Urban Seoul

Every city has its speed. Super fast lifestyle and mobile telephony coexist in the historic spaces of Seoul. Complex network of communication and transportation makes mesmerizing  grid of mutual interaction. Wireless network presence is highly visible through people holding telephone in the streets and global mobile commons, such as Starbucks.  Advertisement invades the city scape to its deepest corridors and homes. Chinese and English characters; foreign texts make up the urban poetry through billboards and neon signs. A situationist's paradise, Seoul is constantly growing and decaying.
Shoot me if you can is an interface to build consensual urban reality through mobile photographs. The photographs shot during the game are often blurry and off focused. It also contains unintended image of the passerby and architecture on the background. Collective exploration in to the landscape, it is a collage of the city Seoul as we see it.

Digital Camera: an object of desire

Camera has been, for a long time, object for tourists and special occasion. People take photograph to remember certain moment, place, and people. Recently economic digital camera phone and web-based personal media (ex; blog, www.cyworld.com ) became increasingly accessible among youths of South Korea. It is common to see people taking picture of themselves, posing for camera, and checking the photograph on a tiny LCD. Digital Camera is a toy, a multimedia diary and conversation starter. Digital Camera Phone is a mobile and personal way of taking picture. It also grants easy access to publish the content on to the web. Many Korean youths have desire to show off picture of themselves to complete strangers. Mega portal site, such as www.dcinside.com have thousands of daily upload of very personal pictures. Anyone can view the picture and leave a comment. Surveillance camera and Hidden camera invade private life. Surveillance camera is usually located in areas where safety is an issue. Given consensus from the subject is generally expected. There is a thin line between protecting the possible victim and taking advantage of the hierarchical technology. Modern day peeping toms are not hard to find. One can easily find thousands of candid photographs of anonymous women on line.  Taking a picture without the subject’s consent is a violent act that invades personal right of their image. This work is about dynamic relationship between photographer and subject, and digital camera as an object of desire.  

Mobile phone as an artistic medium

SMS is a realtime messaging system using mobile phone. Multimedia SMS can attach photographs, sounds, and video with the message. It is a uninterrupting mode of communication, compared to telephone call. Korean youths send SMS many times a day. Mobile phone is the primary communication device between friends. It is fair to say mobile phone doesn’t leave the reach of user’s hand for an entire day. As a home of several pioneering mobile communication industry, Seoul is a test bed for cutting edge technology. Everyone is holding a cell phone and taking pictures. Thus network presence is highly visible in the downtown Seoul, where ironically all the electricity and communication wires are under ground. Mobile user can upload their picture to the personal media system, and download contents on to their handheld in real time. Near ubiquitous network situation in Seoul and popular use of cellular phone with digital camera makes this project possible for large number of players and possibly the whole public present at the game site. Collective urban photographic reality as imagined by Situationist International, is thus possible through digital media technology. Away from the conventional use of mobile phone as a two way communication, this project transforms the phone into a liminal object of the game with a metaphor of violent armor. Participants are encouraged to shoot a picture of opponent team member. It is generally uncommon to photograph someone you do not know. Opposed to convention of posing for a camera, participants run and hide, doing best to avoid being photographed. Shoot me if you can grants a reason to run around taking picture of stranger; opponent. It is an artistic approach on counter attacking candid and surveillance camera. Opponent team member is like a walking and thinking surveillance camera. Players in the game wear their phone number stenciled on to the large sticker. You are your phone number.

First person Shooting game

FPS; such as Doom and Rainbow Six is a popular genre of online video / computer game. Player's point of view has the avatar's arm holding an armor and the landscape. It is a very immersive genre of game because of face paced speed, first person perspecitve and realistic rendering of landscape and sound. In multi user networked game, such as Counter Strike, players in remote location meet up in virtual landscape. Social network is formed through mutual interest in the game. There are clans and teams that regularly meet up in the cyberspace. Level is a 3D graphics virtual reality of the game space. In contrast Shoot me if you can, players use actual city as a game board. Team members are physically engaging in the streets and virtually connected via cell phone communication. FPS's realistic representation of the armor is replaced with a Camera Phone. We shoot photograph instead of shooting a gun.