Astral Projection
The idea behind this project is that music will play and depending on the pitch different images of celestial bodies will be projected against the wall. Lower pitches correlate to closer astronomical objects, such as Venus or Saturn, and the higher the pitch the farther the celestial body, like the Orion Nebula. The intended experience is that the combination of music and imagery will transport the audience and give them the fantastical experience of exploring the galaxy. My inspiration for this came from a scene in the television series “Russian Doll” where the lead is sitting at a party awash with colored lights, staring into space, reflecting on her recent experience with death. I want to give people a similar experience without the somberness of death part. Just by sitting there, they could be transported to another location and another experience. As I imagine it, the audience will enter the room where the images will be projected against a white wall of some sort with the lights off. The audience will play some song on their phone, and as the song progresses the images will constantly change based on the pitch. Theoretically, the images would change in beat to the song, which would be an interesting effect. Alternatively, I might not even need a wall and could just project the imagery onto the entire room. Thus, the device itself is small, but it takes up a lot of space since I would need an entire room / wall. Also, as an officer in the Astronomy Club, I could theoretically take the pictures myself. If I were to create this device, afterwards, I would want to give this to the Astronomy Club as a tool to get more non-physics majors interested in astronomy as a grand example of astrophotography. By the way, I’ve never used a projector before, so there may be different steps I have to take depending on how that works.
Sketch
Block Diagram
Supplies
- Microphone / sound detector? – some device to detect pitch, lab may have something
- Projector – lending
- Arduino – lab
- Pictures – I’ll take them myself
Ice Caps
Climate Change is a serious problem that if not addressed can cause irreversible damage to our planet. This project would be a simulation of these effects of climate change. I would include some thermometer / heat sensor. As the temperature rises through various means, such as using a heat gun, it will trigger a water pump to send water from various boxes that represent different ice formations – the Artic, Greenland, etc. – to other boxes that are representative of various locations / affected industries and communities. For example, rising water levels seriously affect coastal communities, so it would pump water from Greenland to the correlating box. Alternatively, place like California are getting drier, so it would pump water from that box to another. Ultimately, the hotter is gets, the faster the rate of water transfer. To better communicate the point of this piece, I would 3D print various models to put in the boxes, so as you pump water from one box to another you would be able to witness a little model house being submerged. It is a cute and humorous piece of imagery, but I believe it effectively communicates the point: climate change will cause irreversible damage. The downside of this piece is that it is one time use as I am currently imaging it. In order to redo the experience, I would have to dump all the water and refill certain boxes. While this does make a point about climate change in of itself, it does limit how many people can experience it. Regardless, the audience of the piece would interact with the piece by either heating up or cooling down through various means / tools to witness how quickly this model world is destroyed. As I’m imagining it, it feels like something that would be placed in the children’s section of a museum to demonstrate the impact of climate change on the world. In the end, it would be fairly large, occupying a good portion of a table.
Sketch
Block Diagram
Supplies
- Thermistor – I’m assuming this is at the lab
- Arduino – lab
- Lots of acrylic and 3D Printing – lending
- Water pumps – lab
Jackpot
The idea behind this project is that your life and experiences are largely influenced by the circumstances of your birth, and a very small minority of Americans are born extremely lucky and in the lap of luxury. This is a cute little machine where for the first time ever, you can “rig” it in your favor through a slot machine. Part of the machine includes a magnet and the user can basically wave it in front of a magnetometer to try and get the result they want. The magnetic values observed correlate to some angle of a servo motor, which is your result. Only, a very very small range of magnetic values correlate to “Jackpot.” Thus, it would require a lot of fiddling and desperately moving the magnet around to get what you want. An added factor is that from using a magnetometer in the past, I know they are very funky and sensitive pieces of equipment, so it would require a lot of work just to get what you want. Alternatively, the magnetic values could correlate to the speed in which the servo motor rotates, which would be a very different experience of trying to hit it right on the slot you want. I haven’t yet definitively decided on which it would be. Either way, the user would have a similar way of interacting with the piece: desperately moving the magnet back and forth in front of the magnetometers to rig it in their favor. I hope that I would be able to implement an LCD that says humorous and sarcastic remarks based off of whatever it landed on. I’m also planning to make the machine fairly small. It would be a box about the size of Olivia’s fortune teller box. Aesthetically, I really want to pull from traditional slot machines with LEDs and lots of lights and a bold design.
Sketches
Block Diagram
Supplies
- Magnetometers – lab
- Arduino – lab
- Magnet – lab
- LCD – lab
- Servo Motors – lab
- LEDs – lab
- Acrylic – lending