Ants&Firefly is an interactive video art piece that simulate the insect world and its interaction with people observing them.
When I was young, I love to observe the ants. However, if I get too close to the ants, they will flee away and disappear. In this point, I have to stand back and wait for them to come out again. Although I understand the best practice to be an ant observer is to stand in a distance, sometimes I can’t help but wonder what they carry and get too close.
Design Process:
In order to reproduce this childhood experience, Joanna and I made an interactive video art piece that the ants in the video will interact with the people in front of them.
When people try to see clearly what the ants are chasing and get close to it, the ants will flee “out” of the painting. (Yes, they will hide from you until you go away and they will come back gradually)
The colony of ants chasing a firefly is controlled by computer language (nature of code using Processing). When the distance sensor embedded in the blank canvas (where the video is projected on) senses an object is close, the sensor will send a signal to the micro-controller (Arduino) on the back of the canvas.
Then the micro-controller will send a signal to the computer that run a program (Processing Sketch). The program is designed that when the distance reading is less than 100cm, the ants will flee away; And when the reading is more than 100cm, the ants will gradually come back.
Finally, we project the animation on the canvas and an interactive art piece was born.
