ABOUT

Shadow Lamp is a poetic installation for physical telepresence, which consists of a pair of table lamps and a series of chess-like pieces. 

The pieces are designed in iconic shapes, made with polarizing filters. The lamps can project and animate the shadow of the pieces with a rotatable polarizing filter at the top. The two lamps can be connected in different spaces. One lamp’s filter rotates following the other side. By controlling the angle of the filter and the placement of the pieces, Shadow Lamp can provide playful communication, physical telepresence, and create an ambient sense of accompanying.

POLARIZING FILTER

Light is a wave and it usually vibrates (or wiggles) in all directions. A polarizing filter is a device that allows light to pass only if it is wiggling in a certain direction.

There is a polarizing filter embedded in the PC’s monitor. Our demo on the right shows the effect of blocking the light when rotating the filter over a monitor screen.

The shape at the top of the pieces is designed with iconic patterns for everyday objects. Those shapes are cut at different angles of the polarizing filter so that the lamp can choose to project each shadow or not by letting the light go through the polarizing filter at various angles. The shapes show different colors when placed in front of a monitor screen

MECHANISM DESIGN

The current interaction is designed with one direction. The input-side controls the output-side which enables both of the lamps to project the same animated shadows synchronically.

For the input side, user can manually control the filter position by rotating a handle at the top. The large gear over the filter will drive the rotation of the small gear. The movement of the small gear will be encoded to a potentiometer.

The data from the potentiometer will transmit to the other side of the lamp through WIFI. On the output side, there is a servo motor behind the small gear, which will receive the input data, rotate simultaneously, and drive the polarizing filter to the corresponding position.

DESIGN EXPLORATION

Advisor: Daniel Leithinger

2021. 12