Interactive Lighting:
Light is an essential part of human existence and wellbeing. It can heal, warm, illuminate, give security to name a few. It is a necessary constant in our lives and yet is constantly in flux. Interactive lighting engages us because it taps into an instinctual response to fluctuating light ,a response rooted in natural light. Often the interactive light source is one that is provided/used in an environment devoid natural light which satiates a fundamental need. Our natural fascination with light has led to innovative uses and abuses of it. Interactive light has been (and will be) used to communicate, educate, entertain, stimulate social interaction, help with mental stimulation/wellness and now applied to physical stimulation/wellness. Non television based interactive lighting design is on the rise,hopefully this trend will continue for a long time
to come and bring many more innovative concepts and applications of interactive light.


January 26th, 1925
John Logie Baird gives a demonstration of of the fisrt working television system tomembers of the Royal Institution Unlike later electronic systems with several hundred lines of resolution, Baird's vertically scanned image, using a scanning disk embedded with a double spiral of lenses, had only 30 lines, barely enough to reproduce a recognizable human face.


1975
Pong home videogame console, a simple digital representation of ping pong and yet the most complicated consumer product to date, hits the market . Christmas 1975 found people lined up outside Sears stores, the sole retailer, waiting to buy pong units at a price of $100 ($400 modern equivalent) giving a glimpse of what was to come (Christmas 2006 parents lined up to purchase a Sony Playstation 3 starting at about $450).


1978
The world is introduced to Simon. In 1977 Howard Morrison and Ralph Baer invented a microcomputer controlled game that was easy to learn and simple to play requirirng the player(s) to memorize a pattern and key it in when prompted.This revolutionary game won the hearts of millions. The red, yellow, green and blue flashing lights became forever synonymous with the game.


1991
The artwork by P.Struycken is controlled by a euroGenie computer. It uses the existing data network of the NAi building to control the switching of three types colored fluorescent tubes: red, green and blue. At night the colors change every ten minutes. “pattern recognition and endless variations seem to be in contradiction with each other, but in nature they are closely related. imagine a park with trees. even if the trees would not change, every new walk through the same park could be different. it is possible to make a sequence (logical array) of walks that virtualy never repeats. the view is always changing, but not random. this is characteristic for the work. these patterns have an irresistible effect on people. probably the unpredictable change generates a mental effect similar or comparable to that of the patterns experienced in nature.” (Mathijs van Mannen)


Now
Lightspace Play is an entertainment system that combines the latest lighting and interactive technologies to produce a recreational experience for children and adults of all ages. It includes an interactive floor surface comprised of 16”x16” programmable LED lit and pressure sensitive tiles constructed to fit a 10 foot square space. Each tile consists of sixteen 4” x 4” pixels that can display any color, pattern or image. The surface is able to detect location, movement and density of players to give a realistic gaming experience. Reactions to player movements are displayed on the surface and are accompanied by sound effects. The combination of physical movement and the compelling nature of video games have led many formerly sedentary people to spend several hours a week engaging in aerobic activity and enjoying it. (Lightspace)