Contra/Country Dance Markup Language Project

CDML Project Goals    Other Dance Languages    Who's Who    Listserver    Other Uses of "CDML"

Potential uses include:

• providing a common base from which dance descriptions (e.g., caller's cards) can be printed (in variable formats)
• input to animation of dance sequences (e.g., Greg Hopkin's contra dance designer)
• output from dance generating software (e.g., Robert E. Frederking's Random Contra Dance Generator)
• connecting the two!
• calculation of such quantitative (but as yet undefined) measures as:
  • complexity (related to the number of moves)
  • difficulty (related to the nature of the transitions)
  • "smoothness"
• define a standard database format
• allow for machine searches for certain moves or sequences of moves
• provide an unusual line item for our resumes
• who knows?

At present, we are gathering together (in a virtual sense) and beginning to define goals. We have set up a listserver to host our e-mail discussions. We welcome interested individuals who wish to contribute or merely listen in.

This page has been blogged: http://surgery-graphics.med.umich.edu/~matt/archives/2004_01.html#000422. The author kind of misses the point (CDML is intended as a means to communicate dance descriptions, not a route to create dancinging robots), but it's interesting to read.

In the meantime, please send in any thoughts you might have on this!

Thank you!

§ CDML Project Goals

It is currently contemplated to secure copyright protection for our work, and assign the copyright to some appropriate long lived organization.

§ Other Dance Languages

The following were provided by Greg Hopkins (March 4, 2001):

A collection of links to other resources: http://www.dmoz.com/Arts/Performing_Arts/Dance/Dance_Technology Linkfest

Here is an organization about a historically significant language for dance choreography, also have computer editors for this notation: http://www.dancenotation.org

Info at this link for academics involved with computers & dancing:
http://www.dance.ohio-state.edu/files/Dance_and_Technology/who-what-where.html

[it's an undated but extensive survey of primarily academic efforts - Mike Schuh]

The title of the paper at this link is "Dance and the Computer: A Potential for Graphic Synergy" http://linus.socs.uts.edu.au/~don/pubs/synergy.html

The following were provided by Marilyn Carlson (April 3, 2001):

An explanation of dance notation: http://balletdance.about.com/musicperform/balletdance/library/weekly/aa020298.htm

A computer choreography project. http://www.rz.uni-frankfurt.de/~griesbec/CHOREOE.HTML

This is a website by a guy in Germany, Christian Griesbeck, who is trying to design a computer program for choreography and to simulate dancers

Detailed explanation of Laban Notation http://www.rz.uni%2Dfrankfurt.de/%7Egriesbec/LABANE.HTML

Links to human simulation sites http://www.rz.uni-frankfurt.de/~griesbec/LINKSE.HTML#Human Simulation Linkfest

University of Pennsylvania Center for Human Modeling and Simulation http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~hms/

"The overall goal of the Center for Human Modeling and Simulation is the modeling and animation of human movement. That central topic drives a number of related research interests covering a broad scope from image synthesis to natural language interfaces."

MacBenesh software http://www.dance.ohio-state.edu/files/Links/benesh.html

"MacBenesh 6.0* lets you create Benesh Notation scores or individual staves that can be included in other documents. When printed on a PostScript device, high qu ality output is produced. This latest version has improved reliability and better function for producing Titles, Headers, and Footers for your scores."

Mathematical approaches

Thank you for the visit.