Create Digital Motion

Jul 06 2009

A Different View of Particles: Real World Pinscreens

No, this is not Processing.

Looking for inspiration only within our computer boxes is limiting. Want a fresh perspective? Check out the physical world. And yes, you’ll find even alien-looking patterns of particles out there.

I recently read a post by talented digital artist Golan Levin pointing to the non-digital work of Ward Fleming. According to Fleming, “you’re seeing 40,000 black acrylic spheres 0.125 in. dia. vibrating/contained on an off level glass plate horizontally mounted and back lit.” I also love the more poetic description from YouTube:

the agony of particle behavior. struggling to express consciousness in a world animated by mechanical vibration. a truly empathetic study of particle emotion expressed as fluid/crystal bipolarism.

You’ll find more examples. Be sure to look at these in HD for the full effect.

More information on the 3.5×8-foot pinscreen Frieze Machine by Ward Fleming is available in a separate video. You get to see him making the work, and then watch the beautiful image of a human silhouette against the screen. (Note: pinscreen-modeled nudity.)

Looks like it’s time to write a pinscreen shader.

You can actually buy this kind of work:

Areaware / Atomix

That site notes that this design by Francois Dallegret is not new:

Dating back to the 1960′s, the designer has re-introduced his artful plaything for a 21st century audience. Made from 6000 high precision stainless steel balls, Atomix creates an infinite number of fractal patterns when shaken, tilted, or rotated.

Can Augmented Reality Make Real Games, Expressive Media? Inspiration from Georgia Tech

The State of Plus: Vimeo to Remove Full Resolution Source Files for Free Accounts

9 Comments

Darren Landrum

The HD version of the first vid has been downloading for over an hour now, and is only 2/3rds done. This thing better be made of nothing but pure awesome.

July 6th, 2009 @ 4:22 am

Peter Kirn

Ha, sorry — worth just seeing a few minutes of it. You should be able to skip around and catch a few key moments of what’s going on, even in HD. No need to download all ten minutes.

July 6th, 2009 @ 4:33 am

Darren Landrum

Oh, it’s really no trouble. Youtube’s been very slow for me lately in general. I need to get my frustration out somehow.

July 6th, 2009 @ 4:39 am

Darren Landrum

Okay, that video was pretty freaking amazing, even with the video compression killing some of the detail. I’d think you’d have one hell of a time simulating all of that in Processing.

July 6th, 2009 @ 5:04 am

ericsoco

hey peter — we have one of each of these (sorta) at the exploratorium.

the pinscreen is horizontal, not vertical, but it’s ~4′ on a side. you can get some great effects at that scale that you don’t on a little hand-held one.

the spheres piece is also horizontal, not vertical, and was (i believe) inspired by ward’s work (i’ve definitely seen this video before, in a conversation about our piece). it contains N thousands of plastic spheres sandwiched in a table about 18″x18″; visitors can shake the table, and see patterns much like the ones that appear in ward’s piece.

cool stuff, thanks for posting!