Computational Design and Fabrication for Interactive Barrier-Grid Animations
Published at ACM UIST 2025

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FabObscura introduces a computational system for designing and fabricating interactive barrier-grid animations. It extends beyond traditional straight-line barriers to support curved, radial, and multi-directional patterns. FabObscura supports sliding, rotational, and view-dependent barrier-grid animations.

This repository contains:

• fabobscura_server.py — the Python server that generates barrier-grid patterns and composites.
• A Processing front-end for authoring, parameter tuning, and visualization.

git clone https://github.com/<yourusername>/FabObscura.git
cd FabObscura

Ensure you are using Python 3.8+ and install the required packages:

pip install numpy opencv-python imutils matplotlib pillow sympy flask

The Processing code requires the following libraries:

• ControlP5
• Grafica

You can install them via Processing → Sketch → Import Library → Add Library...

Run the Flask backend:

python fabobscura_server.py

By default, it runs on http://127.0.0.1:3000/.

After starting the server, open the Processing sketch (e.g., fabobscura_ui.pde) and run it.
The Processing interface communicates with the Python server to generate barrier patterns and animations.

To use your own animation sequence:

1. Export your animation as individual image frames (e.g., PNG or JPG).
2. Place all frames for one animation into a single folder inside fabobscura_ui/data/.
3. Each folder should contain only the frames for a single animation.
4. You can refer to the existing folders in fabobscura_ui/data/ as examples.

The system will automatically read and interlace all images in the selected folder to generate the barrier-grid composite.

If you use this software or build upon this work, please cite:

Ticha Sethapakdi, Maxine Perroni-Scharf, Mingming Li, Jiaji Li, Justin Solomon, Arvind Satyanarayan, and Stefanie Mueller.
FabObscura: Computational Design and Fabrication for Interactive Barrier-Grid Animations.
In Proceedings of the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST ’25). ACM, 2025.

@inproceedings{sethapakdi2025fabobscura,
  title={FabObscura: Computational Design and Fabrication for Interactive Barrier-Grid Animations},
  author={Sethapakdi, Ticha and Perroni-Scharf, Maxine and Li, Mingming and Li, Jiaji and Solomon, Justin and Satyanarayan, Arvind and Mueller, Stefanie},
  booktitle={Proceedings of the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST ’25)},
  year={2025},
  publisher={ACM}
}