Structured Rain

Challenge

An irregular natural object is already difficult to projection-map: it is non-planar, textured, and hard to register by hand. Structured Rain added a second alignment problem. The projected imagery and laser output had to share the same reconstructed geometry, remain registered with each other, and stay precisely attached to the log. The workflow needed enough accuracy to make both layers read as one coherent system on the surface.

System

Structured Rain runs on LightStruct, my structured-light scanning and projection/laser mapping system. The system captures the log’s surface using structured-light patterns, reconstructs its geometry, and maps visual content back into projector and laser coordinate spaces. On site, scanning, calibrating, and masking the scene took about 15 minutes, with a companion iPad app used to mask the projection and laser output to the log itself.

On Site

Structured Rain ran for three nights at APOG Music Festival, from dark until sunrise each night. The log sat in a forest nook along a main thoroughfare between stages, where festivalgoers discovered the piece on their walk through the woods.

TouchDesigner Integration

For production use, I built custom TouchDesigner C++ TOP, POP, and CHOP operators that bring LightStruct’s scanning, calibration, geometry, and control data directly into the live TouchDesigner workflow. This allows capture, reconstruction, visual generation, mapping, and output to stay inside a real-time creative environment.