Isle

Fill a container with water. Shine an LED into it. Play some music. The water surface begins to tremble with the rhythm of the sound, and those ripples are projected through a lens onto the ceiling, filling the entire space above. Look up in the darkened room and you find yourself beneath a swaying sea of light.

Isle is an installation that visualizes sound as ripples on water, then translates those ripples back into light across the room. The floor disappears, the walls fall away — you stand in a place where only light exists. As the music changes, the light overhead shifts with it.

Isle [2010]

The original version. Water surface ripples are projected onto the ceiling via a projector, resonating with live music. The spread and intensity of the ripples respond to the rhythm and volume of the music, enveloping the entire space in shimmering white light.

Presented at MAKE: Tokyo Meeting 06, held at Tokyo Institute of Technology, November 2010.

Isle [RGB] [2012]

An expanded version using three-color LEDs (red, green, blue). The color of the LEDs shifts instantly with the beat of the music, casting colored ripples across the ceiling. White to red, blue to green — the music flows visually overhead.

Presented at "Nishi-Chiba Kosakushitsu" in Nishi-Chiba, February 2012.