Dutch Digital Design
sharing the best
interactive work from
the Netherlands

Submit case

Jump to articles

Playful interaction and seriously crafted 3D animation

BrewDistrict24

by

BrewDistrict24

Heritage and Innovation. Amazing immersiveness on a large scale

The Ellinikon Experience Centre

by

The Ellinikon Experience Centre

An atmospheric and beautifully crafted way to digitalise an album

Önnu Jónu Son

by

Önnu Jónu Son

A totally immersive and playful, fun app experience

McDonald's Getaway Island

by

McDonald's Getaway Island

Spending days at this beautifully crafted and innovative digital library

Americana

by

Americana

A flawlessly implemented website with an eye-opening message

The Drop Store

by

The Drop Store

Taking the world of hospitality to the next level, digitally

Be My Guest

by

Be My Guest

A visually strong mix of digital storytelling & e-commerce

CL9UD

by

CL9UD

Raising digital awareness: the decline in press freedom

The Erased font

by

The Erased font

A sophisticated digital experience to explore an iconic museum online

foam.org

by

foam.org
show all cases

Dutch Digital Design.
Stories. News. Events.

Jump to cases

Margot Gabel: passionate about connecting digital design with emotions

Margot Gabel Build in Amsterdam & Dutch Digital Design Curator

Interview

Margot Gabel Build in Amsterdam & Dutch Digital Design Curator

Christian Mezöfi from Dentsu Creative: loves detail and 3D design

Christian Mezöfi Dentsu Creative & Dutch Digital Design curator

Interview

Christian Mezöfi Dentsu Creative & Dutch Digital Design curator

Welcome ACE, Cut the Code, DotControl, Lava and Merlin Studio

welcome to five new partners

News

welcome to five new partners

Aurelija Mockeviciute: visual designer & Dutch Digital Design curator

Meet Aurelija Mockeviciute from Clever°Franke

Interview

Meet Aurelija Mockeviciute from Clever°Franke

To be a Robot Kitten: passionate about creative technology

Partner in the Spotlight: Robot Kittens

Interview

Partner in the Spotlight: Robot Kittens

Dutch Digital Design does Dutch Design Week 2023

Dutch Digital Design does Dutch Design Week 2023

Event

Dutch Digital Design does Dutch Design Week 2023

ADNIGHT 2023: we present to you the Dutch Digital Design route

Adnight - Dutch Digital Design route

Event

Adnight - Dutch Digital Design route

Erick de Jong: creative director, one of our curators, Japanophile

Curator's choice - Erick de Jong from Fonk

Interview

Curator's choice - Erick de Jong from Fonk

Curator’s Choice: meet Giulia Principe & the work of Roelof Knol

Curator’s Choice: meet Giulia Principe & the work of Roelof Knol

Interview

Curator’s Choice: meet Giulia Principe & the work of Roelof Knol

Partner in the Spotlight: Greenberry for socially responsible digital design

Partner in the Spotlight - Greenberry

Interview

Partner in the Spotlight - Greenberry
show all articles

Looking at audiovisual archives: understanding AI technology

Through Artificial Eyes by

View caseAgency

To celebrate their 20th anniversary, Dutch future-themed TV programme VPRO Tegenlicht asked Richard Vijgen - a Dutch artist/designer whose work focuses on artistic data visualisation - to create an experience that presents their broadcast archive of 20 years to the world, but also gives them a scenario for a future way to archive. Result: 'Through Artificial Eyes', an immersive, interactie installation using computer vision*. The installation was displayed at Het Nieuwe Instituut (HNI) in Rotterdam - national museum for architecture, design and digital culture - and is currently on display at Tresoar in Leeuwarden where it is applied to the Friesian audiovisual archive.

*Computer vision is a field of AI that trains computers to capture and interpret information from image and video data. 

The objectives

To explore what could be the role of computer vision (an AI technology) in audiovisual archiving.

To raise awareness around the workings of a computer vision neural network to a broad audience. To demystify the behaviour of algorithms in a playful manner, enabling visitors to understand this often seen as black box technology where they cannot see the inner workings of an algorithm.

The installation

Visitors experience how the computer views the archive of VPRO Tegenlicht. How it searches for and detects certain patterns in 555 VPRO Tegenlicht's broadcasts. The installation playfully allows visitors to discover processes that are essential to computer vision and neural networks. They can dig deeper into the technologies by analysing how algorithms ‘see’ patterns in images or texts. 

A great collaboration between the physical space and digital design. The installation really invites you to interact: dialogue between man and machine.

Visitors can play around with the sliders and see what it does to the results. They are three categories: people, artifacts and natural objects. These categories are the three 'eyes' through which the algorithm observes the archive.

The visitors can then set the 'confidence' threshold. Meaning how confident the algorithm needs to be for a certain result to appear. By playing with this, visitors can explore the limits of the algorithm.

At the same time, it raises many questions about and exposes the ethical aspects of AI technology. Such as who decides which categories are being used, who labels the training data (through who’s eyes are we really looking?) and what are the implications of using this technology. 

Behind the scenes

Studio Richard Vijgen used ImageNet as a source as it is used in many applications using computer vision. 

ImageNet is a visual database designed for use in visual object recognition software research, for training of large scale object recognition models. More than 14 million images have been hand-annotated to indicate what objects are pictured. 

By using ImageNet the studio wanted to show how the structure of Imagenet and the (cultural) perspectives embedded in it, are finding their way into current applications. They included as many categories as possible to highlight both the obvious and successful labels: recognising an apple or a boat. But also the more difficult ones like recognising a bad person or a Dutch person. 

Even though it is technically possible to train a computer by showing it lots of photos of 'bad people' (this is an actual Imagenet category), it is questionable and sometimes leads to controversial outcomes. Yet it is likely that this training data is used in existing applications, creating a rather biased and, perhaps, not truly realistic representation.