Flying Machines

Flying Machines is a series of sounding mobiles that feature flowing curves, slow movements, and spinning fans suspended below delicately balanced speakers. They have a lifelike aura and emit deep, voice-like sounds that seem too low to come from these slender, flightless machines. A study in gentle motion and organic tones, over time the piece reveals complex and subtly shifting patterns of movement and sound.

This project is taken from Ed Osborn

Quicktime Video - 320x240 (6.7mb)

Night-Sea Music

In Night-Sea Music, many small music boxes are driven by slow electric motors attached to them via rubber cables which curl and release intermittently. The piece is titled after a John Barth story, Night-Sea Journey, which is narrated by a confused and not altogether enthusiastic single spermatozoa on its journey in search of...well, something (the narrator is not very clear on the concept). The twisting and spasmodic movements of the piece alludes to those tiny twitching travelers whose brief existence is a suicidal mission to carry information through a difficult environment. The music boxes all play the old folk tune "The Merry Widow," which serves as a wink and a nod towards the overwhelmingly futile energies expended by all those determined sperm.

The motors run at slightly different speeds depending on the amount of slack between them and the music boxes to which they are attached, so there is no way to synchronize the content of music boxes. While the flavor of the melody is heard, the overall contour of its progress is diffuse and meandering. This diffusion is both temporal and spatial since individual notes or clusters of them are heard randomly from various points across the wall where the piece is mounted. The factors causing the different rates of playback - the amount of slack on the rubber cable and the angle of that cable on the wall - are clearly visible and intuitive. The rubber cables make a mark of their motion against the wall, thus emphasizing the piece's tactile presence and leaving a physical trace of the amount of its efforts.

This project is taken from Ed Osborn

Quicktime Video - 320x240 (4.8mb)

Fish pong

FishPong is an interactive system designed to stimulate spontaneous cooperative play in public spaces such as coffeehouses and cafes. FishPong consists of a tabletop tangible user interface (TUI) that allows users to control a fish-themed video game using coffee cups that have been tagged to serve as passive input devices. In this project I contributed to the development of the game narrative as well as the implementation of the interactive experience.

Dancing fish

The iFish is about 8 inches long by 4.5 inches tall and is constructed of plastic. The head of the iFish is solid, while the tail resembles an actual fish tail with many bones. The tail can sway back and forth with a slight touch.

It is is powered by 3 AA batteries that fit into the belly. Once the batteries are installed, you can tap one of the front fins to wake the fish up. 5 LEDs on each side of the head and 3 LEDs in the tail will light up and cycle colors. Bubbling noises will play from its speaker, and wheels in the belly will allow the fish to spin around in a circle.

irises

An iris diaphragm is an aperture with a variable opening diameter. The majority of instances of irises can be found in aperture settings in camera lenses as a means of regulating depth of field and the amount of light that is exposed by either film or sensor in capturing an image. aperture, being an array of irises, is part of a building's facade. Composed of single aperture-modules with receptor (LDR—light dependent resistor) and actuator (servo-motor/iris), aperture acts like an autonomous skin, which is also capable of precise external control. Visual information is transmitted from the inside of the building to the outside, the surface permeability is regulated when the aperture's opening diameters are changed. Each of the apertures in the array can be used to represent a pixel of an image.

BUBO

Bubo is a toy owl with "magic" power that can cast spells and take control over innocent devices.

Turning the real environment into a playground is a fascinating idea to us. It leaded us to think about the interactions between toy to toy and toy to its surroundings. Furthermore, we set the context on mastery by gaining control. In the mean time, we would also like to provide children the experience of exploration and imagination over the real world.

Bubo is a toy owl with "magic" power that can cast spells and take control over innocent devices or other toys in its surroundings. It also has a learning mechanism to expand its spell book stored inside.

Spells are hidden in surrounding infrared remote controls. There are plenty of home appliances controlled by infrared, such as TV, air condition, computer, printers, etc. Bubo can sense the infrared transmission around it, and picks up new spells from.

Light interaction

I really like this kind of interaction, using light to interact the screen

Function of Oil

Fats are required in the diet as they provide the structural components of the cell walls of all tissues. They also act as carriers for the soluble vitamins A, D, E and K. Whilst an excess of saturated fat in the diet can lead to raised cholestrol levels and heart-related diseases, poly unsaturated fats can actually lower cholestrol levels. Some oils contain essential fatty acids, a deficiancy of which can lead to heart disease, acne and eczema. Mono unsaturates have actually been found to reduce cholestrol levels.

Interactive membory ball

UPGRADING the magna doodle

The Magna Doodle is a classic children's magnetic drawing toy.
Comprised of a magnetic drawing board, a pen, and a few magnet shapes.
Over forty million have been sold to date, and still popular with children today.

How can we expand on this idea, with the addition of sound and light?

Simplicity Event

The kid can draw on a wall, when he puts his "pen" into a bucket he can change the color!

Strangely Familiar

interactive lights

Green house effect

Interaction Design Zurich

Interactive pillow

An interaction design pillow, it lights up in dark and in beat with your breathing!

Production insturment

The internal details of the production instrument. The design includes a "no moving parts" direction sensor described below. It avoids the need for expensive and fragile gimbals and oil filled damping chambers used in the earlier instruments. The design uses a combination of a very low power, 3 axis magnetometer and 2 axis accelerometer. The data from these sensors are processed in the microprocessor to determine tilt and magnetic direction, and are combined with velocity sensor outputs to determine the N/S and E/W components for vector averaging.

What does transmission mean?

Electric power transmission, a process in the delivery of electricity to consumers, is the bulk transfer of electrical power. Typically, power transmission is between the power plant and a substation near a populated area. Electricity distribution is the delivery from the substation to the consumers. Due to the large amount of power involved, transmission normally takes place at high voltage (110 kV or above). Electricity is usually transmitted over long distance through overhead power transmission lines. Underground power transmission is used only in densely populated areas due to its high cost of installation and maintenance, and because the high reactive power gain produces large charging currents and difficulties in voltage management.

3 examples of technology artifacts found in SF movies

Click
Click is a 2006 comedy/drama/fantasy film directed by Frank Coraci and written by Steve Koren and Mark O'Keefe. Click tells the story of Michael Newman (Adam Sandler), an overworked architect so wrapped up in his job because of his boss (David Hasselhoff) that his family is forced to take the backseat. He gets a "universal remote" from an eccentric engineer named Morty (Christopher Walken), and finds he can literally control the universe around him. It began filming in late- 2005 and was finished by early- 2006. The film was nominated for an Academy Award or Best Makeup.

Run Lola Run
Throughout the film, Lola bumps into people, talks to them, or passes them by entirely. Details of that person's future are subsequently shown in a series of still frames. The futures are widely divergent from encounter to encounter. In one scenario, a woman whom Lola accidentally bumps into wins the lottery and becomes rich; in a different scenario, she remains poor and kidnaps an unattended baby after her child was taken away by social workers. In yet another scenario, the woman experiences none of the above and becomes a Jehovah's Witness.

Several moments in the film allude to a supernatural awareness of the characters. For example, in the first reality, a nervous Lola is shown by Manni how to use a gun by removing the safety, whereas she does this as if remembered from a previous experience in the second reality. Lola's encounters with Schuster also contain an air of the supernatural, with strong hints that the two share a father-daughter relationship, even if only on a subconscious level.

The movie itself begins by posing questions pertaining to the unpredictability of the world and the unknowable nature of its meaning. It suggests that drastically disparate consequences can alter the fates of different people from a one second change in the time of one person's running.

Back to the Future
Back to the Future is a 1985 science fiction–comedy film directed by Robert Zemeckis and produced by Steven Spielberg. Zemeckis wrote the story, along with Bob Gale. It stars Michael J. Fox as teenager Marty McFly and Christopher Lloyd as mad scientist Doctor Emmett L. Brown. Sent thirty years back in time in a De Lorean time machine, Marty inadvertently interferes with his parents' courtship and is forced to try and make them fall in love, or he will never be born.

Respond to an article by Michael Schmitz

Its interesting to see how science fiction movies have changed over time, the technology has improved so much that the new movies are hardly comparable to the oldest once such as Metropolis which is a silent film from, 1927 created by Fritz Lang.

Now we have got more stories behind the technology like in the movie Password Swordfish from 2001, where a professional hacker is hired by a terrorist organization to do some jobs for them. The movies have got stronger concepts and better function.

Holographic displays, or 3 dimensional images are very popular among directors and occur frequently. Forbidden Planet from 1956 is an example of 3 dimensional image, a device inherited from, the planets former inhabitants. In 1985 DNA analysis and identification was invented and from then on we got more into virtual or augmented reality.

An example of a satiric move scene is from Start Trek IV, when Spock and Scotty are on earth and supposed to use a 20th century personal computer. Scotty tried to talk to it as he is used to do on the Enterprise and of course failed. He was then advised to use the mouse, which he did – assuming that it is used as a microphone.

At that time, he used the computer mouse in a different way and its interesting how we are trying our best today to repropose the computer and make something new and fresh.

Assignment due July 30!

ESSENTIAL ELECTRONICS | 30% | 3 weeks | due July 30

Working with electronics may seem daunting at first, but like any other medium, a few essential components subjected to permutation, combination and variation, can yield complex syntheses. With this first project, you will be introduced to a variety of components that comprise the essential ingredients of most electronic circuits. The basic properties of electricity, and how it can be orchestrated and patterned into output through transducers will be explored along with basic interaction.

1. Electronics: Complete a series of lab exercises that will run through basic electronic circuit building, also covering safety and lab rules. You need to video yourself completing these exercises and post these files to your blog.
2. Materials: Basic fabrication techniques (mainly regarding plastic) will be discussed and demonstrated. A quiz will be issued covering these methods along with electricity.
3. Creative: Working from the materials and electronics exercises, create an audio device or instrument, addressing any or all of these qualities: form, pattern, audio transmission, interaction and light.

The goal of this project is to ease into the techniques of physical computing by taking a look at familiar objects and activities that are seemingly distinct from digital design. By seeing these phenomena from a different perspective we can build a bridge leading into the main content delivered across the rest of the trimester.

Each part of this project must be uploaded to your blog using clear and concise entry headings.Your blog will serve more than just an organization and presentation tool for your project; it will act as an access portal for grading – use it to fully describe your research and production processes for all phases of your project. Think of your blog as a ‘hand-in’ basket: If it isn’t on your blog, it won’t be graded.

Evaluations are based on the timely completion of labs and reading assignments, and creativity and mastery of the project . Project due Monday, July 30.

LAB WORK (lab 1-6)

Lab 1 + Lab 2


Lab 3


Lab 4


Lab 5


Lab 6

Brief for Project 1 - due August 6th.

DMDN312 INTERACTION DESIGN
PROJECT 1, 2: Science Fiction – Science artiFact
COORDINATOR: Doug Easterly

DUE DATE – Project 1, Monday August 6
Project 2, Thursday, September 16

• Video of production, PDF of proposal, other updates and research to blog


Topic Creating an interactive object, using light and sound – design
convergence on Science Fiction Prop


Task 1 Research
a. Read the Michael Schmitz article about HCI in SF movies (posted in the
links section for DMDN312). Write (300 – 500 words) a response on your
blog to this reading
b. Find 3 examples of technology artifacts found in Science Fiction – make
links and summaries on your blog about each

Task 2 PreProduction
a. Write (300 – 500 words) a design concept for a Science Fiction Prop. If
you have problems, create categorical delimiters for yourself (weapon,
communication device, wearable computing, ubiquitous computing). Post
to your blog as PDF file
b. Create a series of design sketches - posted to your blog (this may
include digital renderings, modeling, etc.)
c. Build a test rig; a semi-functional model that determines scale, form and
to a certain degree, animatronic components – video doc to blog
d. Research the possible materials and components to convert your test rig
into a functioning prototype. Post links and conclusions to your blog
e. Generate a parts list and production schedule. Be sure to subdivide your
project into sub-projects. PDF file posted to your blog
f. Critique of your work to this point – be prepared to present the breadth of
your work, resarch and concepts Project 1 - AUGUST 6

Task 3 Production
a. Build it! Make documentation along the way (video, image, writing)


Task 4 Post-Production
a. Use lighting, models, video and other digital manipulation to create a
video document that summarizes your project. Should be less than 3
minutes. May include footage from your Research and PreProduction
processes
b. Present your final work to class for critique (video and artifact) Project 2 -
SEPTEMBER 16

MAKE Volume 09: Fringe

MAKE 09 should be hitting subscriber's mailboxes any moment now. In this issue, explore the fringes of technology with projects that push the boundaries of physics and reason.

Resort chart

Designing for Interaction

"Creating Smart Applications and Clever Devices (Voices That Matter)"

Dan Saffer has reviewed Donald G. Reinertsen’s book Managing the Design Factory: A Product Developer’s Toolkit, which provides a very stark look at the product design process.

Reinertsen speaks about sales being a measure of how much users appreciate the value of a product:

The only measure of the value of a design is its economic value. Our designs are not important because they are beautiful or because they are innovative; they are important because they make money.

A rather naff quote (as my boss said ) and this doesn’t really help us with design ideas but it does remind me of what is important when communicating our product and service designs around the business.

A few interesting points to pull out of the review:

• Design to fail half of the time, because you can learn much more from failure than you can from success
• The UI is only one interface in the product - we have to design for interfaces with other products as well as interfaces with organisations (internal and customer).
• You have to be able to explain why a customer will prefer your product to others in less than 25 words.
• If the product’s proposition doesn’t exclude anything, it’s worthless.

As Dan says, the book provides a very clear view of the design process and a reminder of the important economic perspective.

Are you interested in buying the book?

What is Interaction Design?

Interaction Design

Electronic mediation of human action has been established for several decades now. Today we find RFID tags, intelligent (networked) objects and ubiquitous computing joining the ranks of consumer electronics in a world where one would be hard pressed to find some event that does not involve cybernetics. But only during the past few years have we seen the emergence of tools, methods and resources that have given designers an essential role in the creative shaping of such experiences. This course will focus on electronics, circuit design, material fabrication and programming to build intelligent objects whose design concerns go far beyond aesthetics and functionality. Techniques using microcontrollers will allow student work to extend the mouse/keyboard/screen paradigm of computer based design, integrating a full range of human motion and other phenomena such as light, temperature, computer vision and mechatronics.