Turning the Supertanker

Sharing our Eden July 28, 2008

I had one of the guys from Connector Systems come aboard the Supertanker today to make a site survey for a WiFi project I have had on the back burner ever since I arrived. For those of you who are not quite sure where the Supertanker is, I suggest that you take a look at a little video that I made well over a year ago, called ‘Where in the world is Meadowbank School?‘ To date nearly 9000 people have asked that same question and have used the video to find out.  The most obvious and special part of the school is the stupendous gully that bisects our site and the entire school into two separate sites.  It has been an environmental reclamation scheme over the last 8 years or so and today it is a wonderful resource that the students and teachers use regularly.  A connecting foot bridge spans the gully at canopy level and provides great views into the bush clad gully.  It is a special place indeed.

When I joined the Supertanker I decided then and there that this resource was too special not to share.  I have been slowly inching my way to that goal ever since.  It is my aim to set up wireless access points in the gully so that I can have several cameras set up to stream live content to the web in order that others can benefit from our good fortune.  At the moment I want to set up an ‘eelcam’ in the creek, a ‘fungi cam’ by the rotting logs in addition to that I want to set up feed stations with a camera at each so that students can monitor how and what different native birds eat.  Steve at Connector Systems now knows that we have a large technical issue to solve.  He has gone away scratching his head, to get what we want will not be cheap and will take several iterations to afford and roll out.

Once the infrastructure is in place I will be using a resource called Mogulus to capture and record the streamed video, so that even when we are offline or at night, others in other time zones will be able to see and share our resource. This is all mangaged by the multiple camera facility and the ability to record live streams and build storyboards within Mogulus. Mogulus is a really cool resource that I will be presenting on at Ulearn08, I have just discovered today.

In the meantime we have to rely on static images to share the flora and fauna of our urban Eden.  Currently one of the ornamental cherry trees is in flower and the Tui’s have gone mad over it.  It is not unusual for 10 or  more of these birds to be feasting and squabbling in the same tree.  Take a look at some of the images that I took a couple of weekends ago and imagine what a live feed of the same thing would mean to your class.  All donations to the cause gratefully accepted!

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