You Are My Sunshine

Reactive Installation
Version 1 / February 2004
version 2 / Revised July 2004

Description A large flat monitor hangs on the wall. The monitor is black. When a person walks in front of the monitor, parts of the image lightens up, revealing a map of the world. The visitor casts a negative shadow; he lightens up the world, becoming a local sun. The passage of light over the world map follows the movement of the visitor. His body tracks the days-time over the world. When standing still in front of the image, the sunshine fades. The sun has to move - time has to pass. The song “You are my sunshine” is being sung over the speakers - barely audible. The singing is very gloomy and sad. Not the happy evergreen.
	Reactivity The installation keeps track of the audience using an inexpensive low-resolution webcam. The system can track the movements of up to 4 persons at a time. The system tracks location and size of the person. It also track relative movement of the person. All this is tracked approx. 15 times pr. Second (real-time on a 700MHz computer) The installation does not require a monochrome background behind the audience. But a static background is required, as audience-tracking is done comparing changes between preceding images and the current. Video Click to view a short testvideo (5MB MPEG1 Video)
Technical Stuff Computer: 1.5 GhZ / 256 MB RAM. w. USB interface OS: Win2000 PRO or Win XP. Camera: Logitech Webcam Monitor: Large flat screen (plasma) Audio: Small speakers (volume is low)	EyesWeb This installation was programmed using the free EyesWeb software by Laboratorio di Informatica Musicale, University of Genova. Earth at Night image The backgroundimage of the earth at night was constructed from images taken by the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program's Operational Linescan System.