October 2017

Motion Lights

To explore how the WaveTrace interaction technique could be implemented in domestic, non-screen based, products, I designed and developed a product family of three lights. Each light displays contrasting coloured dots traversing the product itself, using the LEDs both as a light source and UI. Mimicking these dots (i.e. pointing at them) with your smart-watch wearing wrist will select them. Each light implemented the interaction technique slightly different to explore and demonstrate the technique's potential.

Technology

A central hub (Raspberry PI) runs a simulation of all moving targets of all connected lights - ensuring these targets do not correlate amongst themselves. It continuously sends instructions to each light's embedded microcontroller wirelessly. A smart watch sends movement data to the hub, which then correlates these movements and acts upon 'selection'. In addition to selection, twisting the wrist while a light was selected would affect the light's overall brightness.