The theme explored in this project is: "Expressible." Based on the
design framework of technology, people, and future everyday life, the
project explores the inner reason behind the appearance of people's
expression through creative interaction methods and tries to determine
the relationship between people's expression purpose, methods, and
colour emotions. Finally, the project transforms the audience's
personal visual expression into a meaningful emotional sound output
(referring to Kandinsky‘s theory of colour and music), simulating the
synaesthesia experience of people hearing colours.
Three layers of rotatable panels form the prototype of this project,
and each layer has several topics that can establish its emotional
connection with the audience. The audience chooses emotional
expression cards to show what kind of expression and colour they use
to express the selected topic. The digital system outputs unique
musical feedback by users spinning the three-layer panel from any
direction.
Technical Description
The colour sensor module uses the TCS230 programmable colour
light-to-frequency converter, which combines a configurable silicon
photodiode and a current-to-frequency converter on a single CMOS
integrated circuit. The built-in oscillator generates square wave
signals of different frequencies from the light reflected from the
object's surface. The S0, S1 ports determine the output signal
scaling factor and the S2, S3 ports determine which light is allowed
to pass through the filter. The red, green, blue, transparent four
photodiodes are interconnected to reduce the effect of
inhomogeneities in the incident light.
First, set the scale factor for converting the number of pulses of
the TCS3200 output signal to RGB standard values. Then, obtain the
RGB standard value by multiplying the scale factor by the number of
pulses of the TCS3200 output signal stored in the cycle. Using code
in the Arduino development board to make logical judgements to
differentiate between the RGB values of the five colours (blue,
purple, yellow, red and green). Imported the identified values into
the Unity system as the basis for the judgement. The values are
judged in Unity using C# code to determine the output audio and
visual feedback.
Unity obtains audio material via external import. Multiple audio
opponents are created to load different audio, and then these audio
opponents are assigned to different colours. The audio is then
sequenced by C# code.
Besides, to enable the three colour sensor modules to work
independently, three different ports were created in the Arduino
setting, creating three separate C# code files in Unity, each
corresponding to a different port of the Arduino. When the prototype
is launched, the different Arduino codes are imported for the colour
sensor modules in order, and then running the Unity system, the
prototype works appropriately. By combining a programmable LED strip
light with a photosensitive LDR sensor module, the sensor first
measures the initial light level, uses code to implement a repeated
measurement of the light parameter and continually compares it with
the previous parameter to determine if the object is in a stable
state. When the object is static, the LED strip light is set to go
out, and vice versa. The strip is lit. The strip light is controlled
by code to change the brightness, the number of LED beads and the
lighting sequence. In order to provide a stable power supply to the
Circuit Playground Board, two battery packs are connected in series
to the VCC and GND of the development board to ensure a stable 5v
supply.