I´m born into a house with no computer

I started thinking how can we represent sound as space. My first idea was how could we represent speech as sound but when making some research I found some works that were based in this idea, like this work, Watashi-chan

When we think about visualizing sound today in the digital realm, the first think that came to my mind was the soundwave that, for who work with sound, is very familiar.

I started thinking about sound as space and space as a timeline. In the digital representation of sound, when there is no sound we only see a black thin line that has no sound but time representation. Then that line starts to change according with the sound that that track of music contains and each track have different soundwaves.

I wanted to combine this week theme - space - with the theme for the next class - interactivity. I think that both themes could complement each other and I could develop a solid work. (i think it went to the opposite way but ideas and concepts are still valid for development one day)

So my idea for this week assignment was to create a space that could represent a timeline, a very thin corridor that contains no sound. When the visitor enters the corridor, walking through it he could manipulate that space in order to create sound with his body. The idea is that the visitor function as the playhead of the sound file, walking forward and backward and manipulating the sound file. Another idea that I liked it but it was far more complicated was the idea that using a flexible corridor that could be manipulated by the user and this way as we has walking through the corridor and moving his arms he could draw his own soundwave.

I made a small prototype of the corridor ( no picts) and made some tests in Isadora, trying to simulate how could the visitor manipulates the sound. I enjoyed the experience and the tests, because It made me realize that in order to listen to the sound file with the correct rhythm, the visitor must walk with the a constant "speed" or he could choose only to have fun with manipulating the sound going back and foward.

I has very interesting in trying to develop the second idea, where is the user that creates the sound when walking and manipulating the corridor with the arms ( more open or less open). I had the scheme of the installation prepared, using lights and cameras to track the distance and position of the arms in the corridor but to make the manipulaion of the sound it was very hard and I had to learn MaxMsp to do that and it was impossible to do it in 2 weeks.

Maybe I will have the opportunity to develop this idea in the future.

For the missing assignment, my idea is more conceptual that pratical and again, the themes of space and interactivity are combined.

Portuguese people have a special characteristic, very human indeed but for me very peculiar - we love to complain. We complain about everything that happens with us but we don´t do anything to change. I know that this is a commum characteristic of people but as a Portuguese I think that we exceed a little bit. Maybe living in New York gave me more awareness of this fact and also because I don´t see that happen so much here. People are more relaxed or at least they don´t expose so much their complains to the outside. That it´s also another question that remains but in the end I think that there is different cultural aways to approach and view the world.

But, going back to the assignment, my idea is to design a Complaint bag that listen to all your complains. This way, we can put everything out from inside without having to through that negative energy into someone else. The bag becames a friend that listen to all your complains, a shoulder where you can relieve everything.
As we are talking with the bag, complaining, complaning she starts to change it´s shape ( inflate), like trunks of a tree. When we stop complaining, after a while she go back to it´s normal shape. If you complain to much the trunks started to grow and roll over your body making you prisoner of your own complains.
The Complaint Bag wants to give you awareness that complaining so much about the world, people, normal life only affect yourself and that you have to get ride of it or if not you get trapped.

It´s funny because this idea is inside me for a long time, maybe influenced by the ScreamBody, a work by Kelly Dobson and also because I suffer from complaint as a typical portuguese girl.

The idea is to create a bag that could be inflated and that have different holes, from here the trunks start to grow, as we are complaining. The bag have a microphone.(listening to our voice) and in each hole there is a fan that is activated according with the duration of the complain.

I need to make some drawings in order to turn the idea more clear and also to try to make a prototype to study how can the trunks grow in order to roll around the body.
But I love the idea and the concept because is very related to here I came from.

For this week assignment, Kyveli and I decided to play color pencils shavings. We wanted to play with the delicate aspect of the shavings and see what we could do with them.

We made some experiments mixing the shavings with different kinds of glue to create a flexible transparent surface/material. We could use them to make bracelets or if we had larger surfaces we could a bag or something else. We liked the effect of this surface when exposed to light.

We started thinking about the delicate aspect of the shavings and how we could transform this fragile material into a rigid material, trying to change it's appearance and maintaining the beauty of it.

We started by overlapping layers of shavings with glue to get the desire effect of rigidness and playing with the color of it. The result took a form of a pin/brush.

During the process we took some picture to document this assignment and I really like it since the aesthetics and colors of the shavings were really beautiful

This week I decide to create a prototype of a project that I though doing it as a gift to my mother. In one of the first softness class, Alex presented a concept for a project that explored the idea of an object that could transmit presence over distance for people that are separated or live in different parts of the world. It was nice to have the discussion on the class about this kind of artifacts that can communicate over distance some kind of presence . I liked the idea. Is very hard to have relationships over distance
and sometimes you just want to be there but you can. It is also true, as Despina pointed out, that this kind of objects try to substitute something that is not possible to happen and that normally is an object that at the beginning can be funny or playful but it's lifespan ( find a better way to explain this) is very short - like a toy.

For the assignment of this week I decided to explore this topic. I use Skype to talk with my mother and normally we talk every other day but since I started school it's very hard to find time to talk with her and when I have some time I call. Sometimes she doesn't ear the call and miss it and even if Skype has an option that allows you to see who called and all the missed calls, my mother never see that and thinks that I never call her.
So my idea was to create an object that could create some idea of presence to my mother at the same time trying to solve that problem of the missed calls.
Since she is always asking me for a portrait (with a recent picture) I decided to create a portrait that lights up every time I call through skype and if my mother miss the call, he portrait keeps light up, dimming over time, giving some awareness of the passage of time and allowing my mother to know if I called and how long did I called.

I started by building the circuit with led's and programming it in Arduino.

When this part was done, it was time to start by building the prototype. I printed a picture in a clear paper ( to give the light box effect) and I started building the prototype in cardboard.

With the structure was completed was time to take the circuit out of the breadboard and put it into the structure. It was the first time I did this and I was happy because it worked at the first time.

With the circuit done, now I think I have to think how to:
- build the structure in other material and in a way that it can be easy to change the picture and to change the batteries
- create a program that can access the Skype ( using an API) and track the missed calls

I am very happy with the result of this project and how in a short period of time I has able to build the prototype and having it working and also, doing something for my mother.

For the last assignment of the Softness of Things, under the theme of Transformation, I presented the project i have been developing for the Physical Computing class.

The idea of the project is to create a device that enriches the experience of visiting a museum at the same time that allows social interactions by connecting visitors with similar experiences.
When visiting a museum our emotions are constantly changing. We like some artworks that we see, we don’t like others and our body responds differently according to the stimulus received/given from an artwork.
What if we could map the emotional responses of our body in relation with what we are experiencing? Later on we can have access to that information and visualize how our emotions changed during the visit to the museum and see, for example, how our body reacted to a specific artwork that we really liked.
What if, having a device that captures our emotions and maps them, we could create a way of linking people that share similar experiences? By being linked (visually) both visitors have something in common and that could be a good starting point for a good conversation.

Now I'm just developing the first part of the project, where the device saves your emotional response when visiting a museum and allows you to see the visualization of your emotional response, transforming the values of the GSR into a visual representation.

Representation in real time - simulates what can happen. This part of the program in not visible to the visitor. Is the part of the program that is receiving the data from the GSR and the data ( event based) when an artwork is tagged.

The aesthetics of visualization are not completed and I was experimenting a more organic organization of the viz, since we were visualizing the emotional response of
the body. This is an example of that viz where the size of the circles represented the value of the response.

This is the result visualization through time where we can see the graph of our emotional response an when we were "supposedly" seeing a specific artwork. Also allows to see the graph of others visitors.

Another important step of this project was the design and building of the device. I used neoprene as a material because I needed something resistance and elastic. Here is some pictures of the process:

Please see the project website for more information.
(since is not update it please download Posted by qwertyfun on December 13, 2007 10:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)