Touchless Navigation

Community (2008) is a demo I put together in part to demonstrate some of my earlier work with IR proximity sensor array (in this case consisting of nine sensors) and using it as a touchless navigation interface. The demo is in part inspired by the amazing support Virginia Tech received from all over the world in response to the tragic event of April 16, 2007 in a form of written cards, photos, as well as large murals that have literally covered the hallways of the entire campus, and many of which have proven difficult to preserve. My idea was to digitize these historical mementos and make them accessible via a kiosk-like interface using the aforesaid touchless navigation. The music in the video is one of the soundtracks I composed as part of an unrelated collaboration. Here it is playing in the background because the same video was one of the embedded video media in the demo to showcase environment’s ability to handle a mix of images and videos. Photos used for the demo came from a random selection of Virginia Tech outreach photos. The entire interface was prototyped in MaxMSP, while interfacing with IR proximity sensors was achieved using I-cubeX USB board.