Process & Production

Hardware

Final Response

Well I was kind of upset about this project because I thought it was well done, but at the last minute the thing ups and dies on me. I will post the finish product later. Everyone seemed to think the thing was a vibrating chair, but it wasn't. All the suggestions were things I had though of and resolved but everyone could not experience them because for some reason the project died.
Note to Katerie** It worked that morning and the day before.! Just saying, sorry i'm just really upset.
weeeeelllllllllllll whatever......
All in all its been a great semester see ya next semster God willing! :)

I really enjoyed Dragon and Obi's piece it was well done and crafted, anya's piece made me laugh, and i'd like to have one of carlotta and elexis' dogs, and emilie and miriams work was well resolved as well!

Final Project Process: Final idea.

Taking the idea of the vibe boards i was thinking of at first making the same thing but on a simpler scale of just one sensor as you entered the house it would set off the vibe board to the possible rhythm of a heart beat. With the help of Dragan the idea was proposed to have the vibe boards connect to a house hold object like a chari, lamp, fridge, cabinets, carpet, ceiling etc. I wet with the chair. I was initially messing around with a push button system to set the vibe boards off then, i went to a range finder, then the idea came up from either Dragan or I of RFIDS. This is what lead t the current idea of having a chair or other house hold object that was loyal to only one person; its owner. The idea of using a waveshield to communicate the idea further came up, so I tried to use both the boards and the wave shield.

The concept is:
Chair that is loyal only to its owner.

Object:
chair the razzes anyone who doesnt have the right RFID: not the owner.
when the right RFID is scanned the chair starts to beat like a heart and begins to play reminiscient sounds that the owner would make while sitting on the chair from the squeaks of the chair itself to him/ her coughing, yawing, and snoring.

The vibe boards are places at sensitive physical locations on the body symbolizing the sensitive nature of the chair and the person.

Technology:
1 Arduino
2 RFID
1 WaveShield
10 "Lily Pad" Vibe Board

The Home stretch:

Put strings on RFID's and hang the on wall for classmates to grab.

double sided tape on RFID's and RFID tags so they sit on the readers.

Safety pins to attach vibe boards to furniture (chair).

Materials:

double-sided tape
string/ twine
push pins
safety pins
electric tape *so vibe boards wont short out on safety pins
speakers (WaveShield)
extension cord
battery pack (waveshield)

*tape breadboard together so pins dont come out.

Final Project Process: 5

Well my idea kind of changed. I was thinking, what if i use vibe boards instead? The thermal imaging thing looks like its gonna take some time and effort I do not have.

Current idea: vibe board security system.
simple idea: when some one walk to a location in the room the vibe board for that location goes off. The vibe boards are on a grid system on the other side of the room. I was thinking of a system of twelve vibe boards.

Final Project Process: 4

Group project idea:
when mass sensors are tripped they send messages to people phones.
-trip a sensor and it send messages to your phone of what you are doing. Messages are send via wifi to facebook or twitter.
-messages sent by scanning qr code upon intry into the house.

QR link to fb or twitter subscribe links.

Sensors:
infrared led's
pressure
vibration sensors
buttons
mic

structure:
sensors are everywhere, conspicuous or inconspicuous.
side are with code to scan.

Final Project Process: 3

Process web: Privacy

some of the nodes are 

heat-light-pure-innocence

heat-refiner-cold-dark-warm-brightt-blue-green

heat-control

notes at the bottum:

invert colors (top of page)

people in the space create life in smaler home

-create life when life isnt present

-take miniature homes with you.

stars in space merge with infrred images

you cant experience the house unless another person turns it on.

notes on side:

ghost: moving heat detection

breathing the heat

open door diplays sensor closed door does't

heat on wall, door, person, object.

Final Project Process: 2

Thermal imaging ideation:
heat as life insideof a house
read everything as heat (hot or cold)
video surveillance
associate the temp reading to other things, people, inanimate object, ideas, etc.
showing heat of people o door with LEDs

infrared thermometer
https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9570

videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMB_6bZSB1o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-6b2pCTJsw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSTZ0l0vfvE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcTKVOzxCmw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLmeON5GbXw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NC63vWy5F58

Final Project Process: 1

I have been thinking about an idea I made as a suggestion during the discussion of the first group projects. The idea was making an led body suit that lit up according to your body temperature. The idea of infrared thermal imaging seemed really interesting to me.

group project response

Some of the feedback we got from this project was to be more specific with the direction of the project. Some people said it was successful in that in itself it had a certain meaning to it but it wasn't nessecarily the meaing we were intending.
Some possible improvements questions and suggestions were:
time code audio
what was the purpose of the monotone voice
keyboard sounds
and why the casing for the device.

we did like the idea of the keyboard and the time code recording to add to the device.
the answer to the monotone voice is that we wanted to keep it neutral asif  the info was being read on screen.

Proposed project extension idea:
people input pulse information via pulse sensor and/ or record their own audio as confessions etc and send data via wifi + date and time information.

possibly done through processing and arduino a laptop of course.
we would send out the infor mation to multiple people with the same head phone and vibe board *possibbly fitted with other sensors that create physical sensations* setup and people would hear each others confessions based on proximity their pulse etc (biometrics.). this is the extended version we would not necessarily do all these things at once.

Final thoughts and such

Video Links
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10153585643150206&l=1650243227243503454

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10153585644635206&l=2711765324747026788

The over all project went ok. There were things that Kacee and I  compromised on for one reason or another which, after critique, we definitely would have done some of it differently. I suggested to Kacee we put all the solar senors in a window and run a wire to the flower, however she thought if we did that it would go against the concept because of how far away the sensors would have been. Kacee suggested we have a bright light shining directly on the flowers and sensors. Which I was uncertain about because then you wouldn't be able to see the LEDs which was what showed the viewer how the solar sensors were working...eventually we compromised by putting the light inside the podium shining onto the sensors. We had the idea about the motion detection of people coming tripping the lights to come on but we couldn't figure out how to make the charge stay until needed(which we now know how to do thanks to Evan's advise! As well as the knowledge about being able to buy a box of broken solar sensors!). There was alot of back and forth when it came to compromising about what went with the concept and what didn't.

Installation View

Final Project & Class Reflections

Although this class was really frustrating at times, I can say I've learned a whole lot over the course of this semester. I think one of the most important things I learned to do was solder because I've come to realize that I soldering is part of my job when we do maintenance on cables and other equipment. I've yet to do any of this type of maintenance because I didn't know how to solder. Because of this class, I can do more for my job and therefore make more money. Aside from giving me an edge at my job, I've learned to be more persistent and detail-oriented. Dealing with all sorts of electronics, both big and small, there is a learning curve and getting a grasp of these things is not easy. It takes time and lots of effort to get them to do what you want them to do and correctly. Besides all the technical things, I've learned to improve upon my soft skills such as my diligence towards things and also time management because I had to put a whole lot of time to my assignments and projects.

In terms of our final project, like I said in the other post, we've come a long ways since our midterm and since we first began the class. I remember in the beginning of the semester when we were playing with LEDs. It seemed alright at first; there weren't too many LED assignments that were hard. Then as the semester progressed, things definitely got harder and harder, like Katerie said they would. I wasn't too worried till we began our midterm project. Having never done any class assignments with Twitter or Ethernet, everything was new to us and we had to learn it all on the fly pretty much by ourselves. Luckily, we got the help of Evan and Katerie to steer us in the right direction. Thanks guys. We appreciate it. For our final project, I wish we tapped into everyone's projects and also had more messages. In the beginning, we decided on 10 messages per project. But as we thought of messages, we got writers block and it became really hard to think of good messages that relate to the projects so we stuck to 7. Lucky number 7. Overall, I'm really pleased of what our project came to be from what we initially conceptualized.

lady ada 4

finally one that actually worked

chap3 proj10 serial mood lamp....fail

another fail... :(
wouldnt even light up

artists responses MOMA

- http://www.moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2011/talktome/objects/140000c/

Continuity Game,
This piece by Guy Lima Jr. was interesting as it made me question the whole what is art and what is a game idea, and whether or not they are capable of being the same entity. My personal opinion is that yes games art forms of art, people create them to entertain people, make them think, question, believe, or simply convey some sort of idea. I believe this piece serves well in both aspects. In on part you have a game that is nearly infinite in possibility, and on the other hand it is visibly presented the way it is by an artists choice. The realm, color, character etc are all artistic decisions. Personally I could see myself playing this for hours, specially on a mobile device, when traveling via car plane etc. and extended period of sitting.




http://www.moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2011/talktome/objects/146229/

Analog Digital Clock,
Is a movie in which a guy is painting over and wiping clean a glass screen that presents itself as a digital clock. The irony is the human factor in this "digital clock". What is very interesting to me is the diversity of this piece, and begs to question is it a digital piece, or a performance piece, or simply a video? Visually it is quite engaging as well. Seeing the number being produced beckons the idea of handwriting and lettering of the human hand, however it is producing a distinclty digital number in design and form. This irony that Maarten Bass is playing with is recurring in his work and really makes the viewer stop and think. 


http://www.moma.org/interactive/exhibitions/2011/talktome/objects/146358

Botanicalls
Robert Faludi and Kate Hartman work together on this project. It is a program linked up to a plant which lets the owner know some of the plants major needs. It is cool as it allows communication (somewhat) between human and plant, both organic; bother world apart in terms of communication. It gives the plant a sort of personality, almost like one you would find with an animal or pets. What intrigued me most about this project was the use of plants. I feel as though plants, though from the same world, are completely different and complex beings besides ourselves, it made me think of Avatar as well, how the plants had a system of communication like synapses of the brain, and information was sent via these channels, very unrealistic but a cool idea nonetheless.

Final Project Process 7 - Ryan's WAV Files

So the name of the guy whose voice we used was Ryan. He was the perfect for us and we loved how he read clearly but had a sort of sarcastic undertone when reading certain sentences. It matched the tone of some of the things we were saying and trying to get across. The site we adopted him from was fromtextospeech.com if you were curious. Kudos for Dragan stumbling upon this site. There were a bunch of voices you could choose from, both male & female, fast or slow. All you had to was type whatever you wanted spoken, choose a voice, listen and preview it to see if you like it or want to enhance it someway, then download it.

The blog won't allow me to upload any WAVS or MP3 files so each group's messages are in Dropbox. They are categorized by the name of the group, then there are the initial recorded MP3's, then the exported WAV files we used for the Waveshield.

WAV files for Obi & Dragan's project

Final Project Process 6 - The Finale

So the big day has finally come and go. I'm proud of myself and Dragan for sticking it through and pushing ourselves to get this thing right. I think we make a swell group. We made so much progress from our midterm project both artistically and conceptually. Electronics are such a pain in the ass, though. I just have to throw that out there. But it feels good when you can get them to work the way you want them to work and it shows. I really wish we had an actual house as a space because that would have really pushed our concept further. However, we made it work with the blackbox space and dividing up everyone's areas for their projects. Our project was much different from everyone else's in the sense that it wasn't an actual physical thing that was tangible. It was more of a voice than a physical apparatus and that is what I liked most about it.

Picture time!!

Our lovely welcome doormat in front of the house entrance

Under the mat was cardboard and a stack of magazines

Cut in the middle was a small rectangular opening to

stick a small black breadboard that housed our 

button, resistor, and wires going under the couch.

Closeup of the button and breadboard

Rangefinder hiding behind the plants and rocks.

I bet you did not know that was there. We tried to

hide it really good.

All of our wonderful wave shields soldered by 

us. Each wave shield held each group's messages,

which were separated and labeled by the memory cards.

The photocell sensor was placed under Miriam & Emilie's

lamp so whenever it was turned on by blowing on the candle, 

one of our messages played.

This was essentially what was under the lamp minus the LED

 and it was also on that small black breadboard instead.

Final Project Process 5 - Sensor Party

#StudioSundays - Back at it again....

So Dragan & I had a great project day Sunday. We figured out a way to kick out of the loop with the wave shield and the rangefinder to make the message not be interrupted. THIS WAS AMAZING. We also added a new sensor to the list, the photocell, to put under the lamp so as people blew on the candle to turn on the lamp, our message would play when the lightbulb sprouted on. And this would continue as each person blew on the candle and therefore, turned the lightbulb on. So for our project we had 3 different types of sensors to be tripped, 2 rangefinders, 1 photocell, and 1 button. A nice group, shall I say. I was so worried that we would not be able to get the rangefinder to work correctly with the wave shield and what do you know; not only do we get the rangefinder to work, but also the photocell to accompany the button. I love how we have progressed so much in this project since the beginning.

So here's what we needed to make all our messages not be interrupted and also play at random. There's a total of 7 messages per group, 4 groups in total. Carlota & Elexis, Kacee & Hayley, Chris & Katie, and Miriam & Elexis.

For the rangefinder, we basically had to comment out all of the conversion lines of code and the serial lines of code that print what inch is detected. Instead, we just used the pwmRange measurement, which is quite different and higher than inches and centimeters. Next we added a variable i and set it to random(7), which is saying play our 7 messages on the wave shield in a random order. I totally forgot about the random function and its use. I remembered using it back in my Processing days. Basically, if the pwmRange is less than 12,000, for every trip play a random wav. 

Final Project Critique

Reflections:

We were really excited when the wind sensor was working properly and just a puff would trip the relay box to then turn the light on. We learned that the wind sensor varies in every location so at the apartment when the air kicked on, the relay box would kick even when no one was blowing on it. We had to take that into consideration when figuring out the correct threshold. We also learned that making our own candle is a pain in the butt. We're boycotting candles and wax for a good while. In critique they're were some suggestions that we would like to move forth with. One was using a real candle and a real flame instead of the LED. We would love to experiment with that for the future maybe for even our senior project. Another was that the LED was red. Very true perhaps a yellow or even white LED would have been better. Lastly was with the presentation. Although this apparatus had wires and batteries coming from each way, concealing everything would have been better for presentation (although we tried with black electrical tape). A table cloth could have done the trick or drilling holes through the side table could have done it as well. These are all things we will take into consideration if we decide to move forward with this project. It was really exciting getting it to actually work and convert to AC power. We're both really excited about how much we've learned through this course. 

Final Project

so we finished the candle after it cracking about a million times...

after finishing the candle we went to the crit space to install and plug in everything for a final test run and thankfully all was well and working