I give this with no gaurantee that it's accurate, if you're unsure consult a qualified electrician, I am not one!

Electrical Power is measured in Watts. Many appliances will tell you their power consumption in watts on a label on the machine, e.g. "500w". This is how much power the appliance needs to make it go.

Your local supply will operate at a set Voltage, in the Uk this is about 230V. The US is 110 I believe.

The third part of the Equation is Current, which is measured in Amps (short for Amperes). This can be though of as a measure of the flow of electricity at any given time. Any given supply will have a rating in Amps, which is a limit on the maximum total current that can be drawn through it. Uk domestic sockets are generally rated at 13 Amps, 13A for short, which means that a maximum of 13A can be drawn from a single socket. The whole ring will also have a maximum limit, usually something like 30A, which imposes a limit on how much you can draw across all your sockets added together.

To find out the Current "Draw" of a given appliance, you divide the Power Rating in Watts by the Supply Voltage in Volts;

Current = Power/Voltage

or

A = P/V (in school you may have been taught to use the letter "I" to represent current. use whichever one you can remember!)

So, for a 500W projector, operating on normal UK mains, the current draw is;

500/230 = 2.18 Amps

So you can safely run about 5 of these imaginary projectors off of a single 13A socket - although don't unless you have to. it's very important not to overload your power sockets by drawing too much current from them; they will tend to overheat, fuses will blow, and you may start a fire. Also, it's important to realise that if you plug in a 4-gang adaptor, for example, you can still only draw 13 Amps total from the socket it's plugged in to!

If you know the current rating of an appliance, you can work out the Power it will draw using a variant of the above equation;

Power is Current Times Voltage, or P = AV (or P=IV in school).

So a light rated at 5 amps at 230V draws 5 x 230 = 1150W.

Uh, hope that helps and makes sense!

Here's a (probably totally unnecessary) analogy that might be useful; think if it like water pipes. Voltage is the water pressure, the current is the width of the pipes, and Power is the amount of water. Say you have a water wheel that needs a supply of one bucket of water a second. If you have a second water wheel that needs two buckets of water a second, you'll need either a pipe twice as big, or twice the water pressure. If your pipes aren't strong enough to take the pressure, then you're going to have an unfortunate mess on your hands!

[deepvisual]

...maybe you have lower voltage mains supply in oz and your beamer will draw less power, I'm not sure


actually, lower voltage means higher current... and vice versa

which is why the national grid is very high voltage = low current, as there is a direct relationship between current and powerloss in cables

[Bokonon]

actually, lower voltage means higher current... and vice versa

which is why the national grid is very high voltage = low current, as there is a direct relationship between current and powerloss in cables

Indeed - V=IR

Where
V = Potential Difference (in volts)
I = Current (in amps)
R = Resistance (in ohms)

(this is also why you need fixed resistance cables for good quality composite video)

[asterix]

Anti War Guerrilla Projection show at Ground Zero, NYC with 100,000 lmns projector

Just a comment - the images scrolled to quickly and they didn't communicate anything to me :) Whereas the englishactivists kept it simple but effective.
Nice work on the action though :) Did that projector only run under 2000W?

[cycloptic]

good idea! i'm going to pitch something like this to the manc-cyclists collective, they organise mass cyclist takeovers of manchester, and it'd be cool to prmote them by having footage of a cyclist careening around town at night...

...oh wait... i'd need a car :/

[Liquidmetro]

Yeh, Rod at Beam in Bristol was heavily involved in an xmas 2006 'Light Up Bristol' project Video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0Bf_8JTbUM) Photo's (http://www.flickr.com/groups/lightupbristol/pool/). Less guerilla and more installation. Seeing this made me proud once again to be a Bristol Resident.:D

[Donnie Darko]

check out this thread:
http://www.vjforums.com/showthread.php?t=21134

:D

[fx.ghosting]

http://youtube.com/watch?v=imUIZn-XUJw

we got shut down at 11pm by police, we think because they thought it would be a distraction to drunk drivers, who knows,

we did get stopped and questioned for "looking a child porn"
because we had laptops in a car...:crazyeyes

[DrEskaton]

does anyone know whats the legality of projecting onto private property in the UK?

we have just been asked to help an NGO with a protest action, they are doing everything by the books and getting permits for everything. Except we want to do some projections onto the building outside of which we are protesting.

is there any laws in the UK that can be applied if our van and projection gear is on public property which we have permission to be on?

we'll do it anyway, we just want to know what to expect so we can try to find loopholes to delay how long before we get shut down. Anyone got direct experience? deep visual?

[sleepytom]

in what way do you have permission to be on the "public property"? do you have explicit permission to be there? Is the place where your van will be a public highway (road, pavement, etc)? If so then you'll most likely get charged with "Obstructing the Highway" (assuming that your not a bunch of pussies who move as soon as the police tell you to!) Depending on what you are projecting you might also get hit with things such as "Causing a Public Nuisance", or "behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace" or various other obscure old laws which get used by the police when they can't think of anything more specific to do you for.

http://www.bindmans.com/ - These people (specifically Mike Schwarz (http://www.bindmans.com/index.php?id=mikeschwarz) ) are very helpful and will give you the best advice available both before and after any arrests ;)

[DrEskaton]

as I see it with any action its all about, delay, delay, delay. pretend to cooperate while buying as much time as possible to get your point across.

doesn't hurt to get as much info as possible about what you might get hit with.

thanks for the legal pointer.

[evomedia]

Well good luck the main laws they will enforce to move you on are:

To stop Nuisance light pollution in Neighbourhoods, the police can use it to get you switched off. Only have to be deamed a nuisance.

Heres the details but same for most councils:
http://www.tendringdc.gov.uk/TendringDC/Environment/Pollution/Light_Pollution.htm

Also the council can technically stop people under as projection in a public place classes as advertising.

They define it in the ACT as:

“Advertisement” means any representation of a word, name, letter, figure or object or an abbreviation of a word or name, or any sign or symbol, or any light which is not intended solely for illumination or as a warning against any danger, which has its object the furthering of any industry, trade, business undertaking, event, or activity of whatever nature and which is visible from any street or public place.

So you either have to apply for permission from the council or you can try and comply to the guidlines.

But most councils are pretty open to exterior projections if considered Art but you have to sometimes pay fees, they just don't want stupid people blinding drivers, showing porn or breaking laws, ie copyright.

You have to create a written application, provide detailed dimensioned drawings, ideally Coloured photographs to illustrate the position of the projection, environmental impact assessments (does the light distract drivers, keep people from sleeping)

They also state your liable for any damage, deaths, injuries caused by your projection, so try and stay away from highways really late at night, the police stopping you saying distracts drunk drivers is actually very wise, if they crash and die your responsible.

By the way only the person putting up the projection is liable, so I could hire someone to drive round for me and have no comeback

[dePICT]

I used to stick my beamer out my window. There was a big wall across the street.
I would make lil messages on the fly, that went with what I saw.
When homeless people hung out, I would write "spare change?" or "buy this man a 40oz."
lil messeges like "fat kids are hard to kidnap"

I saw some hand held portable projector that used a deconstructed cell phone lcd and you could sent it sms messages. real tight

[MasterNinja]

its graffiti but there's no evidence that can be traced to you and your less likely to get caught red handed if you can project from a long way away.

Just keep image away from the busy road crossings and project only on the sides of buildings otherwise you'll distract drivers.

[reeditchaos]

anyone know the legalities of this sort of projection in aust ? seen a lot of walls round lately that scream to be projected on n i can show stuff that isnt dancefloor friendly

[Movement]

We projected onto Battersea Powerstation in London a couple of months ago.....

http://i140.photobucket.com/albums/r30/vjmovement/Global_battersea_2.jpg

[SteveG]

We projected onto Battersea Powerstation in London a couple of months ago.....

http://i140.photobucket.com/albums/r30/vjmovement/Global_battersea_2.jpg

Surely Godskitchen had permission for that one Duffer?

[Movement]

not at all, just went down and did it. looks good though doesn't it!

did similar things in manchester & birmingham. we sometimes project directly onto other clubs with Godskitchen adverts when they have big nights on

[gnomatron]

my word, what did you use for that? looks pretty bright (also looks long exposure, but still!)

[SteveG]

not at all, just went down and did it. looks good though doesn't it!

did similar things in manchester & birmingham. we sometimes project directly onto other clubs with Godskitchen adverts when they have big nights on

Great!...I'll be doing it to Gods soon then from the Factory across the road :lol2:

[Movement]

I didn't personally do it, we used another company so not sure what they used. That particular site used 3 stills from 3 different projectors, but all the other ones used the video I made for the website.

Great!...I'll be doing it to Gods soon then from the Factory across the road :lol2: I dare you to do it :biggrin:

[Vidier]

This one's nice... guerilla gaming with a beamer ;) (ok it's a sponsored thing from epson, but i would love to have a gaming kit like that!)

YouTube- Extreme Gaming with an Epson Projector

[VJFranzK]

Wow! cool video. It says a lot for projector toughness, also

But the guy called MC THIS did it first, and he's a VJ ;-)

This one's nice... guerilla gaming with a beamer ;) (ok it's a sponsored thing from epson, but i would love to have a gaming kit like that!)

YouTube- Extreme Gaming with an Epson Projector (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9sXhYlIfRY)