The Byte Room: Immersive Data Visualisation

A projection in The Byte Room comparing a large red 1 TB cube, labelled “~250 HD movies”, with small 1 GB and 1 MB blocks

BACK

The Byte Room

BACK

The Byte Room

BACK

The Byte Room

The Byte Room turns bytes into a place you can step into. Units from kilobytes to terabytes become physical worlds whose scale you feel before you calculate it.

Visitors compare familiar files and disturb these data worlds with environmental forces, which makes the size of digital information easier to explore.

INSTITUTION

Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design

COURSE

Immersive Experiences

DURATION

1 week

GROUP PROJECT

Naman Jain Davide Airoldi Prianka Kaur

The Byte Room turns bytes into a place you can step into. Units from kilobytes to terabytes become physical worlds whose scale you feel before you calculate it.

Visitors compare familiar files and disturb these data worlds with environmental forces, which makes the size of digital information easier to explore.

INSTITUTION

Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design

COURSE

Immersive Experiences

DURATION

1 week

GROUP PROJECT

Naman Jain Davide Airoldi Prianka Kaur

The Byte Room turns bytes into a place you can step into. Units from kilobytes to terabytes become physical worlds whose scale you feel before you calculate it.

Visitors compare familiar files and disturb these data worlds with environmental forces, which makes the size of digital information easier to explore.

INSTITUTION

Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design

COURSE

Immersive Experiences

DURATION

1 week

GROUP PROJECT

Naman Jain Davide Airoldi Prianka Kaur

THE INVISIBLE SCALE

File size is hard to picture as a number

The Byte Room starts from a simple problem: words like kilobyte, megabyte or terabyte are familiar, but their relative scale is hard to sense. The experience gives those measurements a space instead of another chart.

THE INVISIBLE SCALE

File size is hard to picture as a number

THE INVISIBLE SCALE

File size is hard to picture as a number

MAKE SIZE SPATIAL

Objects make the comparison physical

A text message, HD photo, music file and feature film become points of reference inside the room. Each data unit becomes an object or a world, and visitors compare their scale by moving through them.

Visitors explore the projected Byte Room data environment.

A projected Byte Room data object representing a one-megabyte photo.

Visitors interact with the projection in The Byte Room.

A phone interface used within the Byte Room installation.

A projected Byte Room data object representing a one-megabyte fruit.

Visitors interact in the Byte Room installation space.

Visitors view a projected Byte Room data-scale scene.

A projected Byte Room visualisation of data at large scale.

THE ROOM RESPONDS

Environmental forces make the scale explorable

Visitors can disturb the data objects with wind, storms or quakes. Each form responds differently, so the comparison becomes something to probe, not only something to look at.

A visitor uses a phone interface in the Byte Room installation.

Visitors face The Byte Room’s projected data environment.

A projection in The Byte Room showing the internet at data scale.

FAMILIAR DATA

From a message to a feature film

The references come from everyday digital life. Seen side by side in one room, they connect ordinary files to the much larger volumes of data moving through networks.