An ecology of Flickr images, perpetually evolving inside in a camera / viewer / projector loop.

The system treats Flickr tags as genetic material: the more attention a photo with a certain tag receives from the observers, the more likely it is to survive and spawn images with related tags.

Each generation of images gives viewers a narrower (and often inbred) approximation of what they're focusing on, and kills off what's ignored.

What's happening:

The projection starts with 3 image clusters; each cluster is seeded with a few related Flickr tags. A camera and some image processing code figure out where people are standing relative to the screen and which of the clusters they're in front of.

If a photo is being watched, it takes on some color — and, if it's looked at long enough, recombines with a neighboring image cluster. Unfit images drop away, and new ones related to the dominant tag are fetched live from Flickr to take their place.

( Thanks: Marlena Novak and Ian Horswill for their guidance during development. Thanks also to Ben Kolak for his camera work, the K-Town Moon Base for the installation space. )