Mutsugoto an aid for long-distance love affairs

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Two years in development, Mutsugoto is part art and all romance. It's aimed at people in long-distance relationships and promises to give a bit more than an "I love you, Pooks" SMS before settling down to sleep. The creation of Tomoko Hayashi, Stefan Agamanolis, Matthew Karau, Mutsugoto consists of a computer vision system and a projector to draw light over the couple's bed and body as they lie in bed, yearning and dreaming of their better half..............

Each partner wears a special ring that enables them to draw, using light, over their own, and their other half's bodies. A camera above the bed picks up the movements of the touch-activated ring as it passes over the body and transmits them to the computer system, which then converts the virtual pen strokes into light. The twinkling shots of light give each partner a hint where the other is "touching" them, while the strokes mirror the actual pressure. When the paths of light actually cross (think of when Venkman and Spengler cross the streams in Ghostbusters, but without the actual protonic reversal) then the light changes color.

Distance Lab, a technology lab run by one of the brains behind Mustugoto, is looking for three long-distance couples based in Scotland to test the system this summer. There's a very atmospheric video of the project in action below.

Mutsugoto Via BBC News

http://vimeo.com/3163898
On 13 November 2008, Distance Lab hosted an event on the theme of "Slow Technology", an extension of notions from the "slow food" movement into the design of new technologies. Instead of speed and efficiency, slow technology emphasises the quality, locality, and humanity of the total experience.