I was introduced to the Vectorial Elevation Project by Jim from Jim On Light. The project is an interactive art installation by Rafael Lozano-Hemmer commissioned by the City of Vancouver’s Olympic and Paralympic Public Art Program and Vancouver 2010 Cultural Olympiad. As a lighting professional I have to say that it is pretty darn impressive piece of art and engineering to be able to make something like this work. The installation consists of twenty 10KW Syncrolite moving lights that are connected to a DMX controller which is fed information from their servers which are driven by Google Earth.
If you head over to their website you can design your own lighting look using a Google Earth interface. You can point the lights almost however you want. The system prevents you from shining the lights at nearby buildings and into airplane flight paths. The interface it pretty straight-forward, just select the lights you want and point there where you want. Then you submit your design into the system and when your design is displayed they photograph it and post it on a web-page for you. You can also watch a live feed of the display on their site.
So, I figured I would try it out and I designed a display dedicated to my small blog following. Here are a couple images, the first is a rendering of my design and the second is what it actually looked like last night.
If you want to see more vantage points of my display you can at this webpage. If you go build your own display after reading this, please post a link back here so that I can see! Now go have fun and create some art!
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