Created by the video artist Luc Courchesne, Pocket Worlds includes a collections of spherical photographs that can be viewed as if you were still physically standing where they were recorded. The app is based on panoscopic work Luc has been doing for a number of years now. For its first release, the PocketWorlds viewer includes a collection of twenty images from the Panoscopic Journal. Some of his other artworks include Panoscope 360° (2000-), The Visitor: Living by Numbers (2001), Untitled (2004), Where are you? (2005) and many more.. (see videos below).
The Pocket World viewer uses the compass on the iPhone 3GS to pan left and right as you turn around, and the accelerometer to move up and down. On the iPhone 3G and 2G, and on the iPod Touch (models without a compass), you can swipe your finger left and right to pan. Pinching will let you zoom in and out. The Panoscopic Journal, undertaken by Courchesne in 2000, document his whereabouts and explores the concept of place, of the observing subject and the novel nature of the worlds one is now invited to step in and inhabit. The Journal holds several hundred spherical images from which a collection of twenty is offered with the first release of the Pocket Worlds viewer. Works from the Panoscopic Journal have also been exhibited as prints in galleries and museums and are part of pubic and private collections worldwide.
Bio:
Luc Courchesne took part in the emergence of media arts thirty years ago when, as a video artist inspired by a generation of experimental filmmakers such as Michael Snow and Hollis Frampton, he adopted computer technologies. First delving into interactive portraiture, a great artistic tradition re-articulated in a new mould, his work has recently turned to another important genre, that of landscape. With his installations, “panoscopic” images, and a devices of his own making used to create a sense of visual immersion, he is helping transfom spectators into visitors, actors and inhabitants of the new artforms.more..
Platform: iPhone
Version: 1.0
Cost: $1.99
Developer: Luc Courchesne
