Thursday Salute to Originals: Rain Room
If you were a superhero, what superpower would you pick? Would you choose to fly? Have x-ray vision? Immense strength? Read others’ thoughts? With the onset of fall and its seemingly never ending supply of rainy days, most of the staff here at our Cleveland office has begun to wish for the superhuman ability to repel water. Tired of trudging into the office every morning soggy and damp, we can’t help but imagine how great it would be to ditch the umbrella, raincoat, and galoshes and walk through these often torrential showers without getting the least bit wet.
It appears we’re not alone in this wish. Art studio, Random International, has realized our vision with their most recent interactive installation, “Rain Room”. Using 220 gallons of water per minute, hundreds of individual valves stream down water, creating an interior downpour. Normally, these types of conditions would drench a person almost instantly. However, in this storm, you need not anything but yourself to repel the rain.
Using highly advanced 3D cameras, the Rain Room is able to detect and track human movement, and consequently, turns off rain in those corresponding areas. This means people can walk through and around this 1000 square foot downpour, without ever getting wet. It’s almost like having an invisible bubble or surrounding force field that repels water – the rain simply does not fall wherever someone is located.
A strange and almost unnatural feeling, the Rain Room brings together advanced technology and a seemingly uncontrollable natural element to create an impossible and fantastical environment. Though we don’t think we’ll have this luxury outdoors any time soon (unless someone can figure out how to adapt this for crazy Cleveland weather, that is), we love the concept, and salute Random International for allowing us to feel like (dry!) superheroes for a day!
Image credits: Random International