Hazelight Projection Mapping App

What if your students' artwork could tell a story?

Art teachers are always looking for ways to give students' creativity a new dimension without losing the hands-on experience of making art. This is where Hazelight comes in. Hazelight is a free iPad and iPhone app that brings projection mapping into the art classroom. It allows students to take their own drawings, paintings, sculptures and physical creations and add a layer of movement, light and storytelling. Using a projector, students can map video and visual effects onto real-world objects and surfaces, turning traditional artwork into something interactive. 

What can students do with it?

• Project rain onto a hand-drawn umbrella and make the rain bounce off its edges.

• Bring a painting to life with moving eyes, falling leaves, smoke or glowing effects.

• Add bubbles, sparks, water, wind and other animated effects to their artwork.

• Create the illusion of a window opening into another world.

• Add movement and atmosphere to sculptures, cardboard constructions and 3D artwork.

• Combine photographs, videos and animated GIFs with students' original creations.

• Create installations for exhibitions, school displays, performances and storytelling projects.

Students can outline shapes directly in the app, position video over their artwork and use interactive effects that respond to the physical objects around them.

The bigger opportunity for art teachers

I think the interesting part is the connection between traditional art and digital storytelling. Students still begin with paper, paint, pencils, clay, cardboard and their imagination. Hazelight gives them another way to communicate the story behind what they have made. A landscape drawing could become a living environment. A cardboard castle could become a world with moving weather and light. A sculpture could become the centrepiece of an interactive installation.

This opens up conversations about composition, atmosphere, movement, narrative, audience and how different creative mediums can work together. It also creates opportunities for collaborative projects where students take on the roles of artist, storyteller, designer and exhibition creator.

A few practical things worth knowing: Hazelight is free, requires no account or sign-up, has no advertising or tracking, and projects and media stay on the device. The developer's App Store privacy information states that no data is collected. You can connect an iPad to a projector using an HDMI adapter or a compatible external display connection.

Sometimes the best use of technology in art isn't to create the artwork for students. It's to give them another way to share what they have already imagined and made.

Hazelight is available here:

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/hazelight/id6825195603