I was able to put final touches on all the lanterns, combine the motor and LED sequence, as well as arrange and hide the wires as best as possible.
However, I am now running into some roadblocks in terms taking photos and videos of the artwork in an aesthetically pleasing manner. This is because the lights from the small lanterns are harder to work with than expected (they are internally coded to flash through a sequence of red, green, and blue, that I cannot control). Additionally, the light from the moon was too bright and overpowered the light from small lanterns. I fixed this by putting from fabric over the light bulb and this dimmed the moon’s light appropriately. However, when I took a video of the sequence, I am not satisfied with how the small lanterns look. I think I will fix this during final documentation by have different “modes” for the lighting:
- video sequence of man walking on moon and the stepping stone lanterns lighting up (highlights electronic sequence and storytelling)
- picture of all lanterns lit up together (highlights light aspect)
- picture of bright moon, small lanterns not lit (highlights traditional lanterns and fabric)
The video first shows how the inside of the moon lantern was assembled (I cut out the silhouette on cardboard, taped up the motor, and put fabric over the light bulb), then what the man walking animation looks like on the painted moon lantern, and then two examples of the entire sequence (man walking to stepping stones lanterns lighting up). I still have to play around with arrangements, cropping, and lighting a little bit but all the pieces are together!