http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/240 2013-05-19T00:09:04Z 2013-05-19T00:09:04Z Angel, Julie Margaret http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/6119 2012-11-16T12:15:10Z 2011-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Ciné Parkour: A cinematic and theoretical contribution to the understanding of the practice of parkour Authors: Angel, Julie Margaret Abstract: Through a meeting of practice and theory this thesis shifts the locus of attention from the spectacle to the everyday practice of parkour. Using documentary filmmaking with anthropological intentions and extended access over a six year period, this thesis explores the subjective everyday lived performances and essence of parkour, as experienced by a select group of experienced practitioners, as well as those who were involved in parkour’s creation and development. Parkour is a multidimensional phenomenon that can be experienced as an art, training discipline, sport, set of values, and practice of freedom, depending on an individual’s motivations, cultural understanding and exposure to the history of the practice. The research establishes that parkour is an imaginative and particular way of thinking; remapping the landscape with ‘parkour vision’. Parkour transforms how one experiences, moves, connects and participates in the environment, challenging notions of normative behaviour, socialisation, identity and self-determining actions through explorations of, as well as expressions of the self. The results of which are a means to find a more authentic deeper inner sense of self, producing feelings of inclusion and an enhanced sense of freedom through the creation of an autonomous social body. Parkour encourages self-reliance and mutual co-operation whilst enabling participants to reclaim the wonderment and magic of the human experience, valuing confrontations of fear, pleasure and pain in transcending the real and imagined boundaries of one’s own limitations, play and freedom of expression. This thesis explores themes such as shared cinema, collaborative filmmaking, participant observation and issues of representation. Parkour is discussed theoretically from the perspectives of Eichberg’s work on body cultures, Foucauldian relations of power and technologies of the self, alongside Merleau Ponty’s phenomenology, Csikszentmihalyi’s optimal flow experience, Wellmann’s insights into networked individualism and Charles Taylor’s work on the search for an authentic self and the complexities of a modern identity. This thesis contributes to the growing field of research into body cultures and the continually evolving culture of parkour. Description: This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.

2011-01-01T00:00:00Z Liu, Moxian http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/5074 2012-12-03T16:11:01Z 2011-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Semi-automated mobile television interactive application generation based on XHTML and Java ME Authors: Liu, Moxian Abstract: Mobile Digital TV (MDTV), the hybrid of Digital Television (DTV) and mobile devices (such as mobile phones), has introduced a new way for people to watch DTV and has brought new opportunities for development in the DTV industry. Nowadays, the development of the next generation MDTV service has progressed in terms of both hardware layers and software, with interactive services/applications becoming one of the future MDTV service trends. However, current MDTV interactive services still lack in terms of attracting the consumers and the service creation and implementation process relies too much on commercial solutions, resulting in most parts of the process being proprietary. In addition, this has increased the technical demands for developers as well as has increased substantially the cost of producing and maintaining MDTV services. In light of the aforementioned situation, the Thesis has contributed to this field, by proposing an innovative MDTV service creation and consumption system based on XHTML and Java ME. On the head-end it introduces a semi-automatic creation mechanism to facilitate a less technical and more efficient interactive service creation process. This enables designers and creative individuals to be actively involved in the MDTV service creation process and to develop interactive-rich MDTV service. On the client-end it employs an open-source software environment as the interactive service MDTV consumption platform, rendering the MDTV service implementation process as less proprietary as possible. Furthermore, the Thesis offers a discussion on the different MDTV interactive application models currently used and based on the proposed software, a novel MDTV service presentation method is further introduced and adopted instead of the Rich Media and ECMAScript based methods. Finally, a series of qualitative testing procedures have been implemented with regards to conducting an essential evaluation on the operability of the proposed software system. Description: This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University, 11/02/2011.

2011-01-01T00:00:00Z Baker, C http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/4728 2011-08-03T10:26:57Z 2008-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: ‘Liveness’ and ‘presence’ in bio-networked mobile media performance practices: Emerging perspectives Authors: Baker, C Abstract: If you could share and exchange your dream imagery, feelings and sensations with your friends and loved ones, how would you do it? If could not only share and exchange, but remix and collage them, what would it look like or feel like? How would it work? Explored through the new media performance project, MindTouch, uses biofeedback sensors and mobile media phones in live, staged events. MindTouch is a BBC R+D sponsored PHD research, to connect people remotely through the mobile phone, allowing them to re-engage with each other and with the world, affectively and expressively in new creative, non-verbal/nontextual ways through mobile video performance events. The aim of this article is to discuss current practice-based PhD research underway at the SMARTlab Digital Media Institute's UK base at the University of East London, under the direction of Professor Lizbeth Goodman. The MindTouch project involves the pursuit of a better understanding and facilitation of the individual's mode of expression in relation to the collective experiences of liveness and presence, as observable and ‘capturable’ within the virtual ‘space’ of a live mobile performance event. This article reflects on meta-concepts of this research and on past video collection workshops completed in the first phase of the project, including observations from these workshops, and the on-going practice, development and technical issues involved. It discusses practical processes and concerns (such as methods for encouraging people to connect remotely, that are allowed to reengage each other and the world affectively using the mobile phone), both in and through participants' bodies, and through a range of expressive, creative, non-verbal/non-textual means, through networked performance activities. Description: The article can be found at the URI below.

2008-01-01T00:00:00Z Baker, C Schleser, M Molga, K http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/4727 2011-08-03T10:25:30Z 2009-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Aesthetics of Mobile Media Art Authors: Baker, C; Schleser, M; Molga, K Abstract: In this article, three London-based creative practitioners examine the new emerging possibilities of mobile media in the domain of art and media practice. The three practice-based research projects reflect their diverse backgrounds and perspectives within the emerging field of mobile media, in an effort to define the new genre of mobile media art aesthetics. Despite the different approaches towards working with mobile media, a shared original aesthetic emerges specific to the mobile phone. The article focuses on the pixilated, low-resolution mobile screen aesthetic, interface, production processes and uses, made possible by the mobile phone, revealing their contribution to the field of screen media in the decade of HD. Within the collaborative examination of the work, the authors attempt to define an emerging category of Mobile Media Art. Description: The article can be found at URI below.

2009-01-01T00:00:00Z