From Isabelle Verona:
Designed and prototyped in 2011 in Brazil by the designer Isabelle Verona, OPSIN is an interactive lamp that allows a user to play with light. Inspired by Pin Art, the lamp has mobile pins in one of its surfaces that when pressed, light up. As OPSIN has many pins, a user is permitted to draw and create lighted shapes on the lamp’s surface thereby customizing the light .
To return the lamp to the initial “dark” position (i.e. turn off the light by returning the pins to the pulled position), a user simply presses the front surface against the lamp’s back surface. When attached to a wall, the user would then press the front surface against the wall itself.
Additionally, OPSIN has a system that allows for controlling perceived light intensity. The depth of a pressed pin is proportional to the intensity of light transmitted through it, meaning that the deeper you press, the brighter it will shine. Furthermore, as more pins are pressed, the overall luminosity increases.
OPSIN gets its name from a class of proteins found in the human retina that receive light input and transmit it to the brain. Similarly, when the pins receive mechanical input from a user, they shine and transmit that signal back to the user in the form of light.