Image Credit : Thi Nguyen
Project Overview
Chromatic Motions is a public installation that was part of the 2013 Vivid Light Festival. It is a virtual instrument that allows users to paint on a virtual canvas with their body. The installation analyses live-feed from users and converts shape and motion into colours. This is designed to work with any number of people and in the interaction is very simple – touch creates colour.
Project Commissioner
Project Creator
Team
Thi Nguyen, Designer
Stephen Hamper, Preparator
Project Brief
The aim of this project is to reach the hearts and minds of people by facilitating meaningful and memorable experiences through play.
While the installation is suitable for a single user, when multiple users are present a new dynamic emerges between people. A user-to-user interaction is born when the users start playing with each other, working collaboratively to create shared artwork.
The sensation one experiences and reacting in real-time to their own movements is what matters – similar to a musical instrument. While one often plays a piano to compose and record, it is quite common to just play and improvise without any concern for recording. Every note is just for the moment, a real-time reaction coming from within. Hence when you stop interacting, the colour fades away, leaving only the memory, like the song you’ve just played.
Project Need
Meaningful conversations associated with the social value of co-creation are more about people’s needs and inspirations – it satisfies the need for creative activity while addressing the need for social interaction. Play acts as a creative agency delegated between human and non-human actors. People are active participants rather than passive test subjects or observers.
Chromatic Motions explores how design can influence our lives by interacting with us and shaping the ways in which we interact with each other. It illustrates how play and interactive design responds to human stimuli in order to change the way we reconfigure ourselves by addressing our individual, social and environmental needs.
If our experiences can be influenced by our environment, it will present a new challenge for design. As human-computer interaction becomes increasingly like human-human interaction, there is an increased willingness on the part of users to attempt communication. This sort of interaction can encourage conversations that are social and not just individual. As people have the ability to manipulate space through interactive devices, they also have the ability to create new types of connections with each other.
Design Challenge
Creating a site specific installation that is intuitive, inspiring and engaging for an expected crowd of over half a million people during the 2 week public festival.
Ensuring that the installation is weather proof and durable while working under a modest budget.
Making sure that the technology runs smoothly during the course of the outdoor event.
Working on a heritage listed location.
Sustainability
A low energy consumption using LEDs (24amp)
Individual pieces are easily replaced if damaged, eliminating the need to replace the whole totem.
Designed to be flat packed to reduce space for transport/freight.
Event Experience - Consumer
This award celebrates creative and innovative design for a consumer event. Consideration given to originality, creativity, theming, audience connection and engagement and how the event created a seamless experience for the visitor and helped to reinforce the program's core message
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