VastWaste
Humans once perceived oceans as boundless, and thus impossible to pollute—until we created the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The same pattern is now repeating in outer space.
VastWaste is a data-driven, projection art installation that illuminates the parallels and interplay between marine pollution and space debris. It can also be experienced in Virtual Reality.
For VastWaste, I acted as Computer Programming Lead under the direction of Dr. Özge Samanci at Northwestern University, and was primarily responsible for implementing the projection version. In this role, I created a large inheritance based architecture to allow us to pull data constantly from a static database, live Twitter feed, and EEG headset, and easily switch between the three data sources throughout the experience. I also implemented visual effects for the VastWaste, creating and adding to dynamic satellite explosions and moving ocean and sky effects, as well as informational text for both the audience and other developers that could be switched on as needed. The project was created in Unity and all coding work I completed was in C#.
Exhibitions
2023, 19 Sept – 30 Oct, NOVA-Supercreativity: The New Aesthetics of a Technologically Modified World, Museum of Tomorrow, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
2023, 4 July - 27 August, Electronic Language International Festival FILE, Sao Paulo, Brazil
2022, 17-20 November, Piksel New Media Festival, Bergen Norway
2022, 8-11 August, SIGGRAPH Art Gallery, Vancouver
2022, 10-16 June, 27th International Symposium on Electronic Arts ISEA, Barcelona, Spain
VastWaste generates an everchanging Kessler Effect in conjunction with a data-driven soundtrack. In this installation, satellites spin based on the speed of marine debris. This is calculated by using ocean currents and ocean winds. The number of fragments falling into the ocean is tied to human use of satellites, symbolized by number of tweets per second. Generative music varies in each play based on collisions, number of fragments, their contact with the surface of the ocean and their descent into the ocean.
