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Light Painting Wi-Fi

Posted by samzenpus on from the light-means-might dept.

dostojevski78 writes "Some Norwegian art students built this gizmo to visualize wi-fi signal strength in the city streets. The result is simply beautiful. Who said technology can't be aesthetically pleasing?"

3 of 65 comments (clear)

  1. I know who. by Siberwulf · · Score: 5, Funny

    Who said technology can't be aesthetically pleasing?

    Pretty sure it was Roger Ebert.

  2. I like the concept, just not the application by GodfatherofSoul · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Knowing the difference in signal strength along 100 feet of sidewalk is pretty useless. Just throwing out an idea, I think it would be neat to use a NASA-ish artificially colored satellite view of a city. At different points; record say three different metrics; secured network strength, open network strength, and say number of networks. Assign each an RGB component and color your maps that way. You'd be able to quickly look at a map and determine based on color and intensity the approximate characteristics of WIFI all over a map.

    --
    I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
    1. Re:I like the concept, just not the application by adamdoyle · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I would actually argue that while it may not be useful per se, it is definitely interesting to see how geography affects WIFI signal. I would really like to see a 3d version of this where instead of being, say, 30 rows by 1 column, being 30 rows by 30 columns so that you could have a 3d grid of voxels(?) where height is proportional to signal strength. It would still be artistic yet would paint a better picture of the affects of geography/terrain/building materials on WIFI strength.

      (I do kindof wonder how long the signal strength meter takes to update and if it's enough for this to actually correlate accurately to the current position)