<p>"Pyramid Cascades" is the result of video-mapping experiments during a semester at ECAL, Lausanne. 3D objects made of polystyrene and paper, mounted on servo-motors, form the projection surface for a beamer. Virtual 2D pyramids are mapped onto these real objects. Using a trackpad, users can interact with the installation. Moving the finger from left to right or vice versa causes both the real and virtual pyramids to rotate, creating an illusion of glowing pyramids. Clicking on the trackpad causes small projected circles to fall from the top of the surface and collide with the pyramids. Every collision produces a synthetic bell-like sound, depending on the side and size of the hit surface. The circle-cascade works like a sequencer. Every dropped circle is repeated after two bars, allowing users to create melodies in a playful way.</p>
<h2 id="technical-information">Technical information</h2>
<p>This application was built with Adobe Air and communicates with an <a href="http://arduino.cc/">Arduino board</a> via a serial connection to control servo-motors. The serial communication was managed with the <a href="http://code.google.com/p/as3glue/">as3glue</a> library. The 2D physics was handled by an <a href="http://www.box2dflash.org/">as3 port</a> of the powerful <a href="http://box2d.org/">Box2D</a> physics-engine by Erin Catto. The sound was synthetically generated with the <a href="http://code.google.com/p/tonfall/">Tonfall</a> as3 framework by <a href="http://andre-michelle.com/">Andre Michelle</a>.</p>