All that remains here are practice pieces for vibe coding.
It’s been a while since I’ve done vibe coding, and once again, I ended up working with LEDs.
I’ve displayed a face before, but this time I tried rendering a full body. It was quite a challenge to represent the entire body using an 8x8 LED matrix.
This time, I used the inexpensive MAX7219 as the LED driver chip, and it worked without any issues.
The microcontroller is an ESP32-C3, and I’m sending the LED display data from a Mac that analyzes the video to the ESP32-C3 via Bluetooth.
In the latter half of the video, the joint positions of the head, torso, and limbs—as analyzed—are displayed as an overlay. We used this data to control the LEDs, but it wasn’t as straightforward as we’d hoped, so we went through a process of trial and error.
Incidentally, a famous work that uses an 8×8 LED matrix to depict a human figure is “BITMAN” by Meiwa Denki and Ryota KUWAKUBO. In that work, the Bitman inside the device dances.
https://www.maywadenki.com/products/goods/bitman/
しばらく自分の根気とやる気と技術力とセンスの無さに打ちひしがれつつ、自分はこういったことをアートとは呼ぶつもりはないが、現代のアート界隈について考えていたのだった。
まあ、しかし、それにも飽きてまた以前通りに戻るのだった。
Caution! Inserting electronic devices into the body is dangerous; do not try this at home.
I had another idea for an LED matrix device, so I tried it out.
Daito Manabe and Motoi Ishibashi had already attempted to light up LEDs in the mouth back in 2009.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QsWc58zmBKI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWxPxzTRNF0
This time, I embedded LED matrix devices on the inside of both cheeks and controlled the display based on the shape of the eyes and hands.
The way they light up differs, perhaps because the thickness of my right and left cheeks is different.
I managed to make it so that a "TT" pose displays "TT," making a fist displays cat whiskers, and winking makes a cross rotate on the open side, but unfortunately, these effects aren't very clear.
左右の明るさが違うのはおそらく頬の厚みが違うからで、左側で噛むことが多いのだろうという発見があった。
最初は白いLEDでやったものの、もっとよくわからない感じで、波長の長い赤いLEDに修正してちょっとよくなった気がする。
でも、手をグーにすると猫のヒゲが表示されるようにしたのはまるでわからないな。TTポーズも微妙。ウインクで開いている側は十字がくるくる回転するようにしたのも全然ダメ。そもそも元からの目の細さによってウインクとして検知されない悲しみ。
口にLEDを入れることは2009年に真鍋さんと石橋さんがとっくにやっていて、それだと光の動きはないもののいろんな色に光ってオシャレな作品だった。