Hi, I’m Willie Payne.
I’m here to show off danceON, a live, creative coding environment that integrates
body position data, animation, and a domain specific language.
I’m speaking to you from the past in a prerecorded video, shown within danceON’s media player.
To the left of me is a code editor, where Willie Payne from the less-distant past will
be typing code and trying not to mess up.
Actually, I’m having trouble seeing my code and seem to have misplaced my glasses.
Why don’t I code myself some new glasses?
Maybe, start with a circle.
Tell the computer where to draw the circle!
Great, you’ve given the circle fixed coordinates, but if I move my eyeglass doesn’t move with me.
Maybe we can use pose detection?
That’s better - now it is locked to my eye.
Let’s make it so I can actually see through it.
And make it a little more stylish please?
Both eyes?
You can just provide a list of coordinates.
You know what, I don’t need them when I am close enough to the screen.
Maybe add a condition that checks how big my face looks to the camera?
Perfect. If you can give me glasses - what about super powers?
How about shooting flames?
What!? That’s not what I asked for!
Were those clown emojis!?
Much better. I wonder what else we could do?
danceON was developed to support a remote 2020 summer camp combining dance and computing.
To learn more about danceON’s design process and how four teams of young women choreographed
and animated original performances, please check out our paper,
“danceON: Culturally Responsive Creative Computing.”
The images shown are just a few examples drawn from learner projects.
My co-authors are: Yoav Bergner, Mary Etta West, Carlie Charp, Ben Shapiro,
Danielle Szafir, Edd Taylor, and Kayla DesPortes.
This work is part of the Dancing Across Boundaries project which is supported by the National Science Foundation.
Finally special thanks to our partners at STEM From Dance including Yamilee, Elena,
Stacie, and Shannon, whose insights and efforts guided every step of this work.
I invite you to check them out STEM From Dance.org.