Barbara Keating has been working in collaboration with two rather talented people on a project that uses innovative technology to explore our industrial and cultural histories.

Several journeys, and static shots, both night and day were filmed on the River Tyne, using a Red One camera (James McAleer of Steadired www.steadi-red.com

Sam Keating  (www.midibounce.com) not only used GPS to track the journeys, but also adapted software to  enable GPS to drive the zoom on the camera so that it matches the speed of the vessel as filming takes place.

These tracks are being overlaid onto sideways sonar scan data, made available by Port of Tyne, to form the visuals on a touch screen.

Viewers will scroll the screen, exploring the image of the riverbed. As they come across the GPS tracks, a video relating to the journey will be triggered to play on a nearby screen. As the viewer approaches a crossover point with another journey they will be alerted. Along the way the viewer will be invited to discover some frames of video graded to resemble paintings from the local museum archive.

At certain points the viewer will lose control of the screen and the video will play a shot which appears to approach the rivermouth endlessly, almost as if in suspended animation. We can see that we are moving over the water, but we don’t appear to get nearer the harbour bar.

There is a point in time and space where all the possible projected video journeys cross, are linked/or just miss each other, regardless of elevation, tidal changes and timings of journeys. The piece will be interactive, presenting the audience with opportunities to slip from one journey into another, or just hear sounds from another journey that cannot be reached directly, or cause disruptions to happen.

A  pilot phase  took place, during which  technical testing was carried out. Filming took place over the course of one year between March 2010 and March 2011 The Tyne River Project  has been developed with the support of Port of Tyne, South and North Tyneside Councils, South Tyneside Marine Technical College.and DFGDSSeaways.