Simple arrangements that appear to change with viewing are quite common, i.e. 3D, eyes that follow you, etc.

We're talking about something a bit different here: A picture that would notice that you are looking at it, and perhaps changing in a significant way, for instance a nude covering herself, or a section of the picture showing significant new detail.

Techniques already in use in eye/head movement control of computers could be used, and with the advent of heat sensitive fabrics, such art need not be confined to the computer screen but can use traditional surfaces as well.
-- theircompetitor, Jan 27 2005

(?) Very similar idea from the halfbakery _22Gaslight_22_20Gifts
[robinism, Jan 28 2005]

(?) Eye-motion lasers http://www.spie.org.../jan97/eyescan.html
Can be done without damage (so they say) [shapu, Jan 28 2005]

gaze-sensitive anti-domestic-abuse ad http://gizmodo.com/...hen-nobodys-looking
From Amnesty International. Slogan: "It happens when nobody is watching." [jutta, Jun 27 2009]

FRAMED http://techcrunch.c...in-digital-artwork/
[theircompetitor, Jul 25 2014]

How about a painting that's nude except when you look at it?
-- Worldgineer, Jan 27 2005


That's just Tantalus and the grapes all over again [world].
-- wagster, Jan 27 2005


A painting which is nude except when you look at it would be an interesting thing to have in a public art gallery. The first visitor to the gallery in the morning might catch a glimpse of the nude image but the figure would be covered for the rest of the day when the gallery is reasonably crowded. It might inspire some people to call for a co-operative strategy ("Excuse me! Could everyone here please look away from the picture for a moment?"). Even more complex in terms of its effect on the behaviour of a group would be a picture which was nude when one person was looking at it but was covered at all other times.
-- hippo, Jan 27 2005


i seem to recall something exactly like this in the harry potter film/book- with the ghost paintings that move and interact. ?
-- benfrost, Jan 27 2005


ben, you're exactly right now that I think about it, though of course being in a fantasy movie doesn't make it baked or implementable, i.e. FTL ideas are still posted though the concept has been in literature for a long time.

I got the idea watching a Science Channel show about heat sensitive fabrics and I was especially interested in the possibility of doing this on a canvas -- which of course is what they do in the movie.
-- theircompetitor, Jan 27 2005


A nude made of heat sensitive material, with a computer run sensor that can sense eye/head movement to see where people are looking, hooked up to a heater, so that the area being viewed would change color.

Now imagine a elementary school trip to the museum… the children passing the nudes… all of their little eyes gaping… the immense heat generated due to all the ogling…a flame springs to life from the overheated fabric…first one and then more of the nudes catch on fire… the extreme chaos that resulting from the museum being burned down… maybe not the best idea.
Well at least it would be fun [+]
-- brodie, Jan 27 2005


Of course there are coffee cups that work this way—at least, you have to have hot coffee in them before they will reveal anything. Or the reverse, and you have to have cold beer in them. So this would work great in a bar. Full beer, full nudity. Half-full beer, topless only. Etcetera. And it would work even better (in truck stops, for instance) if the nude woman became a nude man.

“Goddamnit,” Butch said, covering his mug with both burly hands, “I said FILL IT UP!”
-- pluterday, Jan 27 2005


"Damnit Butch," Laura said as he returns, "stop filling that up," as she starts emptying it again.
-- Worldgineer, Jan 27 2005


Similar to "Gaslight Gifts" (see link)
-- robinism, Jan 28 2005


This would actually be even easier than you might thing, at least at a basic level. There are scanners which detect eye movement (link).

Just set them above the paintings in question, and they'll find eyeballs. If they do, then the heaters go on, the paint changes, and the hottie in the clam becomes just another Janet Reno.
-- shapu, Jan 28 2005


A series of fast change portraits altered by group facial recognition software that is looking for one person of the group with only one eye showing would do it.
-- wjt, Jun 28 2009


If a breast is exposed in a gallery when no-one is there to see it, does it offend a fundamentalist?
-- Twizz, Jun 29 2009


very interesting, jutta, thx
-- theircompetitor, Jun 29 2009


How about if you added an algorithm that assessed the attractiveness of the person looking, and decided whether it WANTED to be seen nude or not?

And potentially various interim levels of 'come hither' looks?
-- kindachewy, Jun 29 2009


Ah, or one that switches from a woman to a man when viewed (or vice versa) to mess with the viewer's sense of gender attraction. Or even switching from an attractive nude to an unattractive nude, just to be cruel.
-- Worldgineer, Jun 30 2009


Somewhat interesting that both this idea and the baked version have something to do with sex.
-- daseva, Jun 30 2009



random, halfbakery