Mid-term Project: Video Theater

For my mid-term project I decided to create a mini-theater for an interactive video.

Video: I created 2 short movies for this project. The first movie is a slide show of travel images of South Africa. The images come from a 1959 travel catalogue from the South African Tourist Corporation titled "Colourful South Africa" and my personal photographs of South Africa from a Study Abroad in 2007. The second movie is a montage of clips from the movie "Come Back Africa," which was created secretly from the Apartheid government in Johannesburg in 1959. "Come Back, Africa" was created to show the real conditions of Apartheid, while the travel catalogue shows wish images. The 2 movies will be layered, with "Come Back Africa" in the back with travel photos in the front. Both movies will be playing on a loop, but the first movies of travel photos will have variable transparency from the sensor readings by changing the alpha value of the movie. This will recreate a hybrid image of Apartheid pastoral wish imagery and the submissive exotic native with the imagery of the modern black man.

Switch: For the switch I made to metal mesh pads with foam in-between them. Originally I thought that the foam was conductive, which it was not. So I ended up cutting the foam to create holes so when pressure is applied the metal mesh will make contact and close the circuit. I then wrapped the metal mesh switches in the non-conductive foam to create a pad, which be used on any seat.

Interface: The interface consists of the switch being covered by a beach towel on a chair. Arduino and the breadboard are placed in a headphone cover and pinned onto the bottom of the overhanging part of the towel. The USB cord is ran from Arduino under the towel to a Mac book. The video is shown on the Mac screen. To make this a theatrical experience, I constructed a stage to cover my Mac book with a red curtain.

Outcome: As the viewer sits on the seat, their movement will produce various serial readings. These readings dissolves the travel imagery allowing the imagery of the masses of black modern men traveling to work upon the theater.