The Rainbow Maker

The Rainbow Maker: An interactive video game projected from the roof of Bessie the Ambulance onto a large screen. A Traverse installation in which the audience pass between the side of Bessie and the projection screen to immerse themselves in and play with making Rainbows drawn from colourful light using infrared tracking and projection mapping. This interaction is then gamified as an interactive installation where you make your own Rainbow and make a wish.

New for Winter 2020, with roadtesting due by the end of September. Write to garth@safetycatch.net for more info. Or sign up to the Newsletter to be kept in the loop.

What might at first look like a ‘travelling emergency service drive-in cinema’ is actually a walk-in and play interactive projection experience, where the video game controller is your body moving in the space:

Audiences will be encouraged to first wash their hands at a handwashing / sanitation station.  They will be asked to stand inside a cordoned off area one at a time. They will face the screen with hands to their sides while they are calibrated or synced up with the camera mounted on the side of the ambulance (infrared). Once synced they can play. They will be encouraged through visual & verbal cues (on the Ambulance window screen & sound system), to wave their arms and dance in order to create the message they wish to infuse into the Rainbow. The colour will appear inside their projected silhouette on the screen above and opposite them.
They will then be cued to follow a series of instructions to play different levels of the game: Playing paper, scissors stone against their silhouette. Dancing a jig. And so on. Each playful level will require them to move to generate the colour to fill in the Rainbow.
The projection will go onto a custom built screen on the A shaped gable end of a 4 x 6 Metre Gala Tent. The player’s colourful silhouette will be projected onto the 4 metre wide part, and the rainbow onto the top of the A above their heads. This will act as a Covid safe weather proof shelter for friends and audiences of up to 4 Covid Safe bubbles at a time to witness their friend or family making Rainbows.
This newly painted rainbow will gradually be coloured in one band at a time. The Rainbow Wave Maker offers a welcome opportunity and a beautiful way to wave a big thank you to our beloved NHS, its staff and all our carers. Rainbows are also a symbol of unity in diversity, and of universal hope. The playful concept of this installation is that we are making rainbows to bring others hope.

The idea with these installations is to point at the Elephant in the room, but also to make it less scary and to enjoy a whimsical interactive experience.

Each day the Ambulance would be driven away and set up again on return. Get in and get out would take an hour each. The Gala Tent would be left mounted. This will need stage weights if not on grass, and either security overnight or heras fencing x 8 to create a compound over night. The installation could be mounted for up to 6 days at a time. It may well best suit 3-4 days per week for several weeks. And in different locations. The main consideration is space. Bessie is a standard former NHS Ambulance at 6.5 metres long and 2.1 wide. The installation space would need the 6 metres of length plus the ambulance plus player space. The estimate is a 12 metre long space by 6.5 metres at the Ambulance end, and 4 at the Gala Tent end.

The installation will encourage people to wash their hands before they make the Rainbows with handwashing stations. A collection or donation links to local health charities can be directed alongside the Ambulance.

* These will be a Covid-19 Safe, Socially distanced installations, where the Ambulance gives cues. The Ambulance will be given a voice and keep ‘score’ while the Doctor will commentate and assist when necessary from the roof of the ambulance where we have a trap door. The Doctor can help or encourage and guide when needed, from the 3 metre high ambulance roof or van cab, and by using a microphone. This installation can be made socially distant for audiences very easily if necessary, with only people co-existing in households or bubbles allowed to play it together, or even playing solo with the pace of the game increased. Accessible versions for audiences with physical inhibitions, or movement impairments will be created and easily available.