Last Friday evening I was working with producer/writer/choreographer Lydia Fraser-Ward and dancer/physical actor Philippa Hambly at Rich Mix, Bethnal Green where Hi Siri was presented as part of the Women of Mass Destruction 3. Hi Siri featured pre-recorded and live interactive visuals created with the latest version of the Kinect sensor which is basically even better all round than the first version, in itself quite excllent.

Hi Siri is about a relationship between a woman, Iris, and her phone, Siri. It begins with Siri being plugged into the ‘flat OS’ thus giving her control of all domestic services, signalling the start of a general takeover bid by Siri upon Iris’ life. The interaction design follows a trajectory from Siri being a jumble of curves and lines to a recognisably human (albeit digital) form.

It was great to work within the performance environment for a change. After a lot of pre-design I only had to press a few buttons on the night, but obviously they still had to be the right buttons in the right order! That 20m USB extension finally came in handy. Thankfully the perfomance went well and congratulations are due all round. A couple of stills follow…