As you walk into the gallery on the first floor of Science World in Vancouver, a large panel beaming with dozens of LED rings draws you in closer. In front of the panel, there are three controllers marked simply 'Speed', 'Colour' and 'Delay'. When you try moving each of the controllers, the lights come to life, animating in beautiful and unexpected undulating patterns. The hues also change, cycling through the full spectrum, from electric blues and greens to deep purples, fuchshias and brilliant yellows. The more you experiment with all three controllers, the more patterns and behaviours you get to see Halo produce.

Halo was inspired by emergent properties, which occur only when the parts of a system interact in a wider whole. For example, when a bicycle and its rider work in tandem, forward cycling motion arises, but neither one can produce the motion on their own. In a similar way, people can affect the patterns of Halo and trigger stunning behaviours by changing the combinations of inputs (Speed, Colour and Delay).