Chameleons at large
Interactive Installation | Communication Design
Delivering knowledge in playful interaction.
1 month
In collaboration with:
Yichun Wang, Li Song
Director:
Scott Minneman, Maria Mortati
My role:
Chameleon's Graphic | Concept | Coding | Final Set-up
Intro
Chameleons at large is whole body interaction installation using camera-based interactive with animated figures and foliage. The whole experience is about three escaping chameleons with different characters. We are using arduino, webcam, and an interactive platform to create an experience to let the chameleon appears when players wear a chameleon’s tail ( beautifully handmade by our teammates) and it can dance with players. I hope to deliver knowledge with our installation in an interesting interactive way.
CAS NIGHTLIFE DAY!
How it started
This project is designed for the CAS nightlife. As the CAS has one of the best aquariums, planetariums, and natural history museums all over the world, one of the most important duty of CAS is deliver knowledge and educate visitors. So the original idea is
HMW create some interactive installations to deliver knowledge in interesting ways.
Ideation
After the field trip to CAS nightlife, I got inspiration from several installations there and shared my insights about several interesting objects which I want to design with including chameleon as Oustalet's Chameleon is one of the most famous “host” of the Museum. I finally decided to focusing on Knowledge about Chameleon.
Wrong Knowledge: Why Do Chameleons Change Their Colors?
After making the decision of focusing on Chameleon, I did homework about knowledge about the chameleon and invite people to finish quiz about Chameleon. I find one of the biggest wrong knowledge is many people believe chameleons change colors to disguise themselves and hide from predators.
But look at this picture below:
Instead hide itself, this chameleon change its color to such a conspicuous style. Isn't that weird?
Actually,
It is valuable to deliver this knowledge to the public with an interesting interactive way.
Three Chameleons
Foodie: Chameleon can shoot their tongue in an incredible speed. I create a fat chameleon who is eating all the time to deliver the knowledge.
Party Animal: Instead of protection from predators, chameleons change color to reflect their moods. Isn't that pretty similar to party animals whose face tunes red after several rounds?
Bookworm: With two eyeball rotating separately, chameleon can look at two different directions at same time. If somebody has this skill and loves reading meanwhile, he/she must be a bookworm as he/she can read two book at same time.
Build a connection between Guests and Chameleons
We are using arduino, webcam and codes to create an experience to let the chameleon appears when players wear a chameleon’s tail ( beautifully handmade by our teammates) and it can dance with players.
CAS NIGHTLIFE DAY!
The video is at the beginning of the page. We are required to finish the setup within one hour. So we designed everything for the set-up convenience.
What we learned from the night:
!Nothing is more important than your information delivery. You should let your audience know what you are showing them within 5 seconds.
!!The interaction should be direct and simple. Every step should be designed naturally without instructions. And fewer steps means better interaction in most cases.
!!!The core concept should be delivered within 3 operations. Or you lose your audience.
!!!!Physical objects help a lot in a whole body interacting installation. But keep everything simple stupid.