REMAP L.A.

You are walking east along Temple Street in downtown
L.A. one balmy evening, tracking your progress on your GPS- linked PDA.
As you cross Beaudry Avenue a flag pops up on your on-screen map: a
past user of this interactive “guidebook” has attached a digital image to
these unique GPS coordinates.

The technology needed to make such a scenario a reality is currently in the early stages of development. The above example of the system’s use is just one small part of an ambitious interactive media project known as REMAPPING LA. Leading the UCLA venture is the Center for Research in Engineering, Media and Performance (REMAP), a collaboration between TFT and the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science. REMAP is dedicated to the creation of new levels of synergy among technology, engineering and the arts.

The originator of the project iFabian Wagmister, an associate professor in the Department of Film, Television, and Digital Media as well as a digital artist and digital cultures innovator. Wagmister compares the system to the user-created treasure trove of information on the Wikipedia web site: “Because anyone who uses the site can post there [on Wikipedia], you might expect it to get clogged up with misinformation. But the people who use the system shape it themselves, by using it in accordance with what they want and need.”

One clear difference in this case is that REMAPPING L.A. will draw people away from their computers and out into the neighborhood, since the overlay interface is site specific and will only work if you are at the location. The “mapping” that results as community members fan out and explore can be used as the basis for indoor and outdoor multimedia initiatives. Wagmister credits his colleague Jeff Burke, executive director REMAP, for his numerous contributions to the project, including cementing the Engineering and TFT collaboration, attracting much of the corporate support and having the technological vision to implement the general social and cultural goals of the project.

Wagmister and his family live in a remodeled nineteenth-century ice factory at Baker and N. Spring streets in downtown L.A. The building is across the street from an extraordinary expanse of undeveloped real estate that is about to become the Los Angeles State Historic Park, which will serve as the living laboratory for the development of REMAPPING LA. The evolving installation, which Wagmister is creating in consultation with California Department of Parks and Recreation, will be the prototype for REMAP’s technology. The works that are created will be exhibited both in the park and in the adjacent Chiparaki Cultural Civic Computing Center.

Assisting Wagmister in the R&D phase are his students in the innovative Engaged Media Production Workshop. One meeting per week is a relatively conventional classroom discussion; for the second meeting, students are equipped with GPS devices andcamera phones (supplied by corporate partner Nokia) and dispatched in teams to explore areas in the vicinity of the new park. The information, images and route maps collected in this way are downloaded into a central database. Together, all of these pieces form a map of the area surrounding the park, one that has been enriched with several layers of instantly accessible images and information – in truth, a collaborative art project.

Another corporate partner, Cisco, has provided equipment to create a testbed WiFi network over the park area. UCLA Engineering’s CENS, the Center for Embedded Networked Sensing, and in particular REMAP’s Co-Director William Kaiser and CENS Director Deborah Estrin, also contributed materially to the networking effort.

“People wonder what’s the essence of this workshop,” Wagmister says. “What are we teaching these students? At the most obvious level we are teaching about new media with new technology, exploring some cutting-edge stuff and giving them a sense of the many ways in which these can be used in a city. But beyond that, we are encouraging explorations and new thinking about the relationships between media, identity, communities and cities. We’re teaching them to use these technological tools to investigate and even interrogate their urban context, to make contact with others, to consider broader needs – and perhaps we can give them a clue of what it really means to be part of something.”

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