Students’ Braintone Art creations. Photo: Yvena Chowdhury via dallasinnovates.com.
The Dallas-based company Braintone Art’s software allows anyone to create a piece of unique art using their brain’s focus picked up through an EEG headset, reports Dallas Innovates. On its website, the company states that the “information streams wirelessly in real-time through the Braintone Art Imagery Generation Engine to project your emotions as abstract artwork on the digital canvas.” But it’s not just emotion that shows up on the canvas. “I like it because it lets me express my creativity,” said a participant at a recent Math Corps camp for fourth-graders. “It helped me because I had to focus on doing one thing specifically and try to get it perfect.” That sounds like art-making.
The software has two different art styles and a few different color palettes to choose from. The brainwave element is added by tying people’s brain activity to the virtual paintbrush via the EEG headset. For an explanation of the process, go here.
There have been a few artists that have used brainwave technology—not to mention many scientists and communication experts—but this is the first to make it so user friendly that fourth graders can use it and learn how their brains can affect it.
The Center for the Brain Health’s Dee O’Neill believes it can help make people more aware of their brain function at a basic level. “I feel like people are completely fascinated by it and excited for the information that it provides, not even just Dallas, but nationally,” O’Neill said. “People definitely are excited to see how their brain is working and how they can make it work better based on that information.”
