16ⁿ _ ƒ5³ is an interactive kinetic light sculpture, extending the bi-dimensional screen space, by transposition of its pixel resolution to the physical space. Conceived as a modular infrastructure, 16ⁿ _ ƒ5³ is a communication and computation system, propagating in form of light and sound, the events it inhabits. Presence and motion create and alter the transmitted data, and propagation of this data becomes a space-time parameter.

ƒ5³ _ framework 5*5*5 refers to informatics’ modular workspace, called a framework. Here, ƒ5³ ’s “frames” constitute the framework, a space built up by five modules of 2*2m, divided in 5*5 squared elements, establishing a matrix of 5*5*5 = 125 modules. At the one side diffusing the light (white) and at the other side absorbing the light ( black ), the modules constitute a binary language (0,1) and a space of 125 pixels, allowing to transcribe captured data from the physical environment in a kinetic and luminous play _ in between opening and closing, in between transparency and reflection, in between light and dark.

via: www.lab-au.com

The Aquatics Centre in Bejing, commonly known as the Water Cube, will be the home for nearly all of the 2008 Summer Olympics aquatic events. This unusual venue spans some 80,000 square meters, and will have approximately 440,000 LEDs embedded throughout the structure.

The Water Cube integrates the geometry of water bubbles into a rectangular, plastic structure. LED lighting fixtures will illuminate the bubble designs from inside the structure’s translucent walls, allowing the entire building to glow with extraordinary color-changing LED light.

via:ledsmagazine.com, beijing2008.com

Flow 5.0 is an interactive sculpture by Studioroosegaarde made out of hundreds of ventilators which are reacting to your sound and motion. By walking and interacting an illusive landscape of transparancies and artificial winds is created.

Moving through Flow 5.0 the visitor becomes conscious of himself as a body,
in a dynamic relation with space and technology.

via: Mirjam Struppek - Urban Screens

*”Revolution”* is a new bar in Las Vegas which was created as homage to the Beatles. Moment Factory was given the mandate to create to a mix-media installation combining video projections; LED screens and LED lighting fixtures.

The innovative aspects of the project resided in the synchronicity of the different medias, the usage of the LED emitted light on printed surface (reacting with the ink pigment) and the optical illusion in the “LED potholes” (Custom round LED screen sandwiched into 2 two-way mirrors).

All these particular techniques integrated with a powerfull showcontrol and beautiful content resulted into a stunning visual global environment, constantly renewing and enhancing the user-experience.
Media : LED fixtures (Illumivision LightwaveLX) , Video Projections, SACO custom built round LED screen, printed surface overlayed on extruded surface (bar backwall).

Via:MomentFactory

Texas always does things in bigways, and Victory Park, an urban, mixed-use community/businessdevelopment area that recently opened in Dallas, personifies that grandiose Texan vision. A network of grand-format LED displays, a key component of this entertainment destination, intricately connects visitors to the United States’ largest outdoor, digital-art gallery (part of what is known as Victory Media Network® [VMN]) and binds Victory Park tenants, visitors, sponsors and visual artists into a globally connected media world. Three distinct, yet integrated, display sites comprise the VMN display system, the site’s most visible aspect:
• The Portal Screen.
It attracts and promotes plaza activity and incorporates event promotions, sponsor branding, Victory Park advertising, and daily, live WFAA (an ABCaffiliate) newscasts.
• The Tower Display.
One screen faces Victory Park’s main gateway, and the other faces the plaza. The tower displays Victory Park and sponsor logos.
• Media Walls.
Eight, 10-pixelpitch OLite Barco boards, each 15 x 26 ft. long, are divided into two sets of four, mobile displays. Each set is mounted on a five-story office building to create the site’s epicenter. Both buildings face each other, separated by the large plaza’s courtyard. This allows visitors unobstructed views and immersive experiences with the ongoing media-wall presentations.
Horizontal rails allow the videoscreens to move across each building.

From signs to media platforms
David Gales, principal of Vantage Technology Consulting Group :
“The challenge was how digital media could create an exciting urban destination and a dynamic, mixed-use environment, and also be economically sustainable. This led us to the unified structure that we called VMN, which presents a mix of commercial and non-comercial content in a large, public space.”

You’ve got soul
If Victory Park’s heart is its architecture and EDS integration, ist soul lies within VMN and its media walls. The walls’ noncommercial, digital-art program serves as an ongoing cultural area that reinforces Victory Park and Dallas as a new, international entertainment destination.
Operating at least 16 hours daily, the media walls offer various content:
• An outdoor art gallery.
The media walls comprise the United States’ largest outdoor digital-art gallery. In conjunction with VMN, the Victory Arts program collects graphic animations and video art for continual display on the media walls.
• Commissioned art.
Jennifer Steinkamp, an internationally known installation artist who works with architecture, motion and perception, created “Ring of Fire” for VMN.
• A unique branding opportunity.
Sponsorships allow corporations exclusive branding rights to promote their business actvities and host special events. Each sponsorship opportunity allows corporations specific time each day on VMN’s media walls, the tower screen, the portal screens and the electronic-kiosk system.
• Live news on a daily basis.
One tenant, WFAA-TV (an ABC affiliate), airs news and entertainment to the greater Dallas metropolitan area. To complement VMN, WFAA broadcasts its live news segment at selected times on the portal screen. At least 40 to 60% of the media walls’ daily content features the digital-art collection.

Text by Louis M. Brill (louisbrill[at]sbcglobal.net)
Louis M. Brill is a journalist and consultant for high-tech entertainment and media communications.

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A three-dimensional matrix of 624 globes, each fitted with 24 LEDs, provides a compelling lighting scenario in the atrium of law firm Allen & Overy’s office building in Bishops Square, London, which was designed by Foster and Partners.
The concept and design of the “Pixel Cloud” was developed and produced by the Jason Bruges Studio in London, together with Ledon Lighting, the Zumtobel subsidiary, which supplied the unique LED luminaires.

The Pixel Cloud extends over eight floors and 624 milky-white polycarbonate globes, each with a diameter of 120 mm, combine to form a three-dimensional network. Each of eight parallel high-gloss-polished stainless steel sections supports three arms that each carry 26 globes. The globes are fitted with 24 LEDs and are individually controllable. Inside the globe, a dodecahedron (12-sided solid)-shaped flexible circuit board ensures each globe is uniformly illuminated. The system provides 8-bit resolution in the primary colors red, green and blue. Every globe is individually controllable thanks to specially developed software. Real-time color and light updates perpetually change the three-dimensional LED lighting installation’s appearance.

Jason Bruges Studio has adjusted the spacing of the Ledon globe matrix so that it matches the grid of the façade designed by Foster and Partners. The internal glass façade is transformed by changes in color and light. One bar at a time lights up, bringing the outdoor lighting mood indoors, from top to bottom, sharing it with those working in the offices.

via: ledsmagazin.com

Several new hotel projects have recently opened their doors in the country. Among the is the Lánchíd 19 design hotel, facing the Danube at the foot of Buda’s Royal Palace, a re-launch of a veteran three-star hotel near the capital’s City Park.
The building and its interior are the result of an interesting collaboration between Hungarian architects, graphic artists, photographers and fashion designers.

The unique glass facade was designed by the groups Szövetség ‘39 and Nextlab. These two groups of young professionals, working on experimental developments, set up a workgroup of engineers, producers and co-artists for this project. The duty of this workgroup was to fill the architects’ idea with tangible content and, besides the unique technological solutions, to make an individual artwork. The huge fingerprint-patterns of the glass bridges in the atrium and the butterfly-pattern that can be seen on the front stone wall of the hotel are also the results of this design process.

The hotel’s moveable accordion-like glass façade is an autonomous artwork. It provides unique pictures in the night, so the hotel stands as a kind of ‘lighthouse’ on the Danube riverbank. The movement of the glass lamellas that are painted with tiny graphics generally follows the flow speed of the Danube, but based on the signals of the meteo-sensor on the top of the hotel, the movement intensifies in strong wind and smoothes when the wind stops.

via: www.lanchid19.blogspot.com

The FUSE music-television network, based in New York City, plays rock, alternative, punk, hardcore, emo and indie music. It claims a techsavvy audience ready to interact with the network via the Internet, cellphones and other wireless devices. Fuse recognized its product’s popularity, said Fuse VP of Operations Dave Alworth, but needed an equally effective “public” profile to contend as a new, New York City icon.

“Ultimately, the challenge we faced was how to use the signage to bring the Fuse television studio onto the sidewalk,” said Fitch’s studio director, George Kewin, AIA. “Vice versa, we also wanted to bring the viewing pedestrians ‘into’ the studio to have a more personal contact with the brand.” Fitch proposed four types of LED displays that formed a series of overlapping sightlines to constantly draw viewers’ attention, first to the building, then to the building’s windows. From a distance, the Fuse channel letters, in which videoscreens are embedded, are visible at least six blocks south. As pedestrians approach the building, a second sign system, a series of overhead, high-definition videoscreens, displays endlessly changing colors, video imagery and text messages across the building. For the third sign attraction, a “zipper” electronic message center snakes in and out of the serpentine contours of four, two-story-tall window bays, continues down into the sidewalk in front of the building and ends underneath the channel letters. Finally, surprised viewers watch as LED-display curtains fold and disappear behind the windows in front of them.

The curtain system comprises a mechanical framework that holds the
LED tubes in place as it folds in and out of the window bay and LED video tubes, which LED Effects Inc. (Rancho Cordova, CA) custom designed and inserted into the curtain frame. The original mechanical structure was acquired, according to MultimediaLED’s Bob Sawler, from a company in England, and then modified for this project. When closed, the curtains display a 6-ft.-tall video image. When opened, they fold back into a 12-in. storage space that allows an unobstructed view into the interior television studio.

Text by Louis M. Brill (louisbrill[at]sbcglobal.net)
Louis M. Brill is a journalist and consultant for high-tech entertainment and media communications.
Photos by MultimediaLEDs (Rancho Cordova, CA).

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A stunning lighting scheme has recently been designed, supplied, installed and programmed by Lightscape Projects, part of the Light Projects Group, for the Richard Desmond Children Eye Centre which forms part of the Moorfields Eye Hospital in London, UK.
The new building, designed by architects Penoyre & Prasad, is illuminated on the south side using RGB color changing LED lighting supplied by Light Projects and Tryka.

The LED lighting illuminates the façade by casting light on the underneath of the freely-placed, folded aluminium louvers, which the team has nicknamed “seagulls”, according to Light Projects’ Roger Beckett.
The building has an outer glass curtain wall, with the seagulls positioned on a tensioned cable net about 0.75 m away to protect the building from solar gain.
The LED lighting fixtures are positioned on gantries at each floor level. A total of 64 fixtures were used, including linear fittings and others to fit around the uneven shape of the building. Beckett says that the fixtures are about 80 mm from the glass wall and their light is directed towards the underside of the “seagulls”, with an angle of 50-degrees to the horizontal.

All the light goes away from the glass to prevent direct glare affecting the occupants. “The lighting is designed to be very comfortable for people inside the building,” says Beckett. The lighting system is controlled via a DMX 512 controller, using a Light Projects-designed program to create shifting light scenes with an imaginative mix of subtle colors. Beckett comments, “This project demonstrates how the improving synergy between architects and lighting designers can come together to turn building facades into magical events.”

Via: ledsmagazine

The Allianz Arena has a delightfully surreal appearance. The exterior is covered in tufted, translucent material; viewed from afar, the stadium resembles a giant, quilted doughnut. At night, it becomes positively radiant: the façade is lit from within, which means that the entire arena glows. (The windows of a hundred and six luxury boxes can be partially discerned behind the curved scrim.) On most evenings, the building emits a soft white light, reflecting the silvery tone of the synthetic skin, but on nights when one of the two Munich soccer clubs has a home game—the teams share the stadium—it changes its skin color: red for Bayern Munich, blue for the Munich Lions. The shifting lighting schemes atop the Empire State Building seem timid compared with this chameleon.

The arena retains its allure during the day. The unusual material—ETFE, or ethylene tetra fluoro ethylene—gives the stadium a cushiony texture, as if it were an oversized, permanently moored blimp; you want to climb up and touch it. And its subtle white hue eerily duplicates the Munich sky on a cloudy winter afternoon—the stadium practically disappears. In the sun, it brightens. The 2,760 tufts—made of two sheets of ETFE, each 0.2 millimetres thick, which are sewn together and filled with air—are arranged in a strict diamond pattern, giving the façade a subtle sleekness. There are obvious jokes to be made about the Allianz Arena—one could say that it resembles the Michelin Man, or even a soccer ball—but Herzog and de Meuron are too good to play trite visual games, and the building easily transcends such literal-minded comparisons.

via: newyorker.com