Mojonauts traveling to Reykjavik will want to stop at the Iceland Princess Hotel, a beautiful Captain’s mansion constructed in 1928. The original materials and architecture have been preserved as much as possible. Located in central Reykjavik, the hotel is within walking distance from restaurants, discos, shops, and museums. The Iceland Princess is on a quiet street in the famous and quaint 101 district. The hotel’s upper balcony faces north and offers an ocean view.
That’s nice, you might say. But what does it have to do with MojoWorld? The Iceland Princess hotel features MojoWorld images in all the rooms and suites! According to co-owner and Marketing Director, Morris Emerick, the interest has been outstanding and he plans to extensively promote the artwork as “adding that extra dimension to the hotels.” Emerick’s second hotel, The Metropolitan Hotel, also in Reykjavik, is a four story hotel that has MojoWorld renders in the lobby as well as on the second floor.
“Guests are quite amazed by the artwork,” said Emerick. “I was prompted to place MojoWorld images in my hotels because Iceland is a hotbed of art and music. I wanted to develop a unique approach to bringing guests into the hotel and thought that one-of-a-kind images were the way to go. Although MojoWorld is well-known in the graphics community, it is an enigma to our hotel guests. Most guests think that the images are photos, although there are certain aspects of the images that perplex them. As you can imagine, my staff gets quite a few questions regarding MojoWorld images and do their best to answer them. I tend not to go into much detail as I feel that the mystery of how such images are produced increases the value and impact of the art for our guests.”
How such images are produced is no mystery to most Mojonauts. However, Emerick has had a few fellow users wondering about his rendering and printing techniques. “As to the technical aspects of the renders, I render using tiles with an anti-aliasing of six and a geometry detail of three. I use no shadows, as this would greatly slow the render down. The render size is usually around 10,200 pixels by 5800 pixels. It is rendered on a Pentium 4, 3 GHz pc. The renders usually take as long as one week and up to one month to render. I then pull them into Photoshop and correct for contrast, levels, and color as well as using the clone and or healing tool to correct any missed pixels. I then sharpen at 50 percent. The render is then burned to a CD and brought to the printer. I have the images output on a Hewlett Packard large-format printer using archival quality dyes. I try for a resolution / dpi of at least 200 but can go as low as 150 without loss of quality. The prints are rolled, placed in cardboard tubes, and transported to Iceland where they are framed. Currently, I have 16 images framed and waiting to be hung in the second floor of the Metropolitan Hotel and I will then render more images for the other floors.”
http://www.icelandprincess.com/
http://www.metropolitan-iceland.com/
So how does a hotelier and marketing master come to be a Mojonaut? According to Emerick, “I have had a lifelong fascination for art but could not quite get my fingers to cooperate with my brain. Computer art has at last awakened my abilities and allowed me to create from my imagination.
“I graduated from the University of North Dakota in 1987 with a degree in Nursing and I have a license for R.N. in Arizona USA. Prior to that, I spent 11 years in the United States Air Force as an aircraft armament technician.
“My last deployment was to Iceland in 1983 where I worked on F-4 fighters as part of the Icelandic Defense Forces. Iceland does not have a military but are NATO members. They signed a treaty in 1945 that allows the Unites States to set up a base there for the protection of Iceland, and also to track (once) Soviet bombers and submarines.
“After my return to the United States I began to have recurrent dreams about Iceland. I dreamed that I was going back there but could not quite reach my Icelandic friends nor stay on the island for long.
“Twenty years later I succumbed and returned to Iceland. Prior to returning, I attempted to book a hotel room in April for a June trip. I was told by Icelandair (the main carrier to Iceland) that there were no rooms available city-wide until September. I was also shocked by the high room rates: $210 USD for a basic room. It was then that I decided to investigate the possibility of starting a hotel of my own.
“I sought to bring in investors to purchase what was then named the "Landmark" hotel. This was a converted Captain’s mansion built in 1928, the former owner of which ran afoul of the taxation system and left the country.
“I purchased the hotel with the assistance of Gordon Troan, an accountant friend of mine, and Michelle Swanson. The hotel was opened in May of 2004 and has been doing well since.
“After that initial purchase I was the subject of some publicity in a magazine titled "Seen and Heard." This is a magazine similar to the United States version of the National Enquirer, and the subject of the article was: "Americans come to Iceland to go a Viking." They assumed that we were in Iceland to gobble up the hotel business!
“I received a phone call from our real-estate agent in Iceland stating that there was a hotel for sale at a bargain price: the City Hotel. This hotel is located in the heart of downtown Reykjavik and was a somewhat dilapidated hotel of ill repute. The other co-owners and I decided to completely remodel the hotel outside and inside and rename it the Metropolitan Hotel. Part of this remodeling process involved replacing the dated and cheesy 1960's style artwork on the walls, which of course led me to create the MojoWorld images used throughout the space.”
