PURPOSE:

Window Vision is a reactive sculpture that serves to highlight the changes in the outside environment by gradually shifting between two components depending on varying levels of light and dark.

OBSERVATIONS:

To have called my apt in Manhattan small would have been an exaggeration.  From my tiny room, you could hardly tell that I was living in the midst of a huge bustling metropolis and to that respect, it made me appreciate the architectural form of the window to an even greater extent.  The one window in my room faced a mere brick wall and the light that came in was so meager that I could hardly tell whether it was two in the morning or two in the afternoon.

Therefore I wanted to create something that would be a reminder of the changing levels of day to night and using the window as the fulcrum through which to implement these ideas.

It is a commentary on our perception of the outside environment.  On the one hand, Window Vision emphasizes the architectural nature of the human need to have an interaction with the outside world and the other is neurological. The piece reflects the way that our vision physically sees the world namely through the cellular structures “cones and rods” that reside in our retina.  Cones generally allow us to see objects and color during the daytime, and rods take over during moments of darkness.  In order to express this dichotomy of vision in terms of light and dark, I created two interfaces: solid for day and transparent for night to reflect the way that our own eyes are constantly shifting to adjust for varying light levels.

INSPIRATION:

The idea of a blind affected by light was very much inspired by Rachel Wingfield from RCA, and her research group Loop.Ph for the reactive blind Digital Dawn, which was conceptually based on the idea of photosynthesis.  Digital Dawn explores how changing light levels within a space can have a profound and physiological impact on our sense of well being.

PROCESS:

Using my sculpture piece to react to varying levels of light using a photocell was fairly easy but achieving the right mechanics ended up being the real challenge. The piece is mechanized through a series of pulleys and a stepper motor that would create enough torque to lift up the first structure similar to a window blind. I ended running out of time to test everything once it was constructed.  The construction alone definitely took the better part of a week to put it all together.  Thanks to some friends for helping me fold my pieces! In retrospect, I might have compromised a bit on the piece itself and the construction in order to better test the mechanics.

having to experiment with different types of “rails” in the form of regular wire, invisible wire, string and finally the winning combination of fishing line to get the structure strung up correctly and properly working.

inspiration ideas for the transparent structure: playing with things that look out of focus

in the end i used this halftone image of tree branches to give the impression of someone looking out their window.

from left to right: testing various motors, gears, and power supplies.

the stepper motor required a circuit using a dual h-bridge and two transistors wired in such a way that i could control the stepper motor using two wires instead of four.  tom igoe has a good tutorial for setting up stepper motors and programming Arduino to run the motor back and forth.

however i ended up running into one major issue: more power!  Seeing that my motor ran on a peak voltage of 24V, I was only giving it 5V through my Arduino at the time.  However once I added an external power supply using both the transformer wall plugs and the variable DC power supply, the motor would no longer run properly and either not turn on at all, stall or repeatedly beep.  I had several people take a look at the setup and circuit to no avail.  I ended up borrowing Adam Lassy’s stepper motor driver in order to guide the stepper motor through the steps in the correct sequence and from there I could add on a higher voltage and amperage.  Unfortunately, that still was not enough power to drive the motor to pull the pieces all the way up and stalled about a third of the way.

Keling stepper motor driver

problem solving

Window Vision Take 1 from Angela Chen on Vimeo.
FUTURE:

As the piece is selected to be shown in the Winter Show this year, I am aiming to improve the mechanics of the piece by adding a stronger, more powerful stepper motor and adding larger pulleys in order to add more torque.  Hopefully the combination of these two will provide the much needed boost in order to get Window Vision off of the ground!