The idea I have right now might be a little cheesy (not the best way to start a proposal, I know. But I do want some help in gauging this.)
The idea was inspired by how we can use polarization to reveal the internal stress of transparent materials. I want to ask a handful of people to collect their tear (small amounts: <0.5ml, in a plastic vial.) I’ll then transfer them on to microscope slides, freeze them into an ice droplet, and image them between two polarization filters on the light table under a microscope (or a powerful macro lens (at least 2:1.) I’m debating between photograph and video. Video might be cool since the pattern only exist in ice, so it will slowly disappear as the ice melts into water.
Test 1: stress of glass under polarized light. You can see the white pattern show up as I apply pressure on the stem.
Test 2: Ice cubes under polarized light.
Presentation ideas:
The idea is to metaphorically reveal the stress and emotion behind the tears and observe their slow dissolution as the ice forms into a tear drop. (To my knowledge, the polarization setup does not actually reveal the stress in ice, it should just be some optical effects that results from the surface of ice.) That’s where I feel a little unsure about this idea. The other issue is that the audience have to know the fact that a polarization set up is used to visualize stress in glass and plastic in order to follow the logic behind this piece.
I’ve also been playing with the polarization camera but haven’t found much use within the scope of this idea. But I’m still playing around with it to see if I can find anything else interesting to do with that camera.