Southbank Fountains

I was walking through southbank a while ago and noticed the "new" fountain water feature that is next to the fake beach there. It is a major water feature/pool area for people to interact with. It looks really cool, there are all sorts of different fountains and different colours. Attached is an overall view of the fountains.

Musical Water Fountain Vs D.A.M System

Using water fountains as a means for data visualisation never seemed to be a fitting method, but after some research it seems that there are quite a few projects that seem to use fountains. Whether it is to represent data or to be an aesthetic interactive artwork, fountains have been proposed or used in existing projects.

The work chosen for this reflection and comparison blog entry is the Musical Water Fountain. This project was created by Kuan Li to show ambient visualisation with devises. It was chosen for reflection because of its similarities with our D.A.M system project. Basically the Musical Water Fountain uses music data such as frequencies analysed by a computer, which is then sent to corresponding fountains, which make the data visual. This idea is similar to our project, which will use data from the Internet about dam levels, which is then analysed and sent to its corresponding fountain, which is then producing a visual form of data.

Musical Water Fountain Description

The Musical Water Fountain was created for a project that has to show ambient visualization with devices. As taken from the Musical Water Fountain site, “From this project, the user can get the experience with vision, audio, and tactual.”
This project uses audio, lights, and fountains to make up what the user sees. The music is analysed through a powerful computer that breaks it up into separate pieces of data, which is represented as high, mid, and low frequencies and also analyses the volume of the music being played. There are two fountains that are used to visualise this data. There is one to show the high frequency and one to show the difference between the low and mid frequencies. The data from the computer is then sent to a corresponding fountain, which adjusts its pressure according to the data received. The fountains also have L.E.D’s attached, which are also programmed to visualise the same data that is fed to the fountain it is attached to. A flashing blue L.E.D is attached to the high frequency and a red L.E.D is attached to the mid and low frequencies. The data that is fed to these fountains is represented in the pressure of the fountains and the flashing L.E.Ds.
As mentioned the data is analysed through a powerful computer that is sent through an attached USB cable to a programmed Arduino board attached to each fountain. Each fountains arduino boards programming is different as the data sent to each of the fountains is different.


Comparison
Similarities:
To create an attractive project, the Musical Water Fountain used inspiration from a fountain company (WET Design Fountain) Based upon river stones, pipes run up to a glass vase, which acts as a water fountain. LEDs are then illuminated through the water to create an attractive visualisation for the users of the music that is being used.
One of the D.A.M systems objectives is to create an aesthetic project that can be used in an art gallery for the appreciation of the users of the gallery. The D.A.M system not only addresses the drought situation that Queensland is battling, but create it in a way that is simple and attention grabbing.
This will be done through the use of water fountains, LEDs, and the structure as a whole.
As mentioned, the Musical Water Fountain uses data from music, which is divided into high frequencies, middle and low frequencies by a computer. This data is sent to a fountain where an arduino board analyses the data a second time and converts it to information that affects the fountains pressure and the LEDs attached. The D.A.M system proposes to use the same principles.

The D.A.M system gathers information from the Internet (in this case, information on dam levels in south east Queensland), the computer then analyses the data into three sections, which are sorted by the three dams that have been chosen for representation. The data is then sent through to the fountains, which then are adjusted through possible arduino boards to suit the information fed to them. For instance the level of the dam is low, so the information will cause the fountain to use low pressure.
According to the pressure given to the fountains, a specific LED is illuminated through the water to represent the percentage of the dams. Percentages under 30 percent are illuminated red, between 30 and 60 percent are illuminated orange and percentages between 60 and 100 are illuminated green.
Along with the data affecting the pressure of the fountains on the Musical Water Fountain, LEDs are also affected. The LEDs attached to the fountains are representations of the frequency levels. A Flashing blue light represents the high frequency levels and a red represents the difference between mid and low frequencies.
The purpose of the Musical Water Fountain was to create Ambient Visualization with devices. These devices needed to be hidden, as it would not provide the effect on the users as hoped for.
Similar to the D.A.M system, the computing needs to be ubiquitous to stick to the main focus in the course guidelines.

Because of the similarities between the two projects, the Musical Water Fountain can be used as an inspirational guide when the D.A.M system needs to be made. The use of arduino boards transferring information to the fountains is the main obstacle of this project. Because the Musical Water Fountain uses the same principles and concepts of the D.A.M system, it is only sensible to use this existing project as a guide and influence.

Differences:
While the Musical Water Fountain was created for the purpose of making an attractive display of audio as a visual through the analysing of frequencies, the D.A.M system is using information gathered from the Internet detailing the dam heights. By doing this, the D.A.M system not only creates an attractive display of data, it is also creating awareness of the situation faced in the drought. While the concepts of the projects are similar, the purposes behind them are not.
Another aim for the D.A.M system is to make the project interactive for the users. This gives the users the power to create ‘scenarios’ in the relation to the drought. The Musical Water Fountain however is not an interactive piece. It creates a visually pleasing representation of audio but creates not interaction for the viewers / users.

Although there are differences between the projects, they are not enough to out weigh the similarities. The Musical Water Fountain uses the same concepts and ideas as proposed in the D.A.M system, and the basics of it should be used in the designing and creation of the D.A.M system.