The Group Jump Rope Orchestra: an interactive system topresent a sense of togetherness
Ayaka Sato

Anna Yokokubo

Itiro Siio

Ochanomizu University
2-1-1
Otsuka,Bunkyo,Tokyo,Japan

Ochanomizu University
2-1-1
Otsuka,Bunkyo,Tokyo,Japan

Ochanomizu University
2-1-1
Otsuka,Bunkyo,Tokyo,Japanayaka.sato@is.ocha.ac.jp

anna.yokokubo@
is.ocha.ac.jp

siio@acm.org

ABSTRACTThe Group Jump Rope Orchestra” is an interactive system
to present a sense of togetherness of participants by using
a virtual reality technology. Participants of this system canperform an orchestra music by jumping a virtual rope thatis projected onto their front screen and onto the ﬂoor. As
the number of participants increases, the orchestra becomes
grander.

ScreenProjector
Photo Diode
Short focus
Projector

Keywords
jump rope, orchestra, interactive art, virtual environments

1. INTRODUCTION
A group jump rope is a sport that several people jump intoa long rope one by one and jump together. As the numberof participants increases, it gets more diﬃcult to jump continuously. To succeed in the group jump rope, participants
need to synchronize their timing and rhythm. When theysynchronize, participants will feel a sense of togetherness,and this is one of the pleasantness of a group jump rope.
Similarly, an orchestra perform a music with several people
play instruments together. Also, orchestra is familiar to all
over the world and is often used in interactive systems[1].
We propose an interactive system by mixing a group jumprope and an orchestra together, so that participants can feela sense of togetherness with their sense of vision, hearing
and their whole body.

2. SYSTEM OVERVIEWThis system consists of two projectors, projecting on to thefront screen and on to the ﬂoor, and lasers and photo diodes
to judge whether participants jump correctly(see Figure 1).
The front screen is projected from the back, and a shortfocus projector is used to project on to the ﬂoor, so thatparticipants’ shadows will not be in the way. Photo diodes
are connected to a computer via an USB I/O module. These
determine whether each participant has jumped over theLaser Module

Figure 1: System overview.
virtual rope or not. Due to the determination, music andprojected image will change.
At the front screen, viewed from participants, images of theswinging rope and the person who is swinging the rope areprojected. On the ﬂoor, the image of the rope that themovement linked to the front screen is projected. When anparticipant jump into the virtual rope projected on the ﬂoor,
and jump correctly, one part of the orchestra, for example
a violin’s melody ﬂows. At the same time, images of ripples caused by participants’ jumps are shown on the ﬂoor.
When another participant joins and both participants jumpcorrectly, another part of the orchestra, for example a trumpet’s melody ﬂows together with the violin’s. So, the moreparticipants jump into the rope, the grander the orchestra
becomes. When someone is caught in the rope, which meansthat when someone couldn’t jump at the right timing, adissonance will be played and the music stops. There arevarious music and images that will be projected onto thescreens, so that participants can enjoy various patterns.

3.

REFERENCES[1] Roberto Dillon, Gabriyel Wong and Ron Ang. VirtualOrchestra: an immersive computer game for fun andeducation. Proceedings of the 2006 international
conference on Game research and development, 2006.