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A Little Light Work

tigoeMay 18th, 2012

The end of the semester at ITP always brings interesting projects I haven’t yet seen, which is one of the things that makes working there so much fun. I am a sucker for good lighting projects, and this year’s class featured some really nice ones. Here are a few from this spring’s crop:

Avery Max’ Neon God is a giant El-wire mirror driven by two Arduino Unos. Here’s a prototype video, and here’s Avery with the final wall. If you like rainbow sparkle psychedelia, you’re gonna love Avery’s work in general.

 

 

Avery Max with Neon God

Sukmo Koo’s Hand in Hand is a lamp that requires friends to join hands in order to light up. In his final presentation at ITP, Koo managed to get the entire room, and his thesis advisor, all joining hands:

 

 

Sukmo Koo's Hand in Hand

Geetha Padapati’s Sunlight as Mediated By an Object is a lightbox driven by a camera focused on the sky above her apartment. UUsing Adafruit’s LDP8806 RGB Lightstrip and an Arduino, she created a beautiful abstraction of the subtle changes in skylight.

 

 

 

Sunlight As Mediated by an Object (images courtesy Geetha Padapati)

Emily Webster’s Cellar Door seeks to liven up the ubiquitous sidewalk cellar doors of Manhattan by lighting them from within. Force sensors beneath a sheet of structural plexiglas are tied to an Arduino that controls the halogen lights that light up the entrance and allow pedestrians to stroll over and peek inside.

 

 

Emily Webster's Cellar Door lights up the sidewalk (image courtesy Emily Webster)

The lighting project are only a tiny portion of the great work students did this semester; I’ll hopefully post about a few others in the coming days. Meantime, if you want to see them all, check out the ITP Spring Show 2012 site.

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