Project Description
Gong is an examination of the effects of group breathing. Most times we are unaware of our own breath and even less aware of the breathing of those around us. How does breathing in sync with others make us feel?
As an installation piece it connects four people through their breathing patterns. It helps them to align their breathing with one another by observing the vertical movement of four hanging rings. When all people are in sync, the rings fill with light.
During the two week long course we explored different senses and breathing in particular, by iterating on various prototypes - both technical and aesthetic. The technical prototype uses the motion tracking device "Leap Motion" to track the participants’ hand gestures which they do as they breath in and out. These gestures control the motor that moves the rings left and right. To train the computer to detect these gestures we used the supervised machine learning tool Wekinator.
The aesthetic prototype is a scale model which portrays the interaction between the light installation and the participants in a larger physical space.
Gong was exhibited at SPACE10 as a part of MADE IN SPACE festival.
As an installation piece it connects four people through their breathing patterns. It helps them to align their breathing with one another by observing the vertical movement of four hanging rings. When all people are in sync, the rings fill with light.
During the two week long course we explored different senses and breathing in particular, by iterating on various prototypes - both technical and aesthetic. The technical prototype uses the motion tracking device "Leap Motion" to track the participants’ hand gestures which they do as they breath in and out. These gestures control the motor that moves the rings left and right. To train the computer to detect these gestures we used the supervised machine learning tool Wekinator.
The aesthetic prototype is a scale model which portrays the interaction between the light installation and the participants in a larger physical space.
Gong was exhibited at SPACE10 as a part of MADE IN SPACE festival.
Contribution
I was involved in the concepting, the design, the implementation and documentation of Gong. Together with Benedict, I built the two versions of the experience prototypes that was exhibited at SPACE10.
Links: SPACE10