2: FREE HUGS

FREE HUGS is an installation for the lonely, single, married, happy, sad, sexually frustrated,

depressed, young and old. Those who are looking for affection, attention and distraction in times of social distancing.

Free hugs campaign is a social movement where individuals offer hugs to strangers in public places. How are we performing random acts of kindness during a pandemic?

Free Hugs Month: July - August

Concept

Intimate relationships, personal boundaries, cultural differences and comfort zones. Due to social distancing our everyday lives are affected. What happens if we use computational tools to express ourselves?

Not only its inhabitants function in other ways during the pandemic, the city has also been put in different light. The public domain is of great importance for social life in the city. Where normally an urban culture prevails, and the urban fabric facilitates an open, social climate, we need to find other ways to express ourselves within the city.

For this project I decided to make a simulation of the shadow play. Because the idea of this installation is a little ambitious, I will show the results of openFrameworks in a video. Below you can read how I am trying to realise this installation (without oF).

Reflection on the shadow play: Open Frameworks has definitely challenged me. For someone who calls herself a 'knutselprogrammeur', I struggled most with working from home, alone, not fully capable to form the right questions and not having documentation in print next to me. It took me days before another 'aha' moment came along, realising how to implement something in my code. But beging honest, and I don't want to sound to whiney here (!) the fact that I've been able to try things within openFrameworks and that I've seen some possibilities makes me happy.

Addons and tools used to create this project:

ofxShadowSimple

ofxAssimpModelLoader

LightSystem2D

First I tried to work with the Simple Model Loader, the addon that allows you to implement 3d models, I even failed in adding another model for some reason but wanted to implement two 3d models, make clear

they're positioned 1.5m from each other and then play with light so their shadows 'interact'.

Secondly, I found the addon "LightSystem2D".

After a few mental breakdowns I decided to create something in openFrameworks that I could finish with the help of great examples from junkiyoshi (one -obvious- example used: https://junkiyoshi.com/openframeworks20200331/) The other example will be uploaded when I've found it. Result below:

Code [link]

Source code