I was particularly fascinated by the Gloves section in the Physical Computing’s Greatest Hits reading. It is interesting to learn how engineers created the gloves that could respond to the movements of fingers to make rhythm; I wondered how they created and programmed the force-sensing resistors so that when attached to the fingertips, these sensors would know what kinds of triggers to create according to how strong the forces are. A few years ago, I was amazed at how Ariana Grande could control music with her gloves during her Honeymoon Tour in 2015. Here are a few videos of the way she did it: video 1, video 2. After doing some research, I discovered that she was using the Mi.Mu Gloves developed by MI.MU GLOVES LIMITED (UK) which enables music through movement as the company advertised. During her tour, Ariana used the motions and forces of her gloved hand gestures to add effects to her live performances, for example: holding up one finger to add harmony, opening her palm to add major-sounding harmonies, etc. I didn’t know back then that this technology is called physical computing; it was physical computing that enabled her to do this. In retrospect, it is amazing how physical computing has opened up countless opportunities for musicians to create and control their music both in studio and live environment. This glove technology is a mega hit to them.
I resonate with the author’s point in the second article “Making Interactive Art: Set the Stage, Then Shut Up and Listen”. I think artists’ intentions while making the interactive artworks are important but the audience’s experience is equally important as well. Most of the time when I see an interactive artwork, it is interactive in itself but not to the spectators, which I find to be rather frustrating. One time when I was visiting the Museum of Natural Science, there was a very awesome exhibition about nature that I remembered till this day. The exhibition was showcased in a sphere. When visitors stepped inside, they would directly interact with the elements of nature through their feet. One would step on the elements, for example, water, leaves, wind, bubbles, butterflies, etc. to see how they would become interactive. I got no instructions on how to interpret the artwork but I learned how to interact with it purely through interacting with it. I felt alive; I felt that was such a unique experience; the artwork made me want to play with it again and again. In contrast, most of the interactive artworks I had seen before this one were presumably “interactive” but I wasn’t given any opportunity to interact with them. I did not know how to feel viscerally towards what I was observing, which I think made the objects hardly memorable without photography after moving on from them.