Yuyao Lin, Xinyu Cao, Hailong Li, Zhengchen Liu, Shuzhe Zhang
Experiencing avian perspectives.
02/2024
In our project, we utilized bird vision simulation software (ImageJ & QCPA) and VR technology with Unity Engine to simulate light pollution effects from a bluetit's viewpoint at Albert Bridge near RCA Battersea. Our work, showcased through a panoramic video, allows viewers to experience these impacts via VR, emphasizing light pollution's role in disrupting avian life and its broader implications on climate change. This project aims to enhance awareness and empathy towards environmental challenges, advocating for a reevaluation of our ecological footprint.
Albert Bridge, near RCA Battersea, was selected for its visual impact and relevance to our study on light pollution's effects on birds. Observing the bridge's lit environment helped us understand its influence on avian behavior. This led to a panoramic video in Unity Engine, offering an immersive view of light pollution through VR headsets, highlighting the contrast between human and bird perceptions of the same scene.
We combined ImageJ and QCPA (Quantitative Colour and Pattern Analysis) which can be found here to enables us to simulate how various species perceive their environment under artificial lighting.
Technology risks reinforcing anthropocentric perspectives when used to mediate the more-than-human. The real challenge is not to simulate non-human experience perfectly—an impossible task—but to destabilize human sensory dominance. Technologies can provoke humility, inviting us to confront the limits of our perception and the multiplicity of ecological worlds.