The White House will give the traditional holiday decorations a digital boost this Christmas season. The East Wing and outside decor will feature robotic First Dogs, crowdsourced tree lights and the first-ever interactive greeting card from the First Family.
"Technology has always been an interest of this administration," William Bushong, chief historian for the White House Historical Association, told The Washington Post.
Stephanie Santoso, a PhD candidate in information science at Cornell University, helped to create the "Bo-bot," a robotic dog based on the Obamas' real dog Bo. The First Family's other dog Sunny also received a mechanized interpretation by Presidential Innovations fellows Bosco So and David Naffis.
Robo-Bo can swivel its head back and forth and Sunny-bot has eyes with infrared motions sensors that can detect people's approach, causing the dog to turns its head toward them. The two dogs use simple software and hardware, and Sunny-bot uses rubber bands for its ligaments, according to the Post.
Both teams watched a video of Barack and Michelle Obama interacting with the dogs in a "Let's Move" campaign video as well as viewing videos of other Portuguese water dogs. White House chief floral designer Laura Dowling wrapped both robotic dogs in black polyester satin ribbon to give the illusion of the real dogs' black, coiled fur.
The White House features 56 Christmas trees in the President's Park, representing all the U.S. states and territories, and has them all lit up with LED lights. Google and the National Park Service sponsored an initiative to allow girls to log on to the Made With Code site through December to program the LED lights.
The administration held the first 3-D printed ornament contest and chose five winners. The San Francisco-based company printed the ideas with white and clear plastic polymers.
A digital snowscape in the Booksellers Room features 3-D cameras that project visitors' images on the east wall and make it look like their walking through a winter wonderland.
"We wanted this to be more than a one-way experience," Jillian Maryonovich, a graphic designer at the White House Office of Digital Strategy, told the Post.
The White House will debut all of its holiday decorations on Wednesday, Dec. 3.
