This experiment is about extending the human touch / transferring body heat as a way to connect people. Basically way of communicating real time that "I am thinking of you" in a more visual / caring way than what a text message can.

The idea behind extending your body temperature is that when thinking of human presence, heat is one of the most prominent aspects. Most living organisms emit a heat signature and it differentiates us from machines / objects. For example a tree's leaves can move in the wind, but it doesn’t have a heat signature similar to human beings.

By placing your hand above an infrared heat sensor, your body temperature is translated into a dynamic animation. By having the sensor and the animation output in different locations, you can effectively extend your presence to other, distant locations.

This project was done with Openframeworks. The sensor data is collected with an Arduino. The heat data then distorts a “particle cloud”. The visual is just a png layered multiple times with a time offset on the distortion.