Digital Art Shouldn't be Hard to Display
It's not actually that hard... if you're willing to spend money and setup some custom systems. Commmoditizing a way to display it is quite difficult.
The Problem
Everyone is looking for a low cost solution, but that just isn't how it works. There are a few road blocks that get in the way of good, affordable digital art displays
- Digital art takes many forms - images, video, audio, 3D files, ascii art, and even code. Finding one display that supports all of this is pretty much impossible, especially if you are looking at the cheaper end of the spectrum.
- Screens are inherently light producing, whereas traditional art is typical light externally, either from surrounding light sources or back light. This changes the way we see colors and experience the art.
- Not all screens have the best color technology. OLED is the only type of screen that does art justice. Everything else just isn't as good. Blacks are muted, everything feels flat, and generally it's just not as good as it should be.
- Screens typically only come in the 16:9 aspect ratio but artists make art in any aspect ratio. This leads to empty space and a conundrum of either making the art smaller or cropping out parts of it. Neither is great.
Basically, it's hard if you want it to look really good, as intended by the artist.
Current Solutions
A lot of the frames (that no longer exist) dedicated to digital art failed because the screen was the wrong type, the processor wasn't strong enough, and generally hardware is hard.
White Walls might be the best solution I've seen, yet, it doesn't support code based art, which can be a shame for displaying dynamic and generative art in its full glory.
My Solution
If I had space for screens in my tiny 350 sq ft New York City apartment, this is what I would do:
- Buy LG OLED tvs, the really nice ones that are like $2000 each.
- Buy Beelink computers that runs Windows and mount one to each tv.
- Frame each tv in a really nice box of some sort, perhaps even embedding into the walls if possible so they are super clean.
- Program each Beelink computer with a custom OSC (Open Sound Control) server that allows me to display whatever I want from an iPhone or iPad app. I already have a POC server for this on my Github.
- Create a custom control panel using OSC software for iPhone/iPad.
It just takes a bit of work, but would work really well. All in, I think you'd be looking at about $3000 - $4000 a display depending on labor costs. The computer is just $300.
If anyone reading this wants to try it out, I'll work with you on it! Please reach out.