Words as Social illusions.
                                                                                                            By Vincent de Witt Huberts.
Introduction.
 I propose an art installation that makes use of holographic video, which will represent the illusory effect that words have .The latter mainly with respect to  the modern consumer society. The words and phrases that I have picked will be rendered in such a fashion that when one changes the angle of view to the hologram the illusion behind the word will be represented as an image.  The hologram will be generated with the help of computer applications instead of conventional holography.

Concept.
Words represent concepts and ideas  they are the medium of human communication  (If we all speak the same language, snap je?), and  the meaning of words change as the difference of perceptions do.  But do  words have any concrete representation? Do they still contain their original message , and how do those contents change.? For instance the words "up" and  "down" have no meaning .they were invented to explain what seemed to be happening in a world that was believed to be flat. But we now  know that the earth is spherical and none of the perpendiculars are parralel ( as they would be in a flat world). What may be up at one point maybe down at another.  This metamorphosis is applicable to many aspects of our society and I have been questioning these for awhile .  Is "Democracy"  still used with relation to its original meaning ?  Is there still an understanding of the word "freedom"? In my piece I plan to question these notions of propaganda, and its other aspect will revolve around the use and abuse  of words within consumer culture. The consumer culture bombards  citzens with catchy words and phrases that would insult your intelligence. "Need",  "beauty" , "hapiness", and " all you can eat" are a smidgen of words that have been altered in meaning. Of course this is all based on my own perception of the world but this is what I want to represent anyway.

Holograms.
In my piece I will be utilizing holograms and I think it is important to understand how holograms work. In essence a hologram ,the actual  medium that contains all the information, is a very high contrast black and white film. The record on the film is of the intensity differences on the object which form a pattern that one may ultimately recognize as the object. The functioning of the hologram relies on the use of lasers (Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation), but more importantly the angle difference  between two waves.
 MORE ON HOLOGRAPH'S BASICS

Computer generated holograms & Holographic video.
However  the production of holograms and more importantly holographic video , can be simplified with the help of computers.The method  which I will describe makes use of scanline based computer techniques. The widely available OpenGL  application takes the advantage of acceleration by computergraphics hardware  subsystems. This is an efficient way to produce full parallax displays.The OpenGL library provides a uniform  rendering interface  to the full spectrum of graphics systems  from videogames to the most powerful  graphics work stations . OpenGL is tuned to maximize rendering speed based on a particular  computer's architecture and any install graphics acceleration devices. When necessary, higher quality  images can be rendered in OpenGL by combining several different rendered images.With the help of a program like OpenGL ,  holographic images can be rendered  at high speeds.
 I have described how rendering of this project is feasable , but now I'll get into the  display/projection aspect .
The  MIT Media Laboratory-spatial imaging group.  is  currently  working on an imaging system that can render and display computer generated  holograms at near-video rates . I think that the Mark- I holographic video display would be most suitable for my project's needs.

DIAGRAM OF THE MARK-I.

I have reviewed different possibilities for  what to use  as the best tool for my holographic piece. Companies such as
 Dutch holographic have devices that were feasible to use , but they offered nothing with regard to holographis video. Along the same lines  was the information that I gathered from  HOLOPHILE.INC  who develops 3-D displays for corporations with really interesting , short movie possibilities. However no information on the functioning of their system was offered.Thus I'll stick to the Mark-I display.

The Set-Up & conclusion.
    The  location for the piece could be within any dimly lit place, prefferably indoors.  As long as the projector itself would  located out of sight . or to be seen as little as possible. This  considering the fact that the holographic video is the piece in itself., and I suppose that with the fact that it changes from different viewpoints it would  need a spce for the observer to be able to move around the projection.
    The idea of using holography for the theme of words as illusion is of course the fact that  holograms are illusions ,  To enhance that point in a way.  I have mocked up a basic representation of the  preliminary piece in director to give a slight idea of how it might work.
As is quite obvious this is still a proposal so the final project is still open for suggestions and comments. And I would appreciate all the feedback   for this proposal.
 vincedwh@sfsu.edu