As part of a larger campaign to brand Downtown Portland NORTH was charged with creating an outdoor reactive environment installation in which passersby could interact — based on their location and movements — with artists’ interpretations of snowfall in Portland.
theGOOD was tasked with design and development of the interactive installation using a custom built motion detection platform. Challenges abound with all the environmental factors that go along with an installation of this scope.
Three traditional artists were commissioned by The Portland Institute for Contemporary Art to create their interpretation of snowfall in downtown Portland. The interactive application was built to display three different scenes with randomly-generated snowfall. The three scenes were set to rotate on a timed interval. The application used motion detection to make the falling snowfall react and animate based on the location of an individual’s movement passing by on the sidewalk.
The result was a captivated Portland public that was engaged with a unique interactive experience. The project is also a successful study on the implementation of new technology and a reactive medium into a larger branding campaign.
View video of the installation.
