[art] "Wearable Interactive Art Project"

[Bob Miller]

Ben Barrett wrote:

> Howdy folks.  Sorry to cross-post, please reply to whichever list you're 
> subscribed to, or just me.
> I've been stewing on a project to enjoy this summer, and I'd like to 
> offer up some (the sum?) of my ideas:
> 
> "Wearable Interactive Art Project":  a wearable computer which has audio 
> and video input, and drives EL wire and LEDs or other displays, and 
> collects data for artsy filtration... more or less.

Here are some random thoughts to complement your random thoughts. (-:

My friend's girlfriend made a floor-length skirt with EL wire threaded
into it, and some simple switching circuitry made various parts blink
on and off.  Think blinking neon sign on fabric and you've got the
idea.  It was made for Burning Man last year or the year before.  I
have a badly made movie of her dancing in it somewhere...

Unless you have Big Ideas about processing video or running neural
networks or something, you can use a much smaller, lower-power system
than a Mini-ITX.  A Gumstix or the computer-in-an-ethernet-plug that
was on Slashdot this week would be plenty.  The ciaep has GIO ports
and flash memory on-chip....  The Gumstix is 200 MHz or so -- not
all that slow.

> For video input, I think I'll have to use USB webcams.  
> I'd love to [post]process two streams into a red/blue 3D composite 
> video, which I think is attainable if the cams are mounted on a board or 
> bar to maintain relative perspective.

Ah.  You do have Big Ideas.  Well, prototype it on your desktop box
and see how much CPU it uses, then you'll know (a) what platform(s) it
might run on, and (b) whether you're going to get the software
finished, before you spend money.

Check out the miniPOV, if you haven't.
http://www.ladyada.net/make/minipov/

Also Bunny Huang's rave light in Make Magazine, Volume 1 Issue 1.
(same idea, different implementation).

> Scheming on it:  One example of a desirable sequence I'd like is to have 
> the low-end beat blink the leg lights, and the high-end beat tempo blink 
> the upper-body lights.  Imagine any of various visualization plugins for 
> audio players mapped onto a more limited, but flexible and wearble array 
> of blinkies.  Annoying in most situations that fits right in at burning 
> man  :)  

Somewhere you introduced a rhythm source.  Where did it come from?  Is
this a completely separate system from the video processing thingie?
Would it be easier to implement if it were?

How about a walking spectrum analyzer?  Put an array of lights at
various heights on your body and tie each one to a different frequency
range, then feed it from a microphone picking up whatever ambient
sound you hear.

> I know Jack is built for audio, but "synchronous execution of all 
> clients, and low latency operation" meet my needs perfectly, and there 
> seems to be a good amount of software built up around it and compatible 
> with it.  I'm also imagining pumping non-audio input through Jack to end 
> up with the video sequence also -- this may well involve writing some 
> code, hopefully minimal with everything else that's already written.  

Take a look at the gstreamer library too.  It's video oriented and
probably has lower overhead than Jack for video.  It would definitely
require programming, though.

> MIDI is a possibility for input and/or output, and might even be a good 
> way to sequence the lights.

Maybe.  MIDI hardware is big and clunky by today's standards.

-- 
Bob Miller                              K<bob>
kbobsoft software consulting
http://kbobsoft.com                     kbob at jogger-egg.com