blobWave is an interactive experience which utilizes a Microsoft Kinect to transform the likenesses of objects and people from a physical form into a digital arrangement of blobs which resembles the likeness of a Rorschach painting, and encourages the user to manipulate their personal digital inkblot’s scale and rotation using their hands to examine its finer details or open up more possibilities of a likeness.
Involvement: Coding in Processing (Java-based), OpenKinect libraries
|
|
|---|
The human brains ability to make connections between vague shapes or silhouettes with real objects is one that has been challenged or linked to the capability of a fully functioning being through psychoanalytic tests such as the Rorschach Test.
Rorschach’s are not specific to any design; they are random, but people's brains pick up on forms and make connections between a random assortment of inkblots and real objects. Meanwhile, blobWave does the opposite by turning a real object into a seemingly random assortment of blots. This reversal of roles demonstrates a subversion of the brain’s critical thinking abilities and is meant to encourage the viewer to think more critically about the concept of perception.
Using a Microsoft Kinect camera for interactivity, users are able to create and manipulate their own virtual 'inkblot' using various hand gestures. By moving both hands closer together or further apart a user can scale/ zoom their inkblot image larger or smaller, and by moving both hands in opposite vertical directions to create a “slope” between both the user is able to “spin” the image and rotate their inkblot.