Simon Says... Do As You See...

Color and light are frequently employed by artists and designers to help others to process and better understand information.

"Simon," the popular electronic memory game, first introduced at Studio 54 in New York City in 1978, used color and light and sound to challenge players to recall musical sequences.

30 years later, you can still enjoy playing the game on your computer with a freeware download of "Simon Extreme."
http://files.5star-network.com/Mac/Games/SimonExtreme.dmg  

Color and light are important tools used by designers to engage the game-playing public. Games like Dance Dance Revolution, Rock Band and Guitar Hero use color and light to teach players to recognize patterns or recall sequences. Guitar Hero was developed by two engineers who began working in the MIT Media Lab to develop a computer system that could give non-musicians the experience of performing music. Flashing colored lights give the players the visual clues that allow them to reproduce musical sounds without being able to read music.

Whether you are using an ATM or a touchscreen cell phone, your user experience is probably improved by a designer's understanding of how light and color can be used to impart and organize information.

The designer of the Maya Lin Studio website uses light and sound to create a different kind of user experience. http://www.mayalin.com/
Visit the What is Missing? website http://www.whatismissing.net/ and see how the designers use light to organize and share information, indicate the passage of time, and actively engage the viewer.

On a much grander scale, the 1977 film, "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," demonstrates how color and light and sound can be used to provide a thrilling on-screen moment. Director Steven Spielberg and composer John Williams used these abstract ingredients to elicit emotion and build dramatic tension. (Considering the timeline, you have to wonder if the creators of Simon were inspired by the movie!)



Budding composers: Take note of this example of how the same five note sequence is used to create a completely new work of art. Abbey Lincoln's musical composition, "Another World" from the album, "Wholly Earth," is inspired by the "Close Encounters" theme, but has a completely different sensibility.

http://www.pandora.com/music/song/abbey+lincoln/another+world