SYNESTHESIA PROGRESSION

I've been working on my Interdisciplinary Practice designs for the subject area of Synesthesia and how colour reacts with sound.

I've created a interactive experience where users can walk into a sectioned off room, where contained is a series of 12 cups that can be hovered over to create different tones and fades of sounds. The technology behind this is by breaking the beam similar to a burglar alarm. I'm hoping to start exploring into how these sounds can be manipulated through code so they respond different to different temperatures of each person. Which is similar to a light theremin where it's touch responsive so therefore creating an experience that is unique to each person, as Synaesthesia is unique for each person and do not have many common themes in what each person can see.

Other elements that are within the work is the sound reactive colour spirals that are made out of LED strips and fiber optic cable, which when sounds are produced from the cups or from the microphone stood on a plinth will react to the frequency to the user is talking and illuminate the spirals with different colours. The technology behind this is similar to a Colour Organ where different tones of voice are connected to individual colours, and whilst most people speak at a relatively similar frequency will be altered also with the reaction to the sounds coming from the cups if played together.
To link up with the microphone the words that are spoken are being put through a dictaphone and fed into a word program where individual words will appear on the screen so they can see a visual representation of their own words.
As I have been unable to find a macro or code where I can randomly generate coloured words according to their pitch, frequency, or even if they were randomly  assigned it's been impossible to continue working on the dictation without an external source of colour. So tied into the projection of words I am currently working on an oil lamp wheel that will spin and fill the words with colour as it is overlayed. I'm currently discussing if this should be placed over a black background with white words or white background with black words. I'm considering more white words as the colours will fill the input from the users, making the patterns swirl as in their peripheral vision with coloured swirls as they play cups. So everything within the exhibition will be self generated.

I wanted to communicate the idea that every experience is different, so the user can determine that anothers user was completely their own and not shared. So part of the room will only allow one person to stand inside as it's their interpretation of how it would look to have Synesthesia.
The element of comparison was a very important factor in the communication of this project, so I'm looking into setting up a camera so the users can record their experiences and upload them onto the website WhatColourIsYourSound.com which has been designed specifically for this project so they have an understanding of Synesthesia and perhaps serving a factual purpose for users who don't have it, or would like to understand it further.

The website will be a place to submit, view the gallery as well as my trailer for the entire experience so viewers who will not see the show up can grasp the concept and further explore what it's like to see sounds as colours and patterns.

I'll keep posting my updates of each step of its progression, overall I'm happy with it's status and now I'm going on to start building components of the final design so everything will be working prior to the pdf submission.