Elysium Fields is an immersive installation with both visual and tactile components. The intent is to encourage one or many participants to interact with an environment poised on the brink of reality, one mediated by an individual's inherent electromagnetic field and in constant tension with the artifice which surrounds it.

User Scenario
One or many users can enter through one of three pathways. Upon entering the user is preferably enticed by both the scale and the apparent softness of the wheat-like field. The user then brushes her hands over the tops of the field. As this happens the suspended lighting structure receives and translates the users average capacitance into a hue which then propagates along with their movement through the structure. If more than one person enters at a time then there is an opportunity for the group to meet in the middle and experiment with their additive electromagnetic fields.

Implementation
The installation is comprised of two main parts. First, there are 96 white translucent spheres hanging overhead in what approximates a grid. Inside each ball is a three color light emitting diode (LED) and a tiny microcontroller. Below the grid of lights is a monochromatic field of reed-like structures, similar in appearance to a field of wheat. Along each stalk is a wire which measures the capacitance of each individual interacting within the installation environment. As the user passes through one of three paths the overhead LEDs map the resulting change in capacitance.