This SEGD Global Design Award project was recently presented at the 2018 CODA Summit in Santa Fe, NM. Learn more at: ideum.com/port...
The experimental initiative was designed by Ideum to advance technological frontiers while providing new ways for people to investigate Native American designs, history, and culture. This unique projection mapping project was realized in collaboration with Acoma artist Michelle Lowden and UNM instructor and potter Clarence Cruz. The project was the recipient of a prestigious Global Design Merit Award for interactive experiences from the Society for Experiential Graphic Design (SEGD). Out of 353 entries, only 37 projects were selected to receive an award.
Displaying a range of colorful and nuanced pueblo designs on the entire surface of a massive white olla, or water pot, required artistic sensitivity, historical accuracy, and technical innovation.
Acoma pottery, in particular, is widely known for the fine lines and complex geometry used in many motifs. Projection mapping has often been used to cast content onto curved surfaces, but crisply rendering and blending images like these on the blank pot’s surface while maintaining their integrity required our projection mapping team to achieve new levels of precision.
Visitors are active participants as they use an ultra-wide 34” Ideum touch table to select patterns and designs. Four overhead projectors display the designs in real time on the pot’s body and neck. Ideum developed the custom hardware and software for the interactive kiosk. Christie Digital’s Pandora’s Box was the media server behind the complex warping and projection mapping. This system also controlled LED lights which dynamically change as different patterns are selected.
The Exploring Pueblo Pottery project’s success in creating sharp, seamless images on an unusual shape breaks new ground in combining techniques and technology-and presents new opportunities to tell stories about the people and ideas behind timeless traditions.