Otolab

Cimatics 07 - Otolab: Op7 from watz on Vimeo.
The Italian artist collective Otolab´s performance from the Cimatics 07 festival in Brussel. Blogged by Maius Watz at generator X

Moving Brands

Moving Brands talking about processing

What to do with LED and some programming

Here’s how it works:
The building has a total of 6,000 windows. Behind each of 4,200 of them, there is a lighting installation consisting on average of 12 light bulbs, each with three LEDs – a green, a red and a blue - that can be combined into a complete colour palette. A rapid change in the colour of the lamps instantaneously gives an impression of movement.

The façade can show figures, letters, geometric shapes with various effects and also graphics. To make it work, all the blinds need be closed as the leds are not strong enough to light the façade alone. The reflection on the closed blind illuminates the whole surface of the window. If the blind remains open, you only see a horizontal light line at the bottom of the window. The system is controlled by a central computer. The result is entered in a programme to be translated for the lighting system by the computer.

An image, a visual effect or letters are only visible when some windows are lit in some colours. This means that each of the 4,200 windows equipped with the system can be illuminated separately and exactly in a given colour. This produces the image or the animation you can see.

And in case you thought all this was terribly wasteful of electricity, Dexia say that “The Dexia Tower is equipped with a highly effective energy-saving LED lighting system (electroluminescent diodes). Each LED, at its maximum capacity, uses 1 watt. As a result of the various colour and movement effects, this maximum capacity is never achieved. The different creations presented so far have never exceeded one third of this total capacity. During the night, the tower is illuminated 9 hours in the winter and 5 hours in the summer. Recent tests reveal that the Dexia Tower uses about a third less electricity than the Eiffel Tower in Paris, while the energy required to light a football stadium costs no less than seven times the energy consumed by the Tower.”