INSPIRATION: Trash Trash Trash
One day I was walking to school to ITP and it was very windy there was this plastic bag flying right towards me and I was pretty certain that it will not get me and I am not in its path. Ohhhh, I was wrong...that plastic bag hit straight to my face. Imagine me doing the Keanu Reeves move in the Matrix.
^^^^^ Me trying to get away from the plastic bag.
FIRST PROPOSAL: Thoughts | Ideas | Sketches
For my final project, I am going to create a virtual world of NYC in Unity thats undergoing a natural disaster, cyclones to be exact due to excessive quantity of waste and trash in the New York.
I am going to develop a prototype app in Tango with Motion Tracking feature along with Unity, as well as, implementing DSNY’s Refuse and Recycling Disposal Networks API. The Tango / camera will represent a user (at the center of the universe), all the trash and wastes (movers) in the virtual world are going to be attracted to the user (attractor). The user has to shake or run away from these junks otherwise these junks will block your point of view and the world will gradually turning dark and the user eventually become one of the junk. The number of trash flying around are determined by JSON.
Wind / wave patterns have been always fascinated me (just like flocking and perlin noise example sketches that Shiffman showed), so I want to simulate the wind/cyclone forces. What will make this simulation interesting is instead of the boring particles and spheres that we have been making in p5.js sketches since I started ITP will be replaced by what we throw into trash everyday, which are:
- paper: newspaper
- metal: light poles, pans
- glass: jars,
- food: pizza, lettuce
These trash important keywords are also presents in the API JSON I found! Just what I need!
Speaking of API, as I was researching on New York’s trash and waste API, I came across a well-researched article written by the guardian on the subject matter.
Click on the article's image to the source link.
The article also referenced several sources and links (API page) at the bottom of the article, which I am going to use for my Final project. In addition, the data was fairly recent, 2016.
But now…., what’s confusing to me is making sense of the big data and only extract the necessary one out.
"Baby Steps…baby steps…baby steps….”
My next step is implementing the API JSON into Unity.....