Project 2: That Night I Saw Fireworks on the Airplane – Rosie (Parren)

Name Rosie Gao

Instructor Eric Parren

Title
That Night I Saw Fireworks on the Airplane

Project Description

That Night I Saw Fireworks on the Airplane is a sculptural light object with a sandbox city landscape and lights underneath programmed to display a deliberate generative composition. Using Laser cut,  FakeCandy Processing, and Digital LED Strips, the project tends to show an aerial city night view.

I got the inspiration during a flight from Dunhuang to Shanghai, from which I saw fireworks among city lights through the clouds at midnight. Such a different perspective of normal views reminds me of the beauty in humans’ creation even though they look so small from above, and I would like to document this view to my audience to transfer this touching moment. Different from the common aerial city views we see from photos and videos, I would like to use lights in motion to create the effects of sparkling city lights, moving car flows and burning fireworks.

Perspective and Context
My intention of the project is to review human’s creation in different perspectives. On the one hand, a human-created landscape like city skyline is usually treated as envrionment-unfriendly and artificial comparing to the natural landscape, and on the other hand, we always experience cities as a part of it, confused by its illusions and glories. However, when we look at the city from above, it changes our perception of it. The buildings and roads no longer exist, and what we see it is a lively human creation in the natural environment.

Development & Technical Implementation

Based on my inspiration photos I took and I find online, I first sketch a rough design of the landscape with divided city districts, the shore, and the river. To make these elements, I have a difficult time settling on the material decisions. With professor Parren’s suggestions, I pick fiber optic to make the small fireworks and the frosted acrylic board to be the platform of the landscape as it can scatter the lights of LED stripes. For the city landscape, I pick the landscaping mud which is a classical material for landscape production, and I chose the color grey as it reminds me of the concrete city. For the river surface, I decide to use opaque laser paper stuck to the bottom of the board to both to cover the wires and to reflect the city lights as the river does.

 Midterm Code

As for the coding, I use mainly the 64 flame example and change the sample fire picture to a group of looping CyberPunk photos by Liam Wong. As the lights underneath the board flowing randomly with organic color choices, the fireworks made from fiber optic will sparkle and the river will reflect the colors.

Presentation
The basic landscape makes sense to the audience as it is a classic shape of city miniature. However, the fireworks do not work as effective as straight lights will be needed underneath and it is difficult for me to stabilize the location of the strips. Another problem is that I put the platform in the middle depth of the box which I planned to gather the light inside while having the stripes and wires underneath. While presenting, it actually distracts the user experience as they have to bend down to look into the box to get the whole view, and I am also suggested the put the box on the ground as well. Last but not least, I think the order of presenting the object and introduction really matters as the inspiration story really helps the audience to understand the project and lead them into the scene. 

Conclusion
Reviewing my project, I would say I paid a lot of attention into the material choices and the producing process of my project in order to make it realistic to the view I am trying to recreate, which brings interior meanings to my project. However, there is a gap between the realism effect and the aesthetic effect and I could have worked more on that by studying more on the outcomes of the stripes and materials I am using. Working with materials I am not familiar with is a big risk, and I don’t have enough backup plans created for it. For the presentation, my choice of the location of the board shows my lack of user tests before the final presenting. It also shows the importance of a more precise design in advance.