This was my third year at MIT's Reality Virtually Hackathon. This is the last of this particular hackathon. I hope that they might open it up again, but the event was pretty intense to organize and was run by volunteers.
My goal this time was to work with the Magic Leap hardware and to work with individuals that were there to learn and not pressure the group to overachieve. I love to spend a weekend hacking on something and learning, but I also prefer to be healthy about it, eating properly and getting plenty of rest. I found a great group to work with and made an experience with them that resonated with all of us. It's another fairly therapeutic application, somewhat inspired by a previous project of mine called Immusi. Players can create a location-based musical garden, and express their feelings in their surroundings. The idea could be taken further to create moments for others to experience in a certain place, like an echo of someone passing through, or perhaps the idea of street art. Of course, that would require Magic Leap headsets being mainstream and able to be worn while walking around, so it's still a future possibility.
Here is our description from Devpost...
Inspiration:
We wanted to allow individuals to have an augmented environment to experience their emotions, good or bad, through music.
The Problem:
How can we express our emotions? How do we feel today? Where are we looking to go?
Description:
We use augmented reality in Magic Leap to create a natural space for you to experience a soundscape. We chose to start with the selection of seeds as a metaphor for growth. Flowers appear when the seeds are planted, and they can be nurtured for further development. The potential of the seeds is illustrated in the diversity of the flowers. Each flower now represents one portion, one possible realization of the sensation. While we suggest the emotions of happiness, melancholy, and neutrality, the interpretation is up to the individual. You can linger on one sound, survey them all, or listen for the juxtapositions to match your own mood. In all this we want you to stay grounded so that you can connect your emotions to your life directly.
What it does:
We created a garden of sound using plants as instruments. Players choose a mood from the acorns on the tree and can play music by brushing the plants.
How we built it:
We built the project in Unity. Music was created on Logic and brought into Unity. 3D assets were obtained for free from Google Poly, and Free Unity Assets. Textures were adjusted in Photoshop.
Challenges we ran into:
We tried many types of interactions in the Magic Leap One headset. Hand gestures were a challenge, so in the end, we opted to use the controller.
Accomplishments that we're proud of:
We learned a lot about developing on the Magic Leap One, which was very exciting for us. We hope to continue learning using the emulator.
What we learned:
We now have the ability to start developing further on the Magic Leap One, we learned new skills in Unity, we learned tips and tricks for making objects look better in AR.
What's next for Sound Garden:
We all have an interest in learning more about developing on the Magic Leap One and continuing to develop in Unity and Logic.
Built With
google-poly
logic
Try it out
