Die Andere Stadt (Sarah Buser)

Sarah Buser works as a dramaturg, director, programmer and lecturer. Coming from theater she realises interactive, fictional spaces enriched with the transformation of philosophical concepts through theatrical installations with new media. In her artistic engagement with world, she particularly explores augmented reality as a theatrical and narrative tool. Both the development and programming of software plays a central role, as does the creation and realisation of social and fictional situations. The goal of her work is to create dramaturgical condensations through the interaction of technology and the everyday world, while making the process of understanding visible.

Main goal of the research on Die Andere Stadt was to find a technological and dramaturgical translation of some of the main concepts of the novel The City and The City by weird-fiction author China Miéville. The concept of “unseeing” presented in the novel and the assumption that Augmented Reality is an ideal medium to question our surroundings were the starting point of the research movement.

February

• Deepening skills in C# programming and 3D Gamedevelopment (udemy courses)
• content-related research: How to transform this notion of a shared space from a novel into a AR-Experience?
• Developing the basic concept of the shared virtual and augmented space, that is accessible both at the location and from home (where the computer is)

March

• Setting up unity for Android and Augmented Reality Development.
• ARFoundation: Persistent Cloud Anchors
• Networking Persistent Cloud Anchors with Mirror → First Approach to Mirror in unity
• 1. Basic Multiplayer Setup with Mirror (+ Server Setup)

April

• learning Mirror: syncing color, having shared objects in the shared space (trying), etc.
• Research fragmented Storytelling, Walking Simulators, Videgames. How to situate a Story so it can be discovered by the player?
• Research Visual ideas: How to write on walls? How could the virtual world look like?

Mai

• Research Storytelling: How to implement the concept of shared and distributed knowledge? How to transform the two major narration perspectives into a networked AR experience?
• Mirror: Sychronising Writing (3D in world Text exchange & turn handwriting into font into 3D Letters), Synchronising stones (objects)
• Preparing OpenHouse setup
• after openhouse: refactoring mirror und unity Code

June

• refactoring mirror und unity Code
• Implementing ARCore/GPS-Bridge
• Implementing 3D Objects by 3D artist Tomas Montes Massa
• Worldbuilding in unity (visual), Guiding System, developing user experience (windwos and android)
• Creating texts, recording, place and adjust them in the virtual/augmented world
• Target specific builds and scene-development.
• Fine-tuning and finalisation of Demo

3D Modelling: Tomas Montes Massa
Sounds: Christoph Wirth
Shaderkaratementoring: Max Schweder
Code, Virtual- and Augmented Worldbuilding, Text, Audio, Interactiondesign: Sarah Buser
Research and Development GPS, Unity, ARCore: Sarah Buser with many thanks to Spiel&&Objekt

AR Foundation + ARCore Extensions for Augmented Reality on Android
Mirror
Modular 3D Text by Tiny Giant Studio

Berger, Peter L. und Luckmann, Thomas: Die gesellschaftliche Konstuktion der Wirklichkeit, S. Fischer Verlag Frankfurt am Main, 1969.
Bridle, James: New Dark Age, C.H. Beck München, 2019.
Calvino, Italo: Die unsichtbaren Städte, S. Fischer Verlag Frankfurt am Main, 2013.
Freedman, Carl: Arts and Idea in the Novels of China Miéville, Glyphi Canterbury, 2015.
Hui, Yuk: Recursivity and Contingency, Rowman & Littlefield International Ltd. London, 2019.
Miéville, China: The City and the City, Pan Books London, 2011.
Rosa, Harmut: Unverfügbarkeit, Residenz Verlag Wien - Salzburg, 2019.

Inspired by the following videogames:
Everybody's gone to the Rapture by The Chinese Room , SCE Santa Monica Studio
Gone Home by Fullbright
The Vanishing of Ethan Carter by The Astronauts
Dear Esther by The Chinese Room, Robert Briscoe
The Stanley Parable by Davey Wreden, Galactic Cafe
The Beginners Guide by Davey Wreden, Everyting Unlimited Ltd.

First Gear Games: Getting Started with Mirror
Freya Holmér: Intro to Shader Coding in Unity - An Improvised Live Course