flip-dot window.
A flip-dot display the length of a kitchen window in Madliena: rows of two-coloured dots that click over to draw words, patterns and the odd game of pac-man.
- client
- private
- location
- madliena
- year
- 2018
- sector
- residential · installation
- system
- flip-dot boards · our structure, housing, integration and programming
- made by
- matter make
the project
The client asked us whether a flip-dot sign could be done in Malta. Flip dots are the mechanical displays you might remember from old railway stations: every dot is a small disc, a different colour on each side, flipped over by a magnet. We liked that the picture is a physical thing rather than light, and that you can hear it change.
It runs the length of the window above the kitchen counter, so the pictures sit against the garden. The boards of dots came from a specialist maker. We did everything around them: the structure and the housing, drawn by us and cut on our CNC and laser cutter, with printed small parts; the integration of the boards, controllers and power; and the programming. The artwork is set out in Rhino, so every picture is planned dot by dot. Then it plays: still images, animations, patterns, and now and then a word.
It went into the same house in Madliena as the first Cinema Visiona and the two guest bedrooms, sea views 1 and sea views 2.
