[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iZxA4JElx4[/ame]
Check out this amazing interactive display made up of 25 iPads that was one of the installations on show at this year’s Tokyo Designers Week. According to Tokyo Tek, the installation, called iProject 25, was commissioned by the Environmental Ministry of Japan as part of their Challenge 25 event celebrating the 25th anniversary of Tokyo Designers week. Apparently the brief was that the art should bring awareness to various global environmental issues.
iProject25 was created by Taq, a composer who worked on Konami’s BeatMania, and his friend Simon Mayer, the head of German designers Visual Catering, with Taq being responsible for the music and Simon working on the visual aspect of the display. Both also used to work in the clubs together as DJs, which is where a lot of the inspiration for the installation came from. A programmer called Mui Iwase then came on board and wrote the app that was used to sync the iPads wirelessly via Bluetooth and control the timing of the display.
The display starts with all iPads perfectly synced up, with all individual images forming one complete large image, with an accompanying soundtrack which is also in perfect sync.
People viewing the installation are then allowed to start touching the individual screens and playing with the videos on display, altering the speed of the sound and the video, the brightness of the screen and the melody. This, of course, means that the installation is no longer running in perfect sync, with each individual screen doing its own thing, thanks to the interaction of the people watching. According to Tokyo Tek, this is the whole point of the installation, to show the effect that human interaction has on the environment, as we manipulate our surroundings and interfere with harmony in nature. Heavy stuff indeed, but it all ends happily, as those interacting with the installation must then try to work with each other to get the videos back to their original, harmonious, state.
Source: Tokyo Tek
