Bandai's Project A.i.R. is a $525 blue grid that blows up

Okay Bandai, we get it. After over 50 years of making cheap toys and video games you want to show the world you can make overpriced stuff too. As if your $2,200 Ginza diorama wasn't enough of a statement, now you're producing a $525 box that lights up and blinks like a miniaturized monochrome disco floor. It's called Project A.i.R., or Art In the Room, and it's basically a 5 x 5 grid with blue LEDs covered by some sort of translucent fabric. Inside each square in the grid is a fan that makes the cloth billow, slightly increasing the brightness of that section of the grid. It's an interesting effect for sure, but as you can see in the video below its functionality is somewhat... limited. But is it art?

[Via CrunchGear]

[Frostblade10 Posted Apr 11th 2009 6:12AM]

But will it blend?

[plexusXXX Posted Apr 11th 2009 7:24AM]

Try blending your meaningless life you jerk

[Brickster Posted Apr 11th 2009 8:16AM]

After watching the video I want them to make a bigger one to play Tetris on.

[ctgaffney Posted Apr 11th 2009 9:48AM]

it can probably blend some KilgoreTrout into bits for sushi

[xoxidine Posted Apr 11th 2009 6:17AM]

A box of this, LAME. A wall of this, WIN

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 11:14PM]

You could just buy a ton of boxes of lame and make them into a wall of win...

[Wwhat Posted Apr 12th 2009 3:58PM]

That's what the banks thought ;)

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 10:04AM]

That's a good effect.. just using a fan..

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 6:59AM]

wont the fans make quite a bit of sound?
must be annoying to have it on all the time.

[zerosozha Posted Apr 11th 2009 7:50AM]

If this interacted with your music, I could *maybe* see the point.

[Beastage Posted Apr 11th 2009 7:53AM]

Wall or floor... interacting with music?! sounds like disco to me.

"Well now, I get low and I get high,
and if I can't get either, I really try.
Got the wings of heaven on my shoes.
I'm a dancin' man and I just can't lose.
You know it's all right. It's OK.
I'll live to see another day.
We can try to understand
the New York Time's effect on man."

[Calomile Posted Apr 11th 2009 8:10AM]

I'd rather have one of these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monome

It's a square with rows of LEDs in... But this one actually does something!

[mitchsw Posted Apr 11th 2009 11:06AM]

Monome is even more expensive/crap. Its nice in theory, but $1400 for a 16x16 button matrix and some LEDs. My keyboard has about that many buttons, it cost $14.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 12:39PM]

I'm making my own monome 40h at $150/unit

[Hammersmith Posted Apr 11th 2009 8:13AM]

Might look pretty cool if you put a 'Tony Manero' action figure on it.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 8:28AM]

I thought this was going to be an awesome disco floor augmentation until I saw the thing in that video. Truthfully I wouldn't pay more than $100 ($50 for you Amerifags) for something that makes pretty patterns, it's not you'll notice the cloth 'billow' out of the corner of your eye for most of the time.

[Torch Posted Apr 11th 2009 8:49AM]

Using the godlike speed of the blinking lights to its full advantage, you attack the twenty five squares at the same time. This makes billowing cloth and LEDs useless. This is the Bandai company's Project A.i.R.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 10:18AM]

I see an instructable in this things future

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 10:35AM]

The word 'Random' summed this up nicely.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 10:28AM]

The word 'random' summed this up nicely.

[gonintendo Posted Apr 11th 2009 11:02AM]

Dang it, I was expecting some explosions!

[magallanes Posted Apr 11th 2009 11:18AM]

meh!

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 11:34AM]

It's just a rip-off of the Daft Punk Coffee Table. Even the animations are the same.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zCA79Du-WqY

[crearc Posted Apr 12th 2009 12:00PM]

That think is seriously awesome. I always wanted to build that but never got around to it.

[pika2000 Posted Apr 11th 2009 3:39PM]

A bunch of tiny fans? Wouldn't it be very noisy? I don't want to hear a bunch of small fans whining in my bedroom.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 11th 2009 5:30PM]

That looks like it would make for one awesome game of Boggle.

[niclet Posted Apr 11th 2009 10:23PM]

This is a good start for "haptic" tech :/

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 12th 2009 5:46AM]

I want one :)

[Wwhat Posted Apr 12th 2009 4:00PM]

Blue LED, music visualizer looks, this is soooooo '90's