Recently Hays and I were invited to speak in Madrid at a 3 day technology conference with an emphasis on mobile and how apps are impacting our lives in fields ranging from education to entertainment. We presented a bit of our work alongside other artists, designers and developers who are doing very innovative things in mobile. Most notably, Jorge Drexler (best known for winning the Oscar for Best Song for the film Motorcycle Diaries) introduced an app he's been working on a mobile app that allows users to effect the flow of a song lyrically instead of musically -- aside from being a very interesting concept, the interface design was stunning and it gave us some new ideas of how to approach visualizing non-linear music. We also had fun chatting with Max Whitby, the visionary founder behind TouchPress -- they've produced such apps as Elements for iPad as well as Bjork's interactive app for Biophilia).
Above: The venue, which is also used as an arena for a circus.
Below: David Cuartielles, co-founder of Arduino, demonstrates a high-tech Ouija board he's working on.
Below: This was an incredible installation/game we happened to stumble upon near the festival venue. This is Hays holding up his cell phone and interacting with this full screen game that covers the entire side of a building with LED. The light from a cell phone is detected and then becomes the controller for a snake that roams the pixels of the screens, hunting for these 8-bit monsters.
