Dynamic Interactive Painting

Hey everyone hope you had a good Christmas.

Over the past two weeks I've been trying to collect all my research to work out a final idea for this project. I've had a few different ideas ranging from an installation giving interactors an experience similar to the Synesthesia syndrome, to an interactive piece working as a chain where interactors form a story by engaging and reacting to previous interactors actions. However the more I tried to visualise these ideas as actual pieces giving users interactive experiences, the more I disliked them and felt stuck. So it took me a while of going through lots of different thought before I finally cracked it. I think I am now getting somewhere with an idea of an interactive installation in the form of a dynamic paint by numbers.
Interactors will be drawing (on different computers) parts of a huge image. A small piece from a larger image (divided into individual parts in a grid) is given to them to copy in their own style. Every time an interactor has finished drawing their piece it is automatically uploaded onto the large image. The gradually changing large image is projected onto a wall in a public space to give members of the public a sense of a fixed artwork yet with dynamic movement from the continually changing gridded parts within the image. To ensure that movement is always taking place, the already existing individual parts will be continuously looped at random times.
This will only be a proposal for an installation as it would be technically difficult to make in the short time given.
More description will follow.

























I remember helping out students at Northbrook College with this huge painting which works on the same principle except from being painted in real life not on a computer. This was what inspired me to this idea.

The original image used for this work was from Chuck Close website http://chuckclose.com/

I also found this site inspiring: http://www.chuckclose.coe.uh.edu/

The projected painting would look a little bit like this:

Inspiration for physical computing by Rona Innes

Useful links:
wiring.org.co (look at exhibition)
arduino.cc
processing.org
nastypixel.com/instantsoup

CONTROLLING FLASH WITH A WIIMOTE
Windows
http://wiiflash.bytearray.org/?p=52

Mac
http://screenfashion.org/releases/motedaemon/

Book:
Physical Computing by Dan O'Sullivan and Tom Igoe

Links for Interactive work:

http://www.kirupa.com/developer/actionscript/microphone.htm -Flash animations using microphone
http://imm.sheridanc.on.ca/imm2004/chin/tutorial/ -blowing grass
http://www.nastypixel.com/prototype/?page_id=73 -webcam motion detection
http://www.nastypixel.com/prototype/?page_id=86 -Gesture controlling Google Earth
http://gskinner.com/blog/archives/2005/08/flash_8_webcam.html -snowstorm & game etc
http://members.westnet.com.au/lmwan/projects.html - Wan's webcam experiments
http://www.protozoo.com/?p=179 - generate and pop bubbles
http://www.discombo.co.uk/cam-experiments.htm - cupid game etc
http://www.webcamtastic.com/ -webcam goo
http://www.extendedreality.com/webcam_games_info.html - eyetoys type games
http://cam.playdo.com

Distance changes face perception?

http://www.doctorhugo.org/illusions/illusion1.html
This is probably one of the best illusions ever! Please do the following: look at the above images from your seat in front of the computer; Mr. Angry is on the left, and Ms. Calm is on the right. Now, get up from your seat, and move back 10 or 12 feet. Who’s the angry and calm now? This illusion was made by Phillippe G. Schyns and Aude Oliva.

Gathering some thoughts

What are the elements that I want to explore/play with in this project?
Element that contradict or correspond with the idea of interactivity

Immersed <------> Distracted

Curious <------> Apathetic

Tempting <------> Repelling

I am interested in the question of whether curiousity and temptation are what drives us to take action? This question seems important to ask for the sake of interaction and what makes us interact with something in the first place.

In a game we move forward because we want to unfold, discover and realise the plot or goal. If a door is closed in the game and we have to solve a puzzle before the door will open, we will spend hours trying to solve the puzzle just to see what is behind the door, in other words quench our curiousity. If we have a particular question that we know there is a particular answer to, we will equally spend hours searching (the internet) for the answer. We particularly spend longer if we believe the answer is within our reach. This stubberness seems to be driven by human instinctive curiousity as well as a want to prove ourselves. It is a mixture of irritation of not knowing and the challenge of finding out which keeps us busy because we know that if we do we will be rewarded. These two feelings needs to be finely balanced in order to make the overall experience joyful. If we have to work for too long before the answer is given we become frustrated and give up, but equally if the task is too easy we loose the feeling of being challenged and the reward seems less earned.

These observations are all concerned with the idea of "play" and "fun" which we mainly know from games. Computer games are often the first medium mentioned when talking about interactivety, as these are highly interactive. We can illustrate how interactivity has progressed over time by looking at a film which is not interactive at all to second life which is as interactive as a game gets. But can we say which of these are better? Films are still highly popular today.

3d Magic Eye Tetris

http://www.lutanho.net/play/magiceyetetris.html

Ideas and thoughts so far

These are some rough notes to gather all the ideas/thoughts I have had so far:
Working around the idea of temptation and curiousity - what makes a person want to interact with a medium? Could one play around with the idea of temptation and limitation through images or sound?
Work around the idea of optical illusion and how we memorise. Do we memorise through sound or visuals? Do we always link our past to the present?
Are 3D magic eyes interactive? Could you build on the idea of something being interactive without requiring the user/viewer to physically interact much?

Memory through sound or images?

I've been thinking about sound because recently I've been listening a lot more to the radio rather than watching TV. I've found that radio programs stick much better in my memory than TV programs. I think it may have to do with the fact that when you listen rather than watch, you create your own images. But maybe it's just because we are so used to visual information and are slightly overloaded with this form of information. I was wondering if I could build this idea into my project in some way, perhaps I need to research if there is any truth in this or if it is only my experience that sound is more effective in terms of memorising than visuals. Maybe each individual remembers things differently. I've always wondered if some people memorise more in images, and some people memorise more in sounds, words or numbers. Either way this subject relates well to the idea of how our brain works in terms of how we memorise.