Concept Proposals

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Reactive Thunder Cloud

A cloud-shaped sculpture embedded with a programmable LED strip inside a fluffy, cotton-like material. The LED strip will flash white light in response to loud noises (such as claps, voices, or music), simulating the effect of lightning in a thunderstorm. The intensity of the flashes will correspond to the volume of the sound—the louder the noise, the brighter and more frequent the flashes, mimicking the relationship between thunder and lightning.

Composition

  • Lightweight wire frame covered with stretched-out cotton balls or polyfill stuffing to create a cloud texture
  • Addressable LED strip placed inside cloud structure, controlled by an Arduino (or other microcontroller), allowing light patterns and intensity to be customized.
  • Microphone connected to the microcontroller to detect sound levels.
  • Could be either mounted on a wall or hung from a ceiling to create a floating display

Questions

  • Is a simple flashing light reaction to simple, should more complex effects be used like gradual buildup before flash
  • Suggestions for cloud materials

Color Fusion

A small tabletop structure made from fragments of differently tinted reflective surfaces with an LED light source directed at the model creates colored shadows. Varying surface colors combined with shifting LED colors will reflect and create different colored shadows, demonstrating how hues mix to create new ones. For example, a yellow tint and blue light will create a green shadow.

Composition

  • Colored reflective materials (metallic or acrylic) in primary or secondary colors will be arranged at different angles to allow for scattered reflections.
  • An RGB LED will be directed at the sculpture and cycle through different colors to create shadows
  • A button or dial to adjust colors could be added to add an interactive aspect

Questions

  • Thoughts on interactive vs independent color changing could be made into a color-matching challenge
  • What reflective material should be used, metal, glass, acrylic, or should the light pass through a transparent tinted material instead of reflecting
  • Thoughts on best placement for the light source

5 Comments Add yours

  1. Kat says:

    I think that both ideas that you have are very doable and would both turn out amazing. For the first idea, polyfill would work super well to make the cloud. It is the stuff that is found in a lot of pillows or stuffed animals and can be bought in HUGE bags at Michael’s. I think that for the LEDs inside, a simple flash would work just fine if you are also able to play with color or other aspects of the lighting. Overall, I think it would be a really cool piece just to have in a room and it could be fun if you could sync it to the weather of the location you are in.

    For the second idea, I really like the thought of it being an interactive game. Gels or colored paper would make great cards that could be a part of the game. If you keep the circular board design, a light in the center with colored gels or colored acrylic that could spin around it might be super cool.

  2. Carlos says:

    So, I personally real like the thunder cloud, as its kind of an open ended project when you think about it. You can make it reactive or use real weather data, a great simplistic platform to do a lot of interesting things with. However, if you do go with your other idea, I think you should diffidently make it interactive, there are already a lot of static glass/light displays, and I think one that people can actually “play” with would be very unique. I don’t know how you would do it though, that might be a larger question for you to think about.

  3. Thea says:

    For the thundercloud, my go-to advice would be poly-fil for the material, you can get it for not a lot but in large quantities. I think a more complex affect for the thundercloud would bring the idea to life more, especially if you were able to add multiple settings (thunderstorm mode, weather mode, fun lights mode, etc)

    For the color fusion, I like the idea of it being an independently changing piece, especially if a flame is used to have dynamic motion. I would say a transparent material would let the light shine best, but the material would mostly depend on your budget, and I don’t know how much each material costs.

  4. Cullen says:

    I am personally a big fan of the thunder cloud concept but think either will turn out great in the end. I do think you should have more than just simple lightning effect though. Mabey study what thunder clouds look like in video and try to replicate them.

  5. Andrew says:

    The Thundercloud idea has a lot of potential! You might consider a little flicker before/after the main lightning flash, or even have a couple different types of flashes it cycles through! Would this only respond to volume or would it respond to pitch as well?

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