Audrey Penven Makes Art With A Kinect Hack

As you might not be aware, this is how the Kinect works. It projects a regular (structured) grid of dots on the surface in front of it using wavelengths (light) invisible to the human eye (infrared). Hence, “structured light.” Then it uses the deviations between where it would expect those dots to be if they were on a flat surface and where they actually appear in front of it get an idea of what three-dimensional shapes have been placed in front of it.

Photographer Audrey Penven decided to use this defining feature of the Kinect to take some really astonishing pictures.

All it took was modifying a digital camera and completely darkening her studio to make the infrared stand out more. She and her models worked in complete darkness, interrupted only by the occasional camera flash. Here are a couple of our favorites from her series Dancing With Invisible Light.

All of Penven’s photos can be found at her Flickr (not all of them are Work Safe).

(via Laughing Squid.)