High-Tech Pointe Shoes Make Ballerinas Into App-Trackable Cyborg Ladies

Ballerinas might be some of the world’s most incredible athletes, but now, thanks to a Spanish designer, they’re basically cyborgs as well.

Designer Lesia Trubat‘s fascination with the complexity and intensity of ballet has led her to her latest project, “E-Traces.” Working with Lilypad Arduino, who creates “sewable electronic pieces designed to help you build soft interactive textiles,” Trubat attaches the arduinos various areas on a pointe shoe. The electronics track whenever the shoe comes into contact with the floor; that data is sent to a mobile app, which then translates it into a series of artistic 2D strokes. It’s creating digital art out of three-dimensional movement, and it’s pretty rad:

Trubat told Huffington Post that E-Traces combines the best parts of the world of dance and technology, and she wants the project to expand to other genres of dance as well. “The applications are varied,” she said, “from self-learning—or showing the steps in dance classes—to the graphical representation of live performance.” As a choreographer, the data from the app could be invaluable in developing new and dynamic routines for dancers from a unique perspective.

Someone sew a set of these arduinos onto my Gambas, stat. It’s the closest I might ever be to becoming a dancebot.

(via HuffPo)

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