Monthly Archive for October, 2008
The idea behind this is very simple. The mirror will not be a real mirror, but either an LCD monitor or a back projection with a tiny concealed camera mounted on top of it. I would put a frame around it, and maybe add a piece of plexiglass in front of the screen to make it look like a mirror.
 
 
When a person passes in front of the camera, a vector field will be generated based on his/her motion, which will then be used to warp the image in the mirror. When the application starts, the image will be Louie freaking out inside the mirror, but as people pass in front of it, what the camera sees will gradually replace him on screen.
A mockup built in response to Santiago Calatrava’s proposed 80 South Street project.
Continue reading ‘Dear Mr. Calatrava, In Light of the Recent Real Estate Crisis’
There once was a man named Louie who lived in Cobble Hill and worked at the ticket booth of the New York Transit Museum. He seemed like an ordinary Joe Six-Pack, but he was actually one of the most neurotic people out there. Louie always worried about people talking about him behind his back, and this would unfortunately lead to very embarrassing situations causing people to talk about him behind his back. For example, he would often sneak up on people quietly whispering to each other at the museum and try to spy on their conversations. Louie was obviously not trained in stealth operations and would always be discovered, at which point he would panic and scream obscenities at the museum’s patrons before running away and hiding under the desk of his ticket booth.
Continue reading ‘Louie’s Soul-Sucking Mirror’
I’m a little last minute on this one, but if you happen to be in Sweden this weekend, you can check out Prisoner John Strikes Back and Prisoner John 3: Back and Pissed! at the Uppsala International Short Film Festival. They’ll be part of the Brick Film Fest compilation playing on October 24 and 25.
We finished working on the Tapper gloves, and although there is still aesthetic work to be done, this version is complete functionality-wise.
Tapper now outputs a MIDI signal instead of the custom protocol we were previously using. This means that it won’t work anymore with the Processing sequencer we had built, but that it works with most audio production apps available, such as Live, GarageBand, or Reason. Tapper sends a NOTE ON signal when an FSR is pressed, an AFTERTOUCH as long as the FSR is still pressed, and a NOTE OFF when the FSR is released. This makes the response much more natural as we don’t get repeated notes when the FSR remains pressed and we can change the velocity of a note by pressing harder or softer.
Ari and I advanced our work from phase 1 to phase 2 of the Tapper gloves by conquering the aspect of the project that proved to be our most serious roadblock: actually integrating the technology into the apparel. No, it wasn’t the programming or the circuitry that threw us for a loop… it was dealing with unwieldy polyester and subpar sewing skills.
After consulting with our trusty sewing consultant Sara, we decided on completely avoiding any sewing whatsoever and instead opting for finger condoms, a.k.a. massacred rubber gloves. The flexibility of the rubber proved a perfect tactic for keeping the sensors closely affixed to the fingers and therefore giving us the most accurate readings.
In many respects, the tactile elements of the project are complete as the gloves work largely as advertised. With this part of the project near completion, Ari and I will be focusing on how to refine control over the interface so that the gloves work as expected.
The Processing component has come a long way in the last week. I programmed the integrated samples for the gloves using the minim sound library, giving us a foundation for eventual behavior of the gloves. However, we still have to calibrate the sensors in order to make sure the samples respond as desired.
Explanations are nice, but ultimately it is a live-working prototype that really speaks for itself. Check out the video below:
I saw a very interesting example of successful interaction design at Battery Park over the weekend. There is a spot on the ground where 9 metal tiles are arranged in a 3×3 pattern. When you step on any of them, they make a sound, and each one has a different tone.
For the 30 minutes that I was sitting there, the same scenario kept re-occurring. A couple of people would walk by, someone would try it out, they would stop and play with it, more people would stop and try it, and in a matter of minutes a bunch of strangers would crowd around the piece, jumping around and talking to each other.
I think this is the best possible interaction scenario that my work could have. It should be instantly recognizable, easy and fun to use, and bring people of all ages together. This is a very difficult thing to achieve, but I think simplicity is a major player and an important factor to remember when designing objects for others to play with.
I did not have an accelerometer for the Multiple Serial Output lab, so I used two potentiometers instead. The result reminded me of an Etch-A-Sketch. I wanted to push this idea further so I built an interface that is exactly the same as an Etch-A-Sketch, but which draws a digital picture on screen.
The left and right knobs control the horizontal and vertical position of the cursor respectively. If you shake the controller, the image gradually fades away.
For all the Montrealers out there, my movie Dick Johnson: No Strings Attached is playing at Spasm on October 25. It’s part of Trailer, a compilation of fake movie trailers. Go see it!
