<div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; ">Sounds like an interesting challenge given that it needs to scale. Here are some things that have popped into my mind.</span></div>
<div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; "><br></span></div><div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;">1) What about mounting each window on piezoelectric transducers. Or perhaps two grommets and one transducer per window. It can then detect micro pressure change and sound with just one transducer. I bet this could be extremely sensitive.</span></font></div>
<div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;"><br></span></font></div><div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;">2) If a whole matrix of windows was just one pane of material mounted on transducers, I wonder if you could guess where the pressure is based on the differences in pressure at the mounting points.</span></font></div>
<div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;"><br></span></font></div><div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;">One thing that comes to mind with these transducers as they will pick up all sorts of things like tapping, scratching, pressing and perhaps even more subtle things like loud noises outside the device. You could make different patterns of lights for different types of stimulus. Perhaps for a tap light could start at the point of contact and then radiate outward.across the matrix. A scratch could start a light pattern moving linearly. A press could radiate outward with increase in pressure. I suppose the pane of material might resonate and give some surprises. </span></font></div>
<div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;"><br></span></font></div><div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;">3) A collection of small Web cams inside. I think this was discussed. </span></font></div>
<div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;"><br></span></font></div><div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;">If each matrix had more then one camera, monitoring it from a different vantage point, you might be able to get some interesting ways of figuring out which windows are being stimulated by the observer. Perhaps some cams can look outside the device without looking through the windows. </span></font></div>
<div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;"><br></span></font></div><div><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#333333" face="arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: collapse;">An outside camera could look for faces, expressions (like a camera looks for smiles). This could be used to impact the behavior of the device.</span></font></div>
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Date: Sun, 13 Mar 2011 14:30:59 -0400<br>From: "<span class="il" style="background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: rgb(207, 232, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; ">Andrew</span> O'Malley" <<a href="mailto:aomalley@gmail.com" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); ">aomalley@gmail.com</a>><br>
Subject: [Lab] Touch sensitive/reactive windows<br>To: lab <<a href="mailto:lab@artengine.ca" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); ">lab@artengine.ca</a>><br>Message-ID:<br> <AANLkTi=<a href="mailto:1Z4yqN4vASt7xCQnTKPwnh_bXPXqFGNEnbcn-@mail.gmail.com" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); ">1Z4yqN4vASt7xCQnTKPwnh_bXPXqFGNEnbcn-@mail.gmail.com</a>><br>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1<br><br>Hi gang,<br><br>I'm working on a an interactive light piece which is basically a large<br>tower covered in windows:<br><a href="http://www.technoetc.net/imgs/urbana_2011_gameplay_2.png" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); ">http://www.technoetc.net/imgs/urbana_2011_gameplay_2.png</a><br>
<br>Each window will be translucent acrylic, and illuminated from behind.<br>To provide interaction, I'd like each window to be touch sensitive.<br>I'd like to use a capacitive sensing approach, but not sure if this<br>
will work until I do some experiments; I fear over such a large area<br>capacitive sensing will be very noisy.<br><br>In the meantime, I'd love to hear any suggestions anyone might have as<br>to how to detect users touching the windows. I'd like to avoid having<br>
to use little buttons beside each window or turning each window into a<br>mechanical switch -- since there are 100+ windows, I'm looking for a<br>solution that scales reasonably well.<br><br>Light or IR sensors might be an option, but I imagine will require a<br>
great deal of calibration. Does anyone have any experience sensing IR<br>reflections through translucent or tinted acrylic?<br><br>The piece is still in the design stage, so I'd love to hear your<br>suggestions/comments.<br>
<br>Thanks in advance for your consideration and suggestions,<br><span class="il" style="background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-color: rgb(207, 232, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; ">Andrew</span></span></div>
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