Lifestyle media company UrbanDaddy Enterprises wanted to create an interactive water experience like none before. But as any studio knows, water is not the greatest projection surface. So the company contracted Brooklyn-based art studio Red Paper Heart to create an experience with animations through which guests could swim.

The concept required a good deal of brainstorming on the part of Red Paper Heart’s team, but it finally reached a solution that not only properly projected light, but enticed party-goers to have fun in the pool.

In researching a solution, we had to overcome the fact that projection doesn’t work on the surface of water, it becomes distorted if you project through it, and pool parties are notorious for more standing than swimming,” the studio said. “To make something truly interactive, we needed to get everyone in that pool!”

Pool Party from Red Paper Heart on Vimeo.

The result was a pool with 65,000 ping pong balls covering its surface. The balls provided a display for projecting light and a tactile environment that encouraged guests to jump in and interact. To polish off the show, Red Paper Heart used an iPhone app mapped to the pool that displayed a variety of floating graphics that floated around with the waves.

Audio reactive visuals bumped along with the various DJ’s and musical acts taking place poolside,” Red Paper Heart said on its Web site. “The tactile quality of swimming through ping pong balls, combined with animated colors and light created an interactive event worth telling stories about.”

Zander Brimijoin, a media artist at Red Paper Heart, told Business Insider he was surprised with how fun swimming in ping pong balls could be.

As you swim you hear the clicking of thousands of ping pong balls clacking together,” he said. “It’s hard to describe why, but it was an immensely satisfying sound.”