Created By: Eric Gradman and Brent Bushnell
ArtFall is an interactive installation that allows visitors to construct a dynamic physical simulation by drawing on a whiteboard. For centuries, people have played games that require nothing more than a pen and something to write on. ArtFall opens up a whole new space of possibilities.
When you draw on this whiteboard, your art is captured by a camera. A custom computer vision algorithm analyzes your art and inserts its contours into a physics engine. In this physics engine we simulate a two dimensional world wherein simple objects drop from the top of the whiteboard and bounce off your artwork. A projector overlays the results of this simulation back onto the whiteboard.
It then appears as though circles and squares "fall down" the whiteboard, collide with your artwork, with one another, and with the edges of the whiteboard. The shapes slide down ramps, collect in concavities, balance precariously on one another, and eventually come to rest at the bottom of the whiteboard.
We added some extra features, like controlling the direction of gravity using an iPhone accelerometer. And when installed in a loud environment, a bandpass filter turns musical "thumps" into physical impulses that agitate the virtual objects in the ArtFall world.
Shown at:
- Mindshare, 2008-Dec
- Brewery Artwalk, 2009-Jan
- TEDxUSC, 2009-Apr
