Nanika Limited » Projects

Brain Magazine Cover / Julia

nanika_admin — Thu, 12 Jun 2014 15:43:23 +0000

Nanika was asked to design the June cover of Brain magazine, around the theme “Happy Creation”

We interpreted this as, how do we make ourselves as happy as possible while creating it?

I personally (Andreas) have been experimenting a bit with working in different locations like cafes and outside in the park, I find it makes it easier for me to get into ’the creative zone’ and I’m also interested in the idea of being productive on an iPad.

By iPad we don’t specifically mean the Apple iPad, but this new generation of touch devices in general. The multitouch-on-a-tablet format is a super interesting step forward of the kind we haven’t seen for a while.

So there was this vision of being able to do the whole thing start to finish from a cafe or a bar on an iPad, for the final creation process to feel a bit futuristic.

This is obviously more of a performance art approach to it all as there is a lot of work to be done to be able to get to that moment when you can sit down at a cafe for a few hours and produce good imagery!

So we set out to make an iOS app that somehow could produce really beautiful imagery at print resolutions, ideally it would run on a phone as well so that we could make/explore images whenever a moment was free.

A lot of the projects that we work on involve creating a system that produces images, motion, reaction and exposing the various parameters in the system in such a way that other people can bring their skills and experience to the project and change the system. Being surprised by something you made and know intimately is a great feeling.

The process would be to use this App to make/look for a beautiful image, then take the image into Photoshop Touch to do framing and colour correction. Photoshop Touch on iPad supports images up to 4096×4096 now, so that’s fortunate.

As we were thinking about what do and generally looking around for inspiration and knowledge to use we came across this lovely piece of open source code by Tom Beddard describing a 3D fractal called a Mandelbulb and we knew there would be a lot of beautiful images in there to explore.

A few days later we had an early version of an application that let us explore the shape, the first time it running on a phone was very exciting, we were really living the theme “Happy Creation”.

Julia is available for download at: http://appstore.com/nanika/julia

Kasabian Tour 2011 Interactives

nanika_admin — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 16:54:10 +0000

A project done in conjunction with Silent Studios and art directed by Aitor Throup.

The Kasabian 2011 tour saw a mix of high-end 2D/3D animation, visual effects and live action. Using custom written software the visual properties changed in real-time in response to the music or the live filming of the band, while leaving room for the all important human touch by the operator responding to the live show, enhancing the visuals on the fly.

“It was like watching the best telly you’ve ever seen — a massive concave screen with spectacular graphics reacting to the thumping bass and guitar riffs. Hats off to the team behind it. They’ve come up with something truly original.” – The Sun

Lamp North Prototype

nanika_admin — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 22:12:24 +0000

North is based around the simple idea that wherever you are in the world, there is always another place out there that is important to you and you have a relationship with.

It visualises this relationship by giving out more light the more directly it points towards this location, the (magnetic) north pole in the case in the case of this lamp, but idea is that a future version will allow you to specify the lat/long coordinates of a place in the world, where a loved one lives or the place you were born, to use as it’s point of reference.

Hyundai i40 Light Reveal

nanika_admin — Sun, 06 Mar 2011 13:35:31 +0000

Hyundai i40 Light Reveal by Hi-ReS! and Nanika.

A live event that ran for 7 days prior to the unveiling of the new Hyundai i40 in Geneva.

Users could assume control over a light-rig composed of 200 lights over the Internet and use it to reveal parts of the, then still secret, design of the car with the result streamed back by 3 cameras from the studio in Germany.

Nanika’s custom software allowed realtime control over the light rig which plugged into the website created by Hi-ReS! where users could draw strokes on a virtual model of the light rig and then see the results played through the streaming cameras.

Engineering by Schokopro.

Behind the scenes direction and editing by Ben Unwin.

Music composed in-house by Florian @ Hi-ReS!

Exile (iPad)

nanika_admin — Tue, 21 Dec 2010 17:22:26 +0000

Working with our friends at Champagne Valentine to create an interactive music video for Helen Gifford’s chamber opera Exile on the iPad.

Available now free of charge on iTunes.

Programming by Nanika, Design and Art Direction by Champagne Valentine.

John Lewis Harmony

nanika_admin — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 17:22:50 +0000

Control software for the John Lewis Harmony project.

To promote John Lewis’ range of lighting products Adam & Eve and Upset Media created a house that featured lights from the current in-store range.

Nanika was tasked with writing software to interpret any incoming sound and convert it into a lightshow to be played out on the houses lighting system.

The software, written in C++ and using OpenFrameworks, had a number of different sound responsive scenes that we designed that then in turn instructed DMX-dimmers which had control over the 100 domestic light fixtures, making them synchronized to the music.

Different sound reactive scenes were randomly selected with each new song, but an operator had facilities to choose from these scenes should he feel a particular particular scene would suit a particular song better.

A screen capture of the control software:
(The screen capture affects the sound synchronization a little bit)

As timescales were tight and noone would see the software outside of the team it did not receive too much design TLC.

Avery Perfumes

nanika_admin — Fri, 21 May 2010 16:25:51 +0000

Soundscape and interactive screens for perfume retailer Avery.

Aside from installing screens with interactive capabilities Nanika wrote custom software to be able to utilize off the shelf and inexpensive hardware to create a bird-themed 3d soundscape to enhance Avery’s overall concept of birds.

Concept and Design Lilian Driessen.
All photography copyright Intertrade Europe (UK) Ltd 2010

BFA Virtual Chandelier

nanika_admin — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 16:24:18 +0000

Virtual Chandelier for the British Fashion Awards 2009.

Nanika was tasked by Inca Productions to create a virtual chandelier to be displayed at the British Fashion Awards on a Musion holographic system.

The final sequence was captured by shooing light at a Swarovski chandelier to capture the natural properties of the crystals. Everything is captured in camera and no effects are applied apart from some minor color correction.

The above movie and the images does not show the final piece but rather outtakes from the light tests.

BBC Blast

nanika_admin — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 16:22:09 +0000

Client: Harmonypark Year: 2009

A project by Fallon for BBC Blast, which saw 4 machines brought into the Topolski studio at London’s Southbank Centre for 4 weeks and control over them given over to the public.

Nanika worked on interfacing between the web system and the physical machines in the space, provided camera expertise and wrote various pieces of custom software, among others code that would allows us to automate a DSLR camera to shoot into a curved lens every 5 minutes and unwrapping the resulting image into a format the Flash interface could use, to give the website a 360 degree time lapse of the space.

Concept by Fallon, design and frontend build by Acne, backend by Harmonypark.

For All Seasons (iPhone)

nanika_admin — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 17:35:17 +0000

Nanika’s first iPhone project is a port of Andreas’ 2005 piece For All Seasons, released back then for the PC and Mac.

This project was done mostly to gain some familiarity with the iPhone platform, keep an eye out for more bespoke iPhone projects from Nanika in the future.

For All Seasons is an attempt to use interactivity as part of helping to explain a memory and the emotions that are attached to that memory to somebody else.

For All Seasons (iPhone) is a free download from the iTunes App Store.

App Store link.

The original piece is available for download at:
http://www.hahakid.net/forallseasons/forallseasons.html

Diesel S/S 09 Show Visuals

nanika_admin — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 18:01:44 +0000

Client: Diesel Year: 2008

Nanika created the interactive visuals of the Diesel Spring/Summer 09 New York fashion show.

Mixing prerecorded video with visuals created in real time which were generated by the movements of the models. Harnessing the models movement to create a fusion of subtle and natural animation with a futuristic and technological visual style, in line with the theme of the collection.

Silhouettes of the exiting models were formed of thousands of dancing light particles. Abstract landscapes referenced the motion of the models, captured by tapping into the existing 3 camera set up used to document the show itself.

Art Direction by Diesel Creative Team

Fashion show produced by Inca Productions

Show music mix by Star Studded Studios

On site editing by Ryan Uzilevski and Javier Perez-Karam

Bacardi Glass Designer

nanika_admin — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 15:00:10 +0000

Software to let visitors of the Bombay Sapphire Bar and at trade shows design their own glasses through a playful interface.

The software reads the outline of the users hand when placed into a light-box and lathes the contour to create the shape of a glass, when done the user can enter their e-mail address and send a picture of the glass to themselves or a friend.

Hana

nanika_admin — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 15:40:46 +0000

A self-funded project, Hana is about giving something back to the computers that help me do my work every day.
I wanted to give them a new experience and the furthest I could think of from a computer was a flower, so I decided to create them a piece of software that would help them dream about flowers.
The idea is that no part of process of creating the flowers is hidden from the computer, no bitmaps are used and as few human decisions are hardwired into the software as possible.
If the computer had the capability, it should be able to think and feel it’s way through as much of the creation of the flowers as possible.

Hana is available for iOS here.

OSX Screensaver available here: nanikawa.com/downloads/hana/HanaScreenSaver.zip
White 2nd gen Macbook and upwards supported.

EveryGallery

nanika_admin — Tue, 10 Oct 2006 07:40:59 +0000

A piece for Nokia’s Flagship Store project, which sees high-end retail experiences opened in shopping capitals around the world.

EveryGallery uses the Nokia Flagship stores as a gallery space, blending the traditional with the contemporary, emulating the picture frames of a traditional gallery, but filling it with the work of the virtual artist while it is being painted.

The AV system in a Nokia Flagship store consist of anything from 28 to 42 high-resolution LCD screens with up to 18 of them placed next to each other acting as a single canvas, depending on the layout of the particular store.
Therefore the piece is implemented as an application that accepts a folder of images as content that it proceeds to render as a set of movies suited for the unusually wide canvas, allowing easy updates with new and relevant content.

LiquidCanvas

nanika_admin — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 07:38:59 +0000

A piece for Nokia’s Flagship Store project, which sees high-end retail experiences opened in shopping capitals around the world.

LiquidCanvas is a piece built to create an ambient background for the stores.
It uses selected images and melts them together with flowers and butterflies to create never ending organic forms and colours.

SeeMyStore

nanika_admin — Thu, 10 Aug 2006 15:40:29 +0000

A piece for Nokia’s Flagship Store project, which sees high-end retail experiences opened in shopping capitals around the world.
The Nokia Flagship stores are all designed around a very impressive AV system, consisting of anything up to 42 high resolution LCD screens, arranged in groups of up to 18 in a row, with floor to ceiling LED panels able to change into any colour. Needless to say it’s a fun canvas to work with.

What we wanted to do with this piece was to give people visiting or simply passing by the store at night control over this canvas.

The piece is interactive via SMS, allowing people to request colours or abstract scenes consisting of motion and colour via their messages.

The system always precedes an action with the command responsible for it and constantly gives examples.

The observant user will quickly discover that he or she can combine colours with scene names to change colours for the scene and enter custom colours via RGB, giving him or her a lot of control over the lightshow.

SwimmingMessageSystem

nanika_admin — Wed, 10 May 2006 15:39:02 +0000

A piece for Nokia’s Flagship Store project, which sees high-end retail experiences opened in shopping capitals around the world.

One of the overarching concepts with all our work for the Nokia Flagship stores has been to take peoples own content and make something beautiful for them out if it. SwimmingMessageSystem is interactive via SMS. People can send messages to the piece that then brings the words of their message to life as typographic fish.

The piece is implemented as real time software running on anything from 24 to 42 screens depending on the store layout, providing a seamless canvas.

Wind

nanika_admin — Wed, 10 May 2006 06:31:29 +0000

A piece for Nokia’s Flagship Store project, which sees high-end retail experiences opened in shopping capitals around the world.
One of the overarching concepts with all our work for the Nokia Flagship stores has been to take peoples own content and make something beautiful for them out if it.

This piece, together with SwimmingMessageSystem, is an attempt to bring a bit of nature into the store, the concept of this particular piece being a wind blowing through the store taking messages submitted by users via SMS and flying them across the different landscapes.

In it’s original incarnation the landscape is something like a magic forest, but the idea is to also make versions specific to the locations that stores open up, like the wheat field below for the Chicago store.

The piece is implemented as real time software running on anything from 24 to 42 screens, depending on the store layout, providing a seamless canvas.

Motion Wall

nanika_admin — Tue, 10 Jan 2006 13:19:16 +0000

We were hired by Projector to take part in the Interactive Interior project for the Sony-owned high-end fashion and gadget store Beyes in the exclusive Omotesando Hills shopping centre in Tokyo.

The store is equipped with a projection system that acts as an interactive wallpaper in the store, cycling daily through the different pieces by the contributing designers.
“Motion Wall” takes its inspiration from whatever it is that makes fire or smoke so fascinating and relaxing to watch.

It uses the motion in front of the screen to generate a never ending swirl of colors, letting visitors participate or simply enjoy what is created by the motion of passers-by.