April 09, 2008
March 07, 2008
Week 6 and 7
The past two weeks we had midterm presentations. I felt that my presentation went well. I got some great feedback that I plan to incorporate into my final project. Here are some notes:
- I asked our critics, how I could get the word out to teachers about my blog. Marianne suggested Cited.org
- Don't make the blog a standalone feature....network it with existing sites that teachers use...Marianne suggested I check out ERIC (the educational resource information clearinghouse), askeric.org and thegateway.org
-More images in my slides would bring the presentation to life
-Showing footage of the claymation (other than my students work) would be exciting, it would emphasize how fun claymation really is. Some suggestions were: Mr. Bill and David and Goliath
-Incorporate a clay figure on my powerpoint template
-Stress that the site is for teachers!
-The graph I used did not display well on the projector, the graph needed a solid white background
-Talk to teachers and see what they like
-Check out Frederator, the animation site
-I also asked the critics which CMS to use. I was considering learning PHP, but all critics agreed that WordPress was the way to go.
-Keynote is the new black! I really liked everyone's presentations that used it. Mike Dory's was great!
-I liked slides that had key words in different colors.
This week I tried to get a lot done. I downloaded WordPress.org and setup my database. I also managed to find a child host that I can video demonstrating the claymation process with. Thanks to Neilson!!!
Recently I found myself going in a little bit of a different direction. After presenting, and hearing feedback that I should incorporate more claymation into my project, I realized that my project has so far been all about claymation, but not actually doing any. So, I think it would benefit my project, and also get me more interested in thesis, if I create another film. Since I am creating tutorials on how to film a movie, while I am at it, I will actually make one. I plan to make a quirky teacher armature, that will introduce the project to kids, and hopefully get them excited about doing it!
Tonight I drew sketches of an armature teacher, and did a rough, rough storyboard. I also make a quick prototype of the teacher's head, made out of sculpey. My idea is that the teacher will have a huge bun, and will pull random things (like a scroll of paper, a light bulb, a cupcake, etc. ) out of her hair/head as she is talking. The teacher goes on to explain that anything can happen in clay...and her apple turns into a cardinal, that then flies away. I did a quick flash movie as a reference.
February 20, 2008
Week 4
Week four we handed in our Concept Project Description paper. We then had our individual meeting with Kathy to go over our project as a whole. Here are some of my notes:
-My blog could function as building blocks, there are two "levels": How Tos and Project examples
-There are areas other than academic that will be beneficial - children learn to work in teams, tell a story
-Another project example (ie another country) could help the blog
February 10, 2008
Week 3
We received our personal statement and abstract papers back. Kathy is wonderful, and made comments on our papers that I felt were particularly helpful.
-Many schools today have eliminated the Arts
-I may want to look up:
Progressive Education
Discovery based learning
John Dewey
Learn by Doing and John Dewey - For Dewey, it was vitally important that education should not be the teaching of mere dead fact, but that the skills and knowledge which students learned be integrated fully into their lives as persons, citizens and human beings. This practical element—learning by doing—sprang from his subscription to the philosophical school of Pragmatism.
Jerome Bruner - "To perceive is to categorize, to conceptualize is to categorize, to learn is to form categories, to make decisions is to categorize." Bruner maintains people interpret the world in terms of its similarities and differences. (*I found in my research that Mr. Bruner is a current researcher at NYU's Law School, which could be a potential resource, although I have not reached out to him yet.) More Details on Jerome Bruner
Constructivist Learning
Project Based Learning In Gifted Classrooms
Interdisciplinary
Also Kathy mentioned it would be a good idea to find out units that are relevant across the US -for example, many fifth graders study an ancient culture like Egypt or the Maya.
The other night after class I was pretty stressed about learning PHP in the next few weeks, and I started talking to a friend at school about the "website" I wanted to build. After I explained all of the key features (a forum, file sharing, open source, members, etc.) he asked me how this website was different from a blog :) And it was then and there that I decided I am manipulating either WordPress or TextPattern for my project. I do not need to basically code a blog from scratch to get my point across.
Today I bought the Head First HTML book, to help with my blog.
February 01, 2008
Week 2
This week we handed in our assignments, which included a one page abstract document, and a one page personal statement. We also presented our basic idea (our elevator pitch) and two forms of inspiration. Mine were Wallace and Gromit and a claymation project that I worked on previously.
I received some great feedback. One of the questions that I posed to the group was if they felt I needed to build a dynamic web based tool in order to get my ideas across and to make it the most beneficial to teachers? Kathy expressed that it would be nice for me to do (which I agree with) if its something that I can pick up in a few weeks. Some others expressed that if my material continues to be as rich as the claymation project that I previously did, than having a a dynamic website it not necessary. I also talked to Marianne Petit about this, and she mentioned the option of using either WordPress or TextPattern. I plan to attend her March 3rd class on this, to get a better understanding of what is out there. In the meantime, I am going to request a database on ITP's server from Nancy Lewis.
Some other great ideas and feedback I received from group:
-Investigate Progressive or Project based teaching, this is done at some schools in the area like Dalton and Little Red
-Consider doing video blogs on Blip, on how to make a claymation movie
-Have a child host the video blogs with me, to demonstrate that children have the aptitude to perform the project work
-Look at Charles Song's dynamic web site, all the research is there
-Scott sent me this great link for Vision Education and Media
December 12, 2007
Dust or Magic - by Bob Hughes
As I was reading Dust or Magic, I underlined the following bits that I found interesting:
-Creativity has become the new methodism - an ideology that perverts workers into embracing their own humiliation.
-Scheiderman (Ben Shneiderman, author of Leonardo's Laptop) does not seem aware that a huge portion of the world's population has never made a phone call, let alone use a computer or that the technology that he describes depends on the poverty wages and environmental squalor he'd never tolerate himself.
-In the US economy, an average of $3,000 in hardware, software and related services is spent per citizen.
-The broad-brush definition of "a medium" is: anything that you can use to give somebody else an experience of some kind, in your absence.
-The urge to make something beautiful, impressive or just pretty is so ingrained that the 1930s Modernist idea of making things 'purely functional' came as a shock.
-Technology (graphics, animations, java applets) can sometimes: impair the job's effectiveness (long download time), become the tail that wags the dog (assets are sometimes not dumped because of the amount of money put into them, even though they are not effective) and considered as a tool (a computer's empowerment is surreptitiously selective, it doesn't actually make everything easy).
November 29, 2007
Kerpoof
This week's assignment was to evaluate the Kerpoof site. Here are my general findings:
I am operating under the assumption that this site is geared towards preoperational kids (approx. 3-8 years old), so I decided to dive right in and not look at the instructions. Because what five year old has time for instructions!?!
Make a Picture – Easy to understand, wide selection of tools. All-around fun! At one point I placed an image behind one of the objects in the background. I am still not sure how I managed that, but it is a great option to have.
Make a Story – Fun to use, the animated clips are a nice touch. However, I am not sure if I am missing something…should the animated clips actually move anywhere? Or should all images be static like a classic storybook? If so, I am not sure I truly understand the point in making some images animated.
Make a Movie – I could not understand how to use this potion of the site at all. That being said, this could have a lot to do with my knowledge of Flash. I went into this project assuming that the movie “timeline” should operate as Flash does. It does not. And I am totally confused. However, I do like the basic idea of providing children with a movie making, Flash-like capabilities.
Suggestions:
-Tool tips would be nice to have for the action buttons. For instance, it would be nice to place your mouse over the dynamite button to read that it will delete, before you click on it and potentially loose your work that you wanted to keep.
-At one point I received this error: “TypeError: Error #1009: Cannot access a property or method of a null object reference.
at kerpoof.studio::clear_tool/start()
at kerpoof.studio::clear_tool/handle_drop()
at kerpoof.display::ksprite_ui_manager/::handle_drop()TypeError:
I am not sure exactly what I did to generate this error, but I believe I was trying to drag the dynamite icon onto a story.
-Allow users to utilize all of the icons/movie clips for all scenes. There are so many fun images it is a shame to limit the user and only allow them to be used in certain places.
November 12, 2007
Final Project Idea - Magna Beads
A few weeks ago in class, our assignment was to form a "corporation" with a classmate, and start thinking about unique children's media of any kind. I of course teamed up with Meredith Silverman, and we got right to work. Mer had the immediate, brilliant idea to create magnetic jewelery. Here is our pitch!
Our first step was to order magnets, and see if they had enough force to stay around our neck or wrist. They did.
Our next step was to head to the craft store and see what type of clay we would wrap around the magnets. We needed to find air-dry clay, because if we used baking clay, then the baking process would de-magnetize the magnets.
For our first trial run, we used air-dry, pottery clay.
However, the clay was dry and brittle, and did not pass our "Drop Test," which was basically us standing on the stairwell by the workshop, and dropping the beads on the cement floor.
We headed back to Pearl Paint, and got paper based, air dry clay. This time around came out looking much better.
We didn't even need to perform the "Drop Test" since we accidentally dropped the necklace on the ground. Half of the beads went on the floor (without cracking!) and the other half stuff to the bars on a chair (darn magnets!)
November 10, 2007
Final, Final Project Idea
Technology does not have to only encompass ones and zeros, it can create an emotive context that engages and connects others. “Blowing Kisses” will do exactly that. We are taking a humanistic approach to sending a loved one a virtual kiss. Instead of sending a simple email or a text message, the user will have to actually exert physical energy to send a “kiss” to the receiver. And just like real kisses, the enjoyment of the act will depend on the level of effort set forth. Here is how it will work…
Two people will have “flowers.” The flowers will be a pinwheel-like structure, with tri-colored LEDs in the center. When one person wants to send the other a kiss, they will have to blow on the pinwheel (as hard or as light as they wish.) The intensity of the kiss will depend on how fast or slow the pinwheel moves. For instance, if the pinwheel only moves a little, the corresponding color will be a friendly yellow. If the pinwheel moves a little faster, the color will be pink. And if a lot of energy is exerted and the pinwheel moves quickly, the color will be red hot!
The flower that is receiving the kiss will pulse, in a similar fashion to the sleep mode LED on a Macbook. The pulse will be continuous until the receiver decides to reciprocate the kiss.
Just like in relationships, there will be no telling how well your kiss was received. The sender may think that they tried their best to send a kiss, but in actuality they were only able to muster up the energy required for a pale pink color. These types of misunderstandings happen in real life and are often serious topics of discussion. “Blowing Kisses” may invoke the conversation:
“Why did you only send a yellow kiss?”
“I am sorry, I will try harder next time.”
And we are totally OK with that.
Here is our proposed schematic:
November 08, 2007
Final Project Ideas- Continued
After feeling a little defeated, since we could not quite figure out how to network wireless video without hacking into an existing piece of equipment, we decided to start again from scratch.
We brainstormed in the conference room and wrote down anything that came to mind from trampolines to showing expressions...
From there...we finally came up with our final project idea!! Blowing Virtual Kisses!
November 05, 2007
Final Project Ideas-Working with Allistar
I met up with Rosie over the weekend, and we both decided that we need some time off from the Mouth Piano. So I was in the market for a Networked Objects final project...and I ran into Allistar (who also was rethinking his initial final project). We had worked together earlier in the year, on the Thermometer Project, and I knew that we would come up with something pretty great. So, we decided to team up and do our final project together.
The first thing we did to brainstorm was compile a list of words that were of interest to us. We had:
Laughing, Wearable, Sound, Video, Touch
Our initial area of interest was Laughing. And we started to formulate an idea that we call The Laugh Box. The Laugh Box would be a box with an LCD screen inside, and wireless video. The screen would display live video that is capturing from the another Laugh Box, and vice versa. In summary, we wanted people to interaction and laugh from different rooms. But our big question was: What makes people laugh? So on Wednesday night we set out on a field study, and started to ask strangers, Tisch students and ITP students what makes them laugh.
*Footage to follow soon*
November 02, 2007
Midterm Project
Our midterm assignment was to redo any previous project, without using technology and with the influence of artists that we covered in class. I chose to redo my 18" X 14" vase The Babysitter. To create The Babysitter, there were many technical components: a pottery wheel, a blowtorch and a kiln. To build something close to this scale was definitely tough, but I managed to do so with about $15 of macaroni.
Here is the original, The Babysitter
Here is the start of the macaroni process. I used the "Found Object" influence of DuChamp, and bought a light fixture holder from Home Depot. The lined ridges provided support for my macaroni foundation.
Once I saw how light could shine through the macaroni, I immediately wanted to create my won rendition of Lászlo Moholy-Nagy's Light-Space Modulator.
To make even more of a contrast between light and dark, I spray painted The New Babysitter, brown.
I enjoyed the glazed finish that the brown paint gave the piece. It made me think about perceptions, and how those perceptions change based upon your proximity to the piece. Kara Walker's pieces exquisitely take on this idea.
The Final Project!
October 22, 2007
The Wireless, Networked Mouth Piano - Final Project Idea
My final project idea is to take the original Mouthpiano, and convert it to a wireless, networked head-gear type device.
Here is the documentation for our original project. (Ms. Rosie Daniel is my partner)
Here is the demo of the MP debut in class
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October 18, 2007
Into the MInds of Babes Ch. 10-12
"is Interactive Media Worthwhile - or at Lease Better Than TV?"
Chapter ten was insightful, but I think it all comes down to the common sense that you use when dieting: monitor (how much you eat/how much screen time you have), evaluate (are you eating healthy foods/are these good programs) and participate (do some physical exercise with a buddy/have a parent intervene or follow-up when appropriate.)
Here are some facts that I found intriguing:
-Warren Buckleitner is quoted several times throughout the chapter for his work with the "Children's Technology Review"
-"If you've got an under 2 1/2 year old, get a cat" -Warren (I could not agree more by the way, although I would pick a dog)
-Children can have a hard time understanding cause and effect, particularly if the response is not immediate and if the effect is not in a close proximity
-Game Designers will use "Click Attach" instead of "Click and Drag" for young users
-Research is just beginning on whether interactive media is showing positive, long term effects
-The benefits or drawbacks of interactive media rely on: CONTEXT, CONTENT and the INDIVIDUAL CHILD
-When children are constantly clicking around on a screen, a narrative that once existed may be interrupted
-Interactive programming is not always better than straight video, it depends on the DESIGN
-A problem with interactive media is that it is usually programmed to guide a child down a particular path, which does not allow them to explore and let loose
-Research has found (by our very own professor) that the more control you give a child, the more they respond
-"Alone time" has been shown to have positive effects in regard to ebooks. (Parents are not saying "click here" or "don't click there.")
-Vygotsky believed that children learn best in their "zone of proximal development." Where children have nearly mastered one skill ad are within stretching distance of something a little more advanced.
-"Proximal development" is used in the development of interactive media. Bill Shribman creates games with "self-leveling" which allows the game to calibrate the level based on the number of correct answers.
-Lisa Guernsey's resolutions on interactive media:
~never touch websites that are laden with advertisements
~select games that sense abilities and challenge
~avoid "inconsiderate hotspots" (which are bells and whistles that do nothing to promote a level of understanding
~give kids the mouse to steer
~being on the computer must jibe with her attempts to provide them with a healthy, fulfilling day
Into the MInds of Babes Ch. 6-9
I found a ton of interesting bits of info, that I think would be really valuable to know while creating interactive media for children.
-The Noggin is emulating it programming after a well-run pre-school. (Shows are created with specific learning-based goals in mind, there is an animated host (Moose) that is very much like a teacher, etc.)
-Successful pre-school shows should: be linear, be repetitive, be easy to follow, refrain from excessive cuts between scenes and be slow and steady.
-At 2 1/2 years old a child can understand a storyline: beg., middle and end.
-Children 2 1/2 and younger (0r possibly older) can experience Video Deficit - a term used to explain how video demonstration is simply lost in translation, versus a live-demo
-Under the right conditions, research has shown that 2 year olds can take information offered on the screen and apply it to the world around them
-For participatory media, "The Pause" is used, which allows time for children to respond to a question. The pause is somewhere between 2 and 3 seconds.
-Amy B. Jordon, a senior researcher at the Annenberg School for Communication, says "To be truly educational, you have to have a very narrow audience."
-Sesame was once criticized for being "too frenetic." So Sesame changed its programming layout and started: routine formats, participatory games and full, uninterrupted story lines at beg. of shows.
-Sesame is targets for 2-4 year olds
-Capacity Model - a theory that states to keep things simply stated, so kids can process the material
-When shows are evaluated, Yale psychologists evaluate under the following developmental criteria: cognitive, emotional, social, physical, music and cultural awareness.
-Person to person contact could be the most important thing when learning a language
-Kids will not understand that saying please and thank you is a way of showing respect, until the ages of 4 or 5.
-Having play time can help make a difference in helping a child act pro-socially
-Make believe world is where a child can privately practice how to be a good person
-Experts point to these shows for positive impact on social behavior: Mister Rogers, Sesame Street, Barney and Dragon Tales
-Research has concluded that watching aggressive programming can lead to aggressive behavior. (ie watching Superman and Batman)
-Psychologists have concluded that the best way to ensure children learn good lessons from a tv program, is to follow up with related activities and conversations.
-Its seems that children benefit most from a proper mix of appropriate screen time and imaginative play
October 11, 2007
Into the MInds of Babes Ch. 5
Chapter Five discusses the question: can scary media have a negative emotional affect on children?
Before I get into my personal experiences/views, I'd like to point out a few things that I found particularly interesting in this chapter:
-Without logic and without abstract thinking required to understand the themes of love, history, religion, hatred, betrayal, revenge and forgiveness, children take away far different ideas from media then adults do.
-In a study, children as old as 11 and 12 had difficult distinguishing between what is real and what is "unreal." Some children at this age categorize dinosaurs, knights and Indians as fake.
-Children probably cannot understand that an event on tv or in a book might not occur in real life, until after Age 4.
-David Foulkes believes that children begin to dream between the ages of 7 - 9.
-Emotional Contagion - a term used to describe how one person's emotion state can influence another's
After reading this chapter, I tried to think back to a movie, or book that had a negative affect on me. I remember when I was little, a movie was on, it was on HBO (and I knew I was not suppose to watch this channel) and I decided to watch it anyway. I cannot remember details, I cannot even remember how old I was, but I do remember the movie had something to do with throwing spaghetti noodles, onto a man that was in the bathtub. For some reason this image stuck with me, and I remember not wanting to eat pasta for quite awhile and being sick every time I thought of it. The fact that something has harmless as cooked noodles, had a negative affect on me, makes me question how ok it is to have adult material on the tv at all, in the presence of a child. I am not sure where you draw the line at "adult material," the news is definitely adult material, but I know that there has to be some sort of discretion on what a child can watch.
However, I remember that my parents rented Ghostbusters for one of my birthday parties. It was one of my favorite movies. I am not sure how old I was, but I am guessing I was 6 or 7 since, judging from when the movie came out. Anyway, one of my friends started hysterically crying and was completely terrified of the movie. Needless to say, i think my parents received a disgruntled phone call from her family. I looked up the rating and its PG, which means that parental guidance is suggested. So I guess this movie may or may not have been appropriate to show. But I think it is important to mention that no one else had the slightest bit of a negative reaction - and this was a pretty big party. Also, I think its important to mention that this is the same girl whose mother would put tape over her records to prevent her daughter from hearing any "bad" parts of stories. Yes, I think it is safe to assume that this girl has never heard the ending of "The Big, Bad Wolf." The point I am making, is that maybe too much discretion can be just as bad. This poor girl simply could not handle anything "imaginary" that was not related to candyland and unicorns. I think a part of development is seeing "non-pleasant, imaginary" things. (On a very small scale, of course.) I think seeing these things help children later, when dealing with real-life, unpleasant situations.
Having Fun with Xports
Kyveli, Andy, Allistar and I met to get our Xports up and running. We had a few hiccups, but eventually got our Xport talking via Terminal and Zterm.
Here are some shots of our setup. (Please disregard the whole top half of the breadboard. It's for another project, and I highly recommend Not doing this, and using a clean board.)
Next step was to get our Pong Game working. We first had to the change the arduino code (which utilized an analog accelerometer) to read two digital switches. Then we had to update the code with the server's IP address that is used in our classroom. Here's our code:
// Defines for the Lantronix device's status (used for staus variable):
#define disconnected 0
#define connected 1
#define connecting 2
// Defines for I/O pins:
#define connectButtonPin 2
#define rightLED 3
#define leftLED 4
#define connectionLED 5
#define connectButtonLED 6
#define deviceResetPin 7
// variables:
int inByte= -1; // incoming byte from serial RX
int status = disconnected; // Lantronix device's connection status
// variables for the sensors:
byte connectButton = 0; // state of the exit button
byte lastConnectButton = 0; // previous state of the exit button
/*
When the connect button is pressed, or the accelerometer
passes the left or right threshold, the client should send a message
to the server. The next two variables get filled with a value
when either of those conditions is met. Otherwise, these
variables are set to 0.
*/
byte paddleMessage = 0; // message sent to make a paddle move
byte connectMessage = 0; // message sent to connect or disconnect
void setup() {
// set the modes of the various I/O pins:
pinMode(connectButtonPin, INPUT);
pinMode(rightLED, OUTPUT);
pinMode(leftLED, OUTPUT);
pinMode(connectionLED, OUTPUT);
pinMode(connectButtonLED, OUTPUT);
pinMode(deviceResetPin, OUTPUT);
// start serial port, 9600 8-N-1:
Serial.begin(9600);
pinMode(8,INPUT);
pinMode(9,INPUT);
// reset the Lantronix device:
resetDevice();
// blink the exit button LED to signal that we're ready for action:
blink(3);
}
void loop() {
// read the inputs:
readSensors();
// set the indicator LEDS:
setLeds();
// check the state of the client and take appropriate action:
stateCheck();
}
void readSensors() {
// thresholds for the accelerometer values:
//int leftThreshold = 500;
//int rightThreshold = 420;
//int lt = LOW;
//int rt = LOW;
// read the X axis of the accelerometer:
//int x = analogRead(0);
int lt = digitalRead(8);
int rt = digitalRead(9);
// let the analog/digital converter settle:
delay(10);
//Serial.println(lt);
// if the accelerometer has passed either threshold,
// set paddleMessage to the appropriate message, so it can
// be sent by the main loop:
if (lt == HIGH) {
//if (x > leftThreshold) {
paddleMessage = 'l';
} else if (rt == HIGH) {
//} else if (x < rightThreshold) {
paddleMessage = 'r';
} else {
paddleMessage = 0;
}
// read the connectButton, look for a low-to-high change:
connectButton = digitalRead(connectButtonPin);
connectMessage = 0;
if (connectButton == HIGH ) {
if (connectButton != lastConnectButton) {
// turn on the exit button LED to let the user
// know that they hit the button:
digitalWrite(connectButtonLED, HIGH);
connectMessage = 'x';
}
}
// save the state of the exit button for next time you check:
lastConnectButton = connectButton;
}
void setLeds() {
// this should happen no matter what state the client is in,
// to give local feedback every time a sensor senses a change
// set the L and R LEDs if the sensor passes the appropriate threshold:
switch (paddleMessage) {
case 'l':
digitalWrite(leftLED, HIGH);
digitalWrite(rightLED, LOW);
break;
case 'r':
digitalWrite(rightLED, HIGH);
digitalWrite(leftLED, LOW);
break;
case 0:
digitalWrite(rightLED, LOW);
digitalWrite(leftLED, LOW);
}
// set the connect button LED based on the connectMessage:
if (connectMessage !=0) {
digitalWrite(connectButtonLED, HIGH);
}
else {
digitalWrite(connectButtonLED, LOW);
}
// set the connection LED based on the client's status:
if (status == connected) {
// turn on the connection LED:
digitalWrite(connectionLED, HIGH);
}
else {
// turn off the connection LED:
digitalWrite(connectionLED, LOW);
}
}
void stateCheck() {
// Everything in this method depends on the client's status:
switch (status) {
case connected:
// if you're connected, listen for serial in:
while (Serial.available() > 0) {
// if you get a 'D', it's from the Lantronix device,
// telling you that it lost the connection:
if (Serial.read() == 'D') {
status = disconnected;
}
}
// if there's a paddle message to send, send it:
if (paddleMessage != 0) {
Serial.print(paddleMessage);
// reset paddleMessage to 0 once you've sent the message:
paddleMessage = 0;
}
// if there's a connect message to send, send it:
if (connectMessage != 0) {
// if you're connected, disconnect:
Serial.print(connectMessage);
// reset connectMessage to 0 once you've sent the message:
connectMessage = 0;
}
break;
case disconnected:
// if there's a connect message, try to connect:
if (connectMessage !=0 ) {
deviceConnect();
// reset connectMessage to 0 once you've sent the message:
connectMessage = 0;
}
break;
// if you sent a connect message but haven't connected yet,
// keep trying:
case connecting:
// read the serial port:
if (Serial.available()) {
inByte = Serial.read();
// if you get a 'C' from the Lantronix device,
// then you're connected to the server:
if (inByte == 'C') {
status = connected;
}
else {
// if you got anything other than a C, try again:
deviceConnect();
}
}
break;
}
}
void deviceConnect() {
/*
send out the server address and
wait for a "C" byte to come back.
fill in your personal computer's numerical address below:
*/
//Serial.print("C172.29.6.200/8080\n\r"); this is MY ADDRESS
Serial.print("C128.122.151.208/8080\n\r"); //this is the SERVERs ADDRESS
status = connecting;
}
// Take the Lantronix device's reset pin low to reset it:
void resetDevice() {
digitalWrite(deviceResetPin, LOW);
delay(50);
digitalWrite(deviceResetPin, HIGH);
// pause to let Lantronix device boot up:
delay(2000);
}
// Blink the connect button LED:
void blink(int howManyTimes) {
for (int i=0; i< howManyTimes; i++) {
digitalWrite(connectButtonLED, HIGH);
delay(200);
digitalWrite(connectButtonLED, LOW);
delay(200);
}
}
And here is the setup:
After a trip to Ricky's, we found our idea for how to control the pong game: 2 pink, halloween cowgirl guns!
Then we took apart the guns, placed our ground and power wires inside them, and used wire mesh and aluminum foil to create a switch when the trigger is squeezed.
For the Processing part, we used the same code that was from Making Things Talk
Problems that we encountered:
Problem 1: When setting up the Xport with Zterm and terminal, we initially did not use a reset switch, and had one wire going to ground as our reset. We could not get our terminal program to go into setup mode and could not figure it out.
Solution 1: Don't be lazy, use a momentary switch when you need to.
Problem 2: We could not get our xport online by using an ethernet cable in the pcomp lab.
Solution 2: We had to use an ethernet cable in either our classroom or the in the labs.
Problem 3: We initially had my computer's IP address in the arduino code and were stumped when we could not connect to the server.
Solution 3: Use the server's IP address you are trying to network.
Problem 4: When we re-wrote the arduino code, we only had one "=" in an if statement.
Solution 4: Don't forget your pcomp rules, "==" is needed in an if statement.
Problem 5: Our connection to the server was going in and out/
Solution 5: We did not have a 10K resistor connected to out reset switch.
My Ethnography on Jean Piaget
A few weeks ago I went to the Mets - Phillies game with my boyfriend, a devout fan of the Phillies. Knowing that I had this project coming up, I decided to take my camera, in hopes of getting a few good shots of children at their various stages in the development process. (Hopefully without weirding anyone out.)
October 08, 2007
Everyware - Section Three
Section three cited some thought provoking insights, but also did not have provide as much evidence as I would like. (But I guess that is the point, and also the problem, of having each thought structured around a 2-4 page thesis.) I found one statement particularly interesting, but then later dismissed it, due to the quote not being referenced to an actual analyst. "One rather optimistic analyst sees the market for the "digital home" componentry alone growing to $1 trillion worldwide by the end of the decade.." Who is this analyst, and where is this prediction coming from?
But all cynicism aside, I do think that Greenfield made some compelling arguments. Most notably about the "periphery." Which is your ability to attune to something without attending to it explicitly, as in your peripheral vision. I do agree that the most compelling technologies are less intrusive and are informative without overburdening.
This made me about what I am attune to, and immediately made me think back to when I was apartment hunting this summer. I thought about how having a dishwasher, air conditioning and laundry facilities are not a staple for any building, in any city. Which made it slightly hard to grasp the notion that we are moving towards an era of the "digital home."
On a positive note, I was thrilled to read about a few projects that were mentioned in the book, the "Attention Fader" and "Live Wire." Attention Fader is a framed picture, that is actually digitized to subtly displace images, according to how active or inactive your email inbox is. Live Wire is a long string that looks like a noodle, and hangs from the ceiling. The string swings around, and its intensity depends on the level of ethernet traffic in the building.
I also enjoyed treading the thesis on surveillance. I took the class, Every Bit You Make, last term and have since then been thinking about how we are all being monitored in some fashion or another. The notion of using surveillance for access control for buying alcohol made me think of the idea of cash free bars. Bouncers could not longer be needed if:
-you could only buy drinks with your credit card
-the credit card was able to identify your age
-only one drink can be bought at a time (only you can buy your own drinks)
Of course I immediately thought of reasons why this would never work (underage liability being the main one) but the fact that a small piece of plastic could replace a person's job, even in a bar setting, I think is particularly interesting.
October 03, 2007
My Claymation Project Featured in NYU Today
September 27, 2007
Into the Minds of Babes by Lisa Guernsey Ch. 1-4
I found Into the Minds of Babies to be wonderfully enlightening. Not just for its content on how the television impacts children, but also because of its information on the stages of cognitive development. Some statements/definitions that I found particularly interesting are:
-90% of a child's brain is formed before age 5
-An hour of tv viewing among 0 - 2 year olds was linked to a 9 percent reduction in creative play during the week and an 11 percent reduction on the weekend.
-Attentional Inertia is the term used to describe that the longer children watch tv, the more they want to watch, regardless of the cuts.
-Teletubbies target audience begins at 9 months
-Repetition is a key ingredient for children's programming. Some things will be repeated up to 6 times in one show.
-Babies can hear before birth
-At 4 months babies can distinguish color
-At 6 months babies have the depth perception and visual acuity as an adult's
I was amazed by some of the research that was conducted. Especially the research that related to children of 18 months and their inability to distinguish between 2D and 3D objects. I was also amazed by the research done on ADHD and autism. However, my initial feeling on tv have remained the same. I think that tv is not necessarily a good or bad thing, and that is should be done in moderation. And by no means should it replace interaction between a parent and child.
September 23, 2007
Everyware - The Dawning Age of Ubiquitous Computing
Section One
Reading the first question was a quick read. I enjoyed the reflections that Greenfield shared, but did not take a real personal interest in it until I reached Thesis 04, page 25. And there is was, my intro to physical computing final, described as being an effortless utility. "....the cue embedded in your wallet or handbag that lets you know when one of your friends is within a hundred meters of your present position. Greenfield went on to say that there are also darker implications of this effortless utility, which honestly I had not thought about at the time that I worked on my project, "Friendship Bags." From this Thesis on, I could not stop reading. At first it was a book about what "others" are doing during a time of advanced, networked technology. And now it was about Me!
The next thesis went on to describe other possible effortless technologies, such as RFID chips that are inserted under ones skin, thus becoming a "smart card" for passing along your contact information. Now obviously this is an extreme, but I would wager that my "Friendship Bags" project seemed like an aggressive idea at one time too. The point of all of this? I think is best described at the end of Thesis 8. There are three main reasons that this book and its contents are value to us: Who will shape where the age of everyware is heading? How soon do we need to be thinking about it? Any finally, what can we do to improve the chance that as it appears, it does so in ways congenial to us?
September 20, 2007
Hasbro Power Tour Guitar - Dust or Magic?
There has been a lot of hype in the toy world, surrounding Hasbro's release of the Power Tour Guitar. It has even managed to make headlines on Engadget. But will it be Dust or Magic, is hard to say. I personally was excited about the toy when I saw it in class. However, I am definitely not the target market, which I believe is for a ten year old boy. My initial concern is that the child will become frustrated and discouraged when they receive feedback from the guitar that is not positive. (I am not sure if the guitar boos, but I do remember there is a negative reaction of some kind, if you do not play the tune correctly.) Also, the design is not child friendly. I know that it is modeled after the classic Gibson style, but I feel as though an "On" switch is really needed, especially given the demographic.
However, after all of that being said, I have to lean toward the magic end. I was just reading up on the product, and it allows you to play along with mp3 tracks, as well as create your own mp3 tracks! Now that we are moving towards a mac world, where creative software like Garageband is becoming a staple, and open-source learning is flourishing, creativity is flowing among children. They feel empowered and want the control to express themselves, whether its blogging or creating music, kids want to say how they feel. So, my final answer is: Magic!
The New Thermometer
Here is the link to our group blog
9/19/07
Check out this project, the Hug Shirt It is a wearable, bluetooth accessible shirt, that lets you “send hugs” to anyone else that has a Hug Shirt. There are sensors that read the warmth of the person (among other things) and that temperature is used in the calculation of what kind of hug is being sent. Just something to think about for how to connect people in our thermometer project.
9/22/07
People (including myself) are obsessed with the weather. There is even a Weather Museum ! My group and I met today, to discuss and share our thoughts and findings. We shared the basic notion that knowing the weather of where our loved ones are located, can help us feel connected: Are they outside today? Are they shoveling snow? Etc. We also talked about how knowing the weather forecast can be a form of maturity. Allistar has a friend that is a mother, and knowing the the weather conditions helps her dress her child and herself appropriately. Another topic we discussed was having preconceived notions about an area. When ChoRong went to visit San Francisco, she did not pack long sleeves or a jacket because she was operating under the impression that California is always warm. However, when she got there, she really was cold and had to have a friend bring her fall/winter clothes. (In this instance, checking the weather was not a high priority.) Ben's Mom checks the weather for natural disasters, and also because her husband travels a lot. My grandmother always checks the weather on the east coast, because she moved from the east coast to the west coast when I was little, and wants to reaffirm that she made the correct decision about moving. (The correct decision weather wise at least. ) I think a little part of her gets excited when I tell her that its freezing outside, while she is enjoying 70 degree weather. My sister checks the weather because she wants to know when to mow the lawn. (She lives in New Jersey, and if you've never been there before, grass grows amazingly fast.) Anyway, so she wants to see if there is rain in the forecast. And if so, she will plan around her yardwork duties.
September 19, 2007
First Press Screening
I am interning at National Geographic, in the Kids Entertainment Division. Currently I am working with the VP of Production on finding new animators for various shows that are ready to be picked up by networks.
Today I went to a press screening of Sea Monsters, the new NG IMAX flick. I was completely amazed and utterly immersed in the experience. Once I got over the initial feelings of awkwardness when your eyes are adjusting to 3D, my complete attention was diverted to the show. No email checking, no text messaging, no chatting, just me, my 3D glasses, the screen and of course all of the creatures that appeared so close that I could high-5 them!
So was this Dust or Magic, absolutely MAGIC! It was so magical that I found myself wishing that I had gone to school to study archaeology. My only comment on the film, is that children that are too young may find it scary.
September 15, 2007
The Phillies- Mets Game and Piaget
Today I went to the Phillies - Mets game....Go Phillies! Anyway, I brought my camera with me, in anticipation of seeing a lot children at the game, and hoping to get some shots for the upcoming ethnography project that is due.
Lucky for me, there were a lot of children at the game with their parents, and a lot of children were sitting in the neighboring rows of our seats. I was able to identify an example of each stage of Piaget's Cognitive Development.
Sensorimotor: A little boy (about 1 1/2 to 2 years old) sat in front of us. He illustrated true sensorimotor tendencies and had a toy car in this mouth almost the entire game. When he didn't have the car in his mouth, he was biting the metal bar divider between the seats.
Preoperational: A little girl sat close to us. I am guessing she was about five. A lot was going on in the baseball game, but she was more interested in playing a game that she had created. The game had something to do with dragging her feet across the floor. I could not completely see what she was doing, but she was totally immersed in the game.
Concrete-Operational: A few boys sat near us that were around 9 years old. It was at this age that the children actually seemed to be paying attention to the game. They were talking to their Dad's and pointing at the players (I am assuming asking questions or talking strategies) and they would cheer right away when the Mets had a good play. (I was definitely out-numbered in terms of which team I was quietly rooting for.)
Formal-Operational: The majority of people there were in this stage. (Most fans there were above the age of 17) The best example that I can give of unlimited, logical thought, is The Wave. Yes, that's right, the Wave. Adults were able to focus on the game, while paying attention to the wave, and planning for when it was their turn to stand up and put their hands in the air. A bunch of "slides" of thought at once!
I was able to take a short video of each of the scenarios I described above. I am still keeping my eyes open for more opportunities to get more material, but I think I will use these clips for my ethnography project.
September 14, 2007
Physical Computing Improv
Our first assignment is to chose one word from each of these three columns, and create a physical improv project.
Actions:
* squeezing
* stroking
* tapping
* shaking
* dancing
* caressing
* breathing
* pushing
Things:
* feathers
* cup
* monkey
* playground ball
* sneakers
* lentils
* pudding
Responses:
* color
* sound
* animation
* speech
* music
* kinetic movement
I was pretty stumped about what to do for awhile...and actually still kind of am....so Tuesday I decided to start off by familiarizing myself with physical computing. It's amazing how little you can remember about circuits once you have been away from it for awhile. Anyway, so I started off kind of big, and tried to re-do my ZIgBee radio - pcomp final project from last fall. After becoming frustrated, I back tracked ever further and redid some labs. Yes, I actually redid the Servo Motor and Analog labs. Haha. So today,(Friday) I felt confident that I could tackle wireless and actually was able to get it working. (**Rob Faludi, thanks again for all of your code, and your expertise with Zigbee!**)
So now I have my radios working, and I can actually hit a switch and have an LED light up on the other end.
Here is Rob's tutorial I used originally
Here is my original documentation
Here are my circuits.
Some Close Ups:
Basically one Zigbee is sending, and one is receiving.
The Sender works like this: When the sending Zigbee flips its digital switch (pin 12) off and on, it converts the 0 and 1 values to a readable ASCII value and sends it out the serial port.
The Receiver works like this: When the receiving Zigbee gets the ASCII value (in this case its a "T") then the Arduino turns on the LED that is connected to connected to pin 11.
****This code is lifted from Rob Faludi*****
****If you would like to use this code, absolutely feel free, but be sure to use a different PanID (Your personal area network) My is set to 9999 in this code. Once you have selected a PanID, Be sure check the Wiki, and make sure no one else is using it, and then add yours to the list so that your radios do not interfere with anyone elses.
Here is the Code!
Sender Code:
// a digital input is on port 12
int switchPin = 12;
// a status light is on port 13
int ledPin = 13;
// a byte to send out data:
char thisByte = 0;
void setup () {
// set pins to input and output appropriately
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
pinMode(switchPin, INPUT);
// start up the serial connection with 9600-8-n-1-true (non-inverted):
Serial.begin(9600);
// blink the status LED
blinkLED(ledPin, 3);
// for some reason it seems to help to send an arbitrary character first
//then pause for the guard time before requesting command mode
Serial.print("X");
delay(1100);
// put the XBee in command mode
Serial.print("+++");
delay(1100);
// wait for a response from the XBee for 2000 ms, or start
// over with setup if no valid response comes
if (returnedOK() == 'T') {
// if an OK was received then continue
}
else {
setup(); // otherwise go back and try setup again
}
// set the PAN (personal area network) ID number
// this example uses 0x3330, but you'll want to choose your own
// unique hexadecimal number between 0x0 and 0xFFFE
// (note the comma at the end of the command which indicates that another command will follow)
Serial.print("ATID9999,");
// set the Destination High to 0x0
// to select 16 bit addressing mode. These addresses can
// be assigned and changed by sending commands from a microcontroller
Serial.print("DH0,");
// set the Destination Low (16 bit address)
// this example uses 0x0 for send and 0x1 for receive but you'll
// want to choose your own hexadecimal numbers between 0x0 and 0xFFFE
Serial.print("DL1234,");
// exit command mode (note that we use Serial.printLN here to issue a linefeed that completes the command sequence)
Serial.println("CN");
// the preceeding commands can also be sent on a single line like this, using a single AT command with commas:
// Serial.println("ATID9999,DH0,DL5678,CN");
// the preceeding command line could also be sent as separate commands, by reissuing the AT command:
// Serial.println("ATID3330");
// Serial.println("ATDH0");
// Serial.println("ATDL1");
// Serial.println("ATCN");
// wait for a response from the XBee for 2000 ms, or start
// over with setup if no valid response comes
if (returnedOK() == 'T') {
// if an OK was received then continue
}
else {
setup(); // otherwise go back and try setup again
}
}
void loop () {
// read the switch:
thisByte = digitalRead(switchPin);
// convert it to a readable ASCII value, send it out the serial port:
Serial.print(thisByte, DEC);
}
void blinkLED(int targetPin, int numBlinks) {
// this function blinks the status LED light as many times as requested
for (int i=0; i
delay(250); // waits for a second
digitalWrite(targetPin, LOW); // sets the LED off
delay(250);
}
}
char returnedOK () {
// this function checks the response on the serial port to see if it was an "OK" or not
char incomingChar[3];
char okString[] = "OK";
char result = 'n';
int startTime = millis();
while (millis() - startTime < 2000 && result == 'n') { // use a timeout of 10 seconds
if (Serial.available() > 1) {
// read three incoming bytes which should be "O", "K", and a linefeed:
for (int i=0; i<3; i++) {
incomingChar[i] = Serial.read();
}
if ( strstr(incomingChar, okString) != NULL ) { // check to see if the respose is "OK"
// if (incomingChar[0] == 'O' && incomingChar[1] == 'K') { // check to see if the first two characters are "OK"
result = 'T'; // return T if "OK" was the response
}
else {
result = 'F'; // otherwise return F
}
}
}
return result;
}
Receiver Code:
// an output light is on port 11
int outputPin = 11;
// a status light is on port 13
int ledPin = 13;
// a byte to receive data:
char inByte = 0;
void setup () {
// set pins to input and output appropriately
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
pinMode(outputPin, OUTPUT);
// start up the serial connection with 9600-8-n-1-true (non-inverted):
Serial.begin(9600);
// blink the status LED
blinkLED(ledPin, 3);
// for some reason it seems to help to send an arbitrary character first
//then pause for the guard time before requesting command mode
Serial.print("X");
delay(1100);
// put the XBee in command mode
Serial.print("+++");
delay(1100);
// wait for a response from the XBee for 2000 ms, or start
// over with setup if no valid response comes
if (returnedOK() == 'T') {
// if an OK was received then continue
}
else {
setup(); // otherwise go back and try setup again
}
// set the PAN (personal area network) ID number
// this example uses 0x3330, but you'll want to choose your own
// unique hexadecimal number between 0x0 and 0xFFFE
// (note the comma at the end of the command which indicates that another command will follow)
Serial.print("ATID9999,");
// set the MY (16 bit address)
// this example uses 0x0 for send and 0x1 for receive but you'll
// want to choose your own hexadecimal numbers between 0x0 and 0xFFFE
Serial.print("MY5678,");
// exit command mode (note that we use Serial.printLN here to issue a linefeed that completes the command sequence)
Serial.println("CN");
// the preceeding commands can also be sent on a single line like this, using a single AT command with commas:
// Serial.println("ATID3330,MY1,CN");
// the preceeding command line could also be sent as separate commands, by reissuing the AT command:
// Serial.println("ATID3330");
// Serial.println("ATMY1");
// Serial.println("ATCN");
// wait for a response from the XBee for 2000 ms, or start
// over with setup if no valid response comes
if (returnedOK() == 'T') {
// if an OK was received then continue
}
else {
setup(); // otherwise go back and try setup again
}
}
void loop () {
// get any incoming data:
if (Serial.available() > 1) {
// read a byte
inByte = Serial.read();
// light the LED if a 1 has been received
}
if (inByte == '1') {
digitalWrite(outputPin, HIGH);
}
// douse the LED if anything else was received
else {
digitalWrite(outputPin, LOW);
}
}
void blinkLED(int targetPin, int numBlinks) {
// this function blinks the status LED light as many times as requested
for (int i=0; i
delay(250); // waits for a second
digitalWrite(targetPin, LOW); // sets the LED off
delay(250);
}
}
char returnedOK () {
// this function checks the response on the serial port to see if it was an "OK" or not
char incomingChar[3];
char okString[] = "OK";
char result = 'n';
int startTime = millis();
while (millis() - startTime < 2000 && result == 'n') { // use a timeout of 10 seconds
if (Serial.available() > 1) {
// read three incoming bytes which should be "O", "K", and a linefeed:
for (int i=0; i<3; i++) {
incomingChar[i] = Serial.read();
}
if ( strstr(incomingChar, okString) != NULL ) { // check to see if the respose is "OK"
// if (incomingChar[0] == 'O' && incomingChar[1] == 'K') { // check to see if the first two characters are "OK"
result = 'T'; // return T if "OK" was the response
}
else {
result = 'F'; // otherwise return F
}
}
}
return result;
}
So now for the big question, what can I do with all of this for the assignment?? I decided to use the words, Tapping, Monkey and Color....So now when you tap a switch, a monkey's headband will light up.
Here is the headband:
And there is the finished monkey project! When you tap a button, the headband wirelessly lights up!
May 01, 2007
Public School 59 Learns About Mexico Through Claymation
This is a journal of my work with the America Reads program. America Reads places college students in New York City public schools, to tutor math and English. I worked with the Beekman International School this year. The teacher that I worked with, Anastasis Macris, was absolutely wonderful, and let me teach some lessons on Mexico, through the creation of a claymation film. The kids made armatures, built sets, wrote scripts, recorded the audio, made clothing and performed all of the stop animation. They worked really hard and produced amazing results. Here is a log of our work:
4/24/07 Showed children a slideshow of the different regions of Mexico. (Northern, Southern, Tropical Rainforest and Desert.) We told the children, "Mexico is a country where the land meets oceans and there are deserts, moutains and rain forests....Think about how people live in these areas....." We then asked the children to list questions they may have about Mexico. Here are some of the questions that they came up with:
-What is edible in a desert environment?
-What kinds of animals can you eat?
-Is there running water?
We then divided the questions into these four categories: food, shelter, clothing and vegetation.
Next period was free time, so I brought in my clay, armature squirrel and spoke to the kids about the movie making process. Then I showed them both of my claymation movies. They asked: how I got the bird to fly, how did I get the animals' eyes to move, if the wire would fall off and how did could you take pictures of the animals without being in the picture?
4/27/07 We had an open discussion about what we saw in the pictures, and used books and the internet to research the answers to our questions. Once research was complete, we asked the students to sign up for one of four groups: North Clothing, North Shelter, South Clothing and South Shelter. Later, we came together and talked about needs vs. wants, and details of what we need to live.
4/30/07
I brought in both boxes I used for my claymation projects, along with the clay, armature animals.
5/1/07
We had the kids brainstorm on story ideas for the movie. We wrote down a bunch of ideas on the board, and assigned a story idea for homework. These are some of the questions/comments that the children had:
-Can Shelter people (meaning the Shelter group) make food for the market (scene)?
-Can we make a clothesline? (I am assuming this was derived from seeing my claymation that had a clothesline in it. I was actually pretty excited by this question since they saw my movie about a week ago, and obviously still remembered it and continued to think about it.)
-Are we actually going to be making the boxes (sets)?
-Our porches could have lights!
-We should put a Rue Tree (healing tree) in our set.
The the kids broke up into their groups, and discussed set designs and their research. One child did quite a bit of research for the shelter group, and brought in pictures of Mayan houses. Here is some of the dialogue from the Shelter group:
I: "We can paint sticks!"
N: "The people slept on hammocks and mats. We can get clothing people to make the hammocks!"
I: "N, do you have a doll table made of wood?"
N: "I do not play with dolls!"
L: "We could use cardboard for the table."
I: "And then cover the table with a tablecloth."
L: "Where do we put the TV?"
All: "They don't have TVs!"
5/2/07 Field Trip
We went on a field trip to Pan American Phoenix. One of the parents of a previous student works there, so they kindly offered to give us a tour and provide research for the groups.
5/3/07 Set building Day 1
We started to make clay armature people, the walls for our houses, vegetation and food. I found that sometimes the kids got off track while working with the clay, and started to make things that did not relate to our movie. (Like pizza for instance.) Every now and then, their teacher and I reminded them that they had to make things from their research. To reiterate that, we assigned each group a "recorder," and they wrote down the names of the plants, food, etc. that were made at their table.
5/4/07 Set building Day 2
One period of the day we finished our projects from Day 1, and another period of the day we drew designs on cloth, for the people's clothing and for the outdoor market scene.
Mrs. Macris and I stayed late and put together the houses.
5/7/07 For a homework assignment, Mrs. Macris had the children make tiles for our kitchen set. To incorporate a math lesson, we used the tiles to demonstrate symmetry.
5/16/07 Set Building Day 3 and a Trip to ITP Woodshop
Today we used the tiles that the children drew from the symmetry lesson, and used them to decorate the kitchen sets. We used the cloth that the children drew designs on, to create clothing for the figures. We also created more animals and made pottery for the set.
After school, I went to the woodshop at ITP to make furniture for the set.
5/17/07 Audio
Mrs. Macris wrote the script for our movie, and divided up the lines so that each student had about three lines. Today we recorded the audio with a shotgun mic. The students loved the fact that TV anchors use these exact pieces of equipment. "LIke on Fox news!?" was one of the first comments/questions. The children learned how to talk into a mic, how to read lines (i.e. You do not read the italicized words aloud, they are just directional) and they learned that you cannot interrupt people while they are reading, or the recording will be ruined.
One of the children raised there hand and made an accouncement, "Ok guys, do not be nervous...because we are just kids and parents are not expecting very much. They will be happy with anything!" (Needless to say the kids did not appreciate the humor in that statement, but instead were relieved to hear the piece of advice.)
5/18/07 Shooting Day 1
I brought the equipment in early, at 8 am and got setup. I had an area reserved in the school's all purpose room, and they put up a divider so we would not be disturbed.
Before classes started we had a quick meeting on the carpet to go over the process and to review safety measures. Then we all went down to the all-purpose room for a quick demonstration and time for questions. After the demo, two children stayed behind and I worked in groups of 2-3 all day. Having 2 kids at a time was ideal. I worked with each child individually, and the other child either make any emergency props that were needed or watched me work with the other child, so they were ready to go when it was their turn.
It was an overall fantastic experience! Most of the children were very excited about the project. I moved the camera and used the computer, and instructed the children on when and how to move the figures. Usually I would move the clay animal or person for the first picture, just to demonstrate, and from then on the children performed all of the animation on their own. I had some initial concerns about such young children (between 8-9 years old) being coordinated enough to move the clay figures in small increments. However, not one child experienced a problem with this! They were all very enthusiastic and happy to help. A handful of students even offered their own suggestions about how the clay figures should be moved. I think one of the most exciting parts for the children was the pace at which we took pictures. They seemed to really enjoy moving the figures, moving out of the way quickly so I could take the pictures and then quickly moving the figures again.
At the end of the day, three kids brought me thank you cards that they made. They said: "Thank you for helping us make the movie! You rock! and I will miss you!" So adorable.
5/18/07 Shooting Day 2
Today was our final shooting day. It went smoothly, except for the fact that one of my tota lights did not properly fit in the stand. I shot in the same manner that I had the time before (2 kids at a time) and we somehow managed to get the movie done.
After the shoot I showed the kids the raw footage.
6/04/07 - 6/14/07 Editing
Editing took forever. I had about 1500 images to work with, and believe it or not, iMovie seemed to be the easiest software to use for such a large project. (But I did use AfterEffects for the camera effect in the beginning.) Overall, It was a difficult task. I found that the audio clip (about 7.5 minutes) was just too long. I needed a lot of fillers, so I used my establishing shots (Yes, Susan, I took establishing shots!) and used the Ken Burns Effect quite a lot. (Which I found pretty humorous, because I immediately thought of reviewing iMovie in CommLab, and how we were told to turn off the KB effect off at all costs!)
One of the best pasts of the movie, is the music during the ending credits. The kids placed "Chips and Salsa" on their recorders during music class.
6/15/07 Movie Viewing Day
It was Family Day at school, so we figured that would be a perfect time to unveil the movie! Luckily I was able to come into work late, which was really nice of them considering I had just started.
Earlier that day, the kids made movie posters to publicize the viewing, so cute.
About 10 parents came to see the movie (which was pretty impressive considering there are only 19 kids in the class.) The kids were really excited and had a great time pointing to their friends when their narrative played. It was the first time they heard their audio recording, so they were all really thrilled to hear it.
My final task was to burn copies of the movie for all the kids.
I am honestly pretty sad that it is over. It was overall such a great experience, and I am very glad to have had it.
Click Here to Watch "Milo Goes Home"
*I had to substantially decrease the quality of this file, in order to get it small enough to fit online. It was originally 2G*
April 26, 2007
Mouth Piano - Final Class Demonstation
April 23, 2007
Final Project - Claymation - The Squirrel and The King
This is a little tale about my bulldog, King, and the squirrels that he encounters in the backyard of my house in New Jersey.
The Squirrel and The King
April 16, 2007
Final Project Documentation - Claymation
April 05, 2007
Wearing an Expression
Our assignment this week was to explore either a gesture or an expression. I chose to explore the expression, "April Showers Bring May Flowers!" It is a very literal take on the saying, that utilizes the elements in combination with a raincoat and some soil and seeds.
I began with seedling packets.
And then attached plastic sandwich bags to a raincoat. I was originally going to glue the bags onto the coat, but decided to use Kyveli's brilliant idea and sew them onto the coat.
Finally, I dropped the soil packets and seeds into the plastic pouches on the coat.
And there you have it! Flowers which are grown by wearing a raincoat!
April 04, 2007
"Talking Knots" by Charles C. Mann
Reading this entry actually came at an interesting time. Last weekend, at ITP there was a visually impaired conference. I did not partake in it, but I was on the floor to view the various materials that were around, including materials written with braille. I had never felt braille before in a book form. It really is a beautiful language, both physically and visually.
After reading "Talking Knots," I began to reflect on the amount of precision and effort that must have been involved in spinning, knotting, etc. to symbolize information. Whether the information was used to convey numbers, mnemonic devices, narratives, etc. is unimportant to me. What is important is that a non-traditional form of media was used to convey information. The idea of symbolizing data both visually and hands-on, is a very appealing theory. I find myself wondering why this medium was discontinued from use throughout history.
I thought a lot about how else we explicitly state information, without saying it, or spelling it out. Wedding bands came to mind, crosses and Stars of David, etc. But I could not think of a symbol that is used to both visually and physically state information.
March 27, 2007
Flash - The Lonely Cougar
This assignment was definitely inspired by fall semester classes. In my Intro to Physical Computing class, Meredith Silverman, Ben Chao and I created the "Canoodling Cougar." Our project, in summary, was a six foot tall, animatronic hugging device. We used 2X4s, a lot of wood, a hand-made pulley, an arduino microcontroller, some very intense code, stuffing and of course, a cougar costume, to create our masterpiece. We had originally hoped to call our project, "Big Huggy Bunny." However, after some intense research, Meredith found that due to the high demand in bunny costumes (Halloween plus Easter) they were pretty expensive year-round. So, we settled for a cougar...
March 23, 2007
Feedback from Class on Final Project
I received some great feedback today from the class. I have decided to rework the design of my skirt, based on the suggestions that I received. I found that talking through a process aloud, can often increase inspiration. Here is a list of the feedback/questions that I received. Thanks to everyone for their ideas!
-Instead of waiting for all of the jeans to arrive so that I can map out the design of the skirt, I could map it out the way I would ideally like it, and leave holes to serve as placeholders for the missing people/jeans. If I do not end up receiving the jeans, the holes will represent the ways in which a social network can be broken.
-I could make the skirt modular, so that it can continue to grow, just as a social network does.
-I could create a tiling effect, and have all of the patches be the same shape. (Which could coinside nicely with the skirt being modular)
-How will I know whose jeans are whose? I could use transfer paper on the back of each patch to denote the owner of the jeans. And I could design the skirt so that you can "open up" the patch by flipping it over, to read a story and/or description of the person.
-The placement of each patch could depend on the chronological order in which I met the person. (The people I have know the longest will be closest to me, and I can keep adding people on to the outer perimeter of the skirt as I meet them.)
March 21, 2007
Final Project Documentation
Rosie Daniel and I are working together on the Mouth Piano. Documentation can be found here:
March 16, 2007
Final Project Documentation
During spring break I had three main objectives. One, to stop by Metalliferous, two, to round up as many jeans as I could and three, get conductive thread.
3/12/07 - Called Sheildex looking for thin, conductive thread that will hopefully work in my commercial sewing machine. I was sent a large sample of 235/34 4-Ply.
3/13/07 - Went to Metalliferous. I spent about an hour just taking a step back, and taking it all in. If you have never been there, there are rows and rows and columns and columns of bins that hold anything you can think of: clasps, charms, chains, etc. It can be a bit overwhelming at first. I started out by looking through the bins of clasps, and bought a few that I thought I could test out for my skirt. I am still not sure if I will be using surface mount LEDs to demonstrate the social network, but if I do, I will need some type if connector, like a clasp, to light up each network. Here are the clasps that I bought:
3/14/07 - Went home to NJ for about a day and a half. So many of my friends were happy to help out, and offered me their old jeans. I visited Kerry and Nicolas, Jill, and Susan. I spent so much time visiting everyone that I didn't make it to Patti's before she went to bed. I resorted to asking her to leave them outside her door. I took a picture of the exchange just for the hilarity of it all..
My Jean Collection as of March 22, 2007
While researching similar projects to mine, I began reading about patchwork quilting. There are two types of quilting that have similar themes of my project: medallion and friendship quilting.
Medallion Quilting - quilting based around a central piece of fabric. (My project will center around my jeans/personal social networks.)
Friendship Quilting - quilting made from the scraps of different people's fabric or clothing. Many times each person would sign their piece of fabric/clothing that was being incorporated into the quilt.
Here is the social network that I plan to portray:
Here is a sketch of what I would like the skirt to look like:
3/23/07 Presentation of Final Project to Class
I received some great feedback today from the class. I have decided to rework the design of my skirt, based on the suggestions that I received. I found that talking through a process aloud, can often increase inspiration. Here is a list of the feedback/questions that I received. Thanks to everyone for their ideas!
-Instead of waiting for all of the jeans to arrive so that I can map out the design of the skirt, I could map it out the way I would ideally like it, and leave holes to serve as placeholders for the missing people/jeans. If I do not end up receiving the jeans, the holes will represent the ways in which a social network can be broken.
-I could make the skirt modular, so that it can continue to grow, just as a social network does.
-I could create a tiling effect, and have all of the patches be the same shape. (Which could coinside nicely with the skirt being modular)
-How will I know whose jeans are whose? I could use transfer paper on the back of each patch to denote the owner of the jeans. And I could design the skirt so that you can "open up" the patch by flipping it over, to read a story and/or description of the person.
-The placement of each patch could depend on the chronological order in which I met the person. (The people I have know the longest will be closest to me, and I can keep adding people on to the outer perimeter of the skirt as I meet them.)
3/26/07 Tiling Ideas
I have been thinking about what type of standard shape I would like to use for my skirt, and I received a few ideas on my walk home from 59th Street.
My Jean Collection as of 4/4/07
4/10/07 My Final Jean Collection
This weekend I sat down to create a template for my jean patches:
4/16/07
I have decided to use a template with 4.5" sides. (Which will end up being 3.5" once you factor in the 0.5" seam allowance)
The Final Garment:
March 08, 2007
The Fingerprint of the Second Skin by Kitty Hauser
Prior to reading this passage, I was aware of the intrinsic value of someone's clothing, but I had never sat down and picked a part the ideas and notions that surround individuals and their garments. Hauser explains "...individual garments might be imprinted with the signature of the of the wearer's body, evoking or revealing the wearer's identity, character or physiognomy." Immediately after reading the passage I got up, walked into my closet and started to pull out a few pairs of jeans. But before I could even focus any personal imprints, or "barcodes" as Hauser refers to them, I had to step back for a moment and reflect on the alarming number of jeans that I own. I simply cannot bring myself to divulge the number, but I will say that you need quite a bit more than fingers and toes to count on.
My initial trip to the closet was to look for my own, personal "barcodes," but after being distracted I began to think about why females in general, have a lot of jeans. And more importantly, what do we do with the old ones? Then my final project began to start to make sense. If I could obtain an old pair of jeans from each of my friends, and cut them up into patches that form one skirt, I could physically demonstrate how all of us are socially connected. For instance, in my pattern the following patches will be next to each other: Wendy, Megan and Kim. And the reason for this is... I met Wendy on my recruiting trip senior year in high school and Wendy introduced me to her friend, Megan. Megan and I became roommates about two years later. Then I met Kim, who was an old high school friend of Megan's, and Kim moved in with us. And so on, and so on.
I have not quite figured out all of the details..which I will have to do in the upcoming week, but the reading passage definitely helped to put me in right direction for my final project.
March 07, 2007
Final Project Idea
The What - In summary, our idea is to create a MIDI that is controlled completely by the user's mouth.
The Who - For anyone that may have difficulty using their arms, hands, feet, etc. and would have difficultly or the inability to play music otherwise.
The When - Our project could be used simply for just having fun, and making music. Or, it could be used as an exercise tool to encourage mouth mobility.
The Why - Rosie and I wanted to have a project that can be used simply to just have fun, and at the same time have the positive benefits of enhancing a muscle group.
The How - We are researching different ways to make this happen: sporting mouth guards, retainers, tongue and bit switches...all or some of which will be hooked up to a MIDI.
While researching switches that utilize the mouth, we found a switches (a tongue and a bite switch) that skydivers use to take pictures. The switch is obviously waterproof, and can be bitten very hard without damaging the equipment. (Which is important) and retails for about $40.
http://conceptusinc.com/tongueswitch.htm
We also found references to the TalkBox, which is a tube that users blow in, to create music.
March 02, 2007
Make a Soft Circuit
While constructing my soft circuit, I came across some problems.
First Issue: The conductive thread kept coming undone, even after knotting it.
Solution: Use Fabric-Tac glue, on the ends of the seam.
Second Issue: How to hold the coin cell battery next to the circuit.
Solution: I sewed a pouch for the battery, with a swatch of conductive fabric on each side of the pouch, and metal snaps on each side of the pouch. The snaps clipped on to the positive and negative ends of the circuit.
Third Issue: The pouch only worked occasionally, and the circuit randomly lit up.
Solution: The first pouch I made was constructed with tweed, which did not cling against the battery as much as it needed to. Next time I will use a fabric that gives more.
February 25, 2007
Current Events
Computing Award Goes to Female for the First Time
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/02/22/computing.award.ap/index.html
Frances E. Allen, 74, was honored for her work at IBM Corp. She is the first woman to win the $100K Tutoring Award in the award's 40 year history. She is accredited for her techniques on optimizing the performance of compilers, the programs that translate one computer language into another. She retired in 2002 but continues to stay active in programs that encourage girls and women to study computer science.
UK Embraces Online Gambling
http://www.forbes.com/afxnewslimited/feeds/afx/2007/02/23/afx3455592.html
Gordon Brown will announce plans in next month's Budget to encourage the online gambling industry to be regulated and licensed by the UK government. The Treasury has long had its eye on the potential tax revenues that are generated by online gambling sites that are based in Gibraltar and other offshore centres. For the first time these companies will be allowed to relocate to the UK and obtain a licence under the Gambling Act. However, all companies have said they would never relocate to the UK if they had to pay a tax on gross wins as high street casinos do. (Which can be up to 40%, depending on size.)
MySpace Wins Sex Abuse Suit
http://www.forbes.com/technology/ebusiness/2007/02/14/myspace-legal-murdoch-cx_ll_0214myspace.html
MySpace announced victory in a Texas lawsuit in which the social networking Web site was accused of failing to protect its underage members from sexual abuse. The suit was brought by the family of a 14-year-old girl who says she was sexually assaulted by Pete Solis, a 19-year-old MySpace user. The minor, who was unnamed in the suit, says Solis claimed to be a high school senior to gain her trust and contact information. He was later arrested and indicted for sexual assault.
Texas District Judge Sam Sparks dismissed all the claims against the company, arguing that the Communications Decency Act of 1996 exempts MySpace from liability for ineffective security measures and policies relating to age verification. Forcing the site to confirm the age of each user, "would of course stop MySpace's business in its tracks and close this avenue of communication," Sparks wrote in his opinion.
The CDA, Title V, states two main things. One, that children should be protected in regards to indecency. Two, that operators of Internet services (MySpace in this instance) were not to be construed as publishers and are not legally liable for the words of third parties who use their services.
IRS Goes After eBay
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070225-8919.html
http://www.auctionbytes.com/cab/abu/y205/m04/abu0140/s02
In short, the US government wants to treat eBay as a "broker" who would then be required to file notices with the government about how much money its traders have made. The US proposal calls for this reporting to take place only when people sell more than several thousand dollars worth of merchandise in a year. The government believes that tougher enforcement of the rules could net as much as $2 billion a year.
eBay is resisting calls for it to file any documents, saying that it does not fit the definition of a broker, and that to selectively target it puts the company at a competitive disadvantage. eBay spokesperson Chris Donlay said, "The IRS would need to provide us with a subpoena for a specific individual before we would provide any data. I don't believe this is something that would be typically done for a routine audit, though it theoretically could happen." He said this is true for both eBay and PayPal.
Some bloggers have put a positive spin on the call for auditing, explaining that reporting eBay income allows you to report Internet access fees and all expenses related to eBay selling, such as taking a home office deduction.
Microsoft Loses Suit to Lucent
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/02/22/microsoft.verdict.reut/index.html
http://www.forbes.com/technology/entertainment/2007/02/23/alcatel-lucent-microsoft-markets-equity-cx_po_0223markets01.html
http://techdirt.com/articles/20070222/133532.shtml
Microsoft was accused of violating two digital music patents held by the Lucent, which covers the converting of audio files into digital MP3 files. A federal jury in California ruled that Microsoft Corp must pay $1.52 B in damages. The original asking price was $4.5 B.
Microsoft said the award seemed "outrageous" given the fact that it had paid just $16 million to license the MP3 technology from someone else -- the Fraunhofer Institute, a German research organization that also has a patent on the MP3 compression algorithm. The figure of $1.52 billion had been calculated by multiplying Windows sales volumes and PC sales prices worldwide since May 2003.
Microsoft plans to appeal the jury's decision, but it could take more than two years for the case to reach the court. Analysts say that if the appeal is lost, the door will be opened for Alcatel-Lucent to sue other companies who also licensed the MP3 technology from the Fraunhofer Institute, including Apple, Cisco Systems and Hewlett-Packard.
BitTorrent Strikes a Deal With Hollywood
http://www.engadget.com/2006/12/01/bittorrent-strikes-a-deal-with-hollywood/
http://www.engadget.com/2007/02/25/bittorrent-entertainment-network-to-be-unveiled-tomorrow/
BitTorrent, Inc. announced a partnership with pretty much everyone in Hollywood, including 20th Century Fox, G4, Lions Gate, MTV Networks, Nickelodeon, Paramount Pictures and plenty others. According to the Times, Fox, Paramount, Warner, and MGM will contribute a combined total of some 3,000 new and classic movies to the service.
Now users will be Paying for movies, TV shows and video game downloads. The downloads will only be available to rent: the $2.99 or $3.99 downloads expire after either 30 days or 24 hours from when viewing begins. Commercial downloads will be intermingled with the free content that BitTorrent fans are accustomed to swapping, and will be protected by Microsoft DRM -- a condition that Cohen begrudgingly accepted, claiming, "We are not happy with the user interface implications..It's an unfortunate thing. We would really like to strip it all away."
Wireless Usage Increasing
http://www.itwire.com.au/content/view/9952/53/
A new survey from the Pew Internet & American Life Project says that people with wireless Internet go online more often, showing that 34% of Internet users have used WiFi (at home or elsewhere) or a cell phone network to get an Internet conection, up from 22% in 2004, while 27% have access the Internet from places other than home or work and 19% have WiFi at home – up from 10% in 2005!
February 21, 2007
The Senses
Our assignment was to think about the senses, or a sense, either in an abstract or literal manner. I thought a lot about how memories are associated with scents. The smell of a box of crayons takes me back to pre-school, the smell of Chanel No. 5 takes me back to grade school (Ms. Johnson's signature scent) and the smell of bounce dryer sheets takes me back to college.
My freshman year roommate, Sara, used dryer sheets for everything: her laundry, dirty cleats and basically anything else that you can think of. For my project I wanted to incorporate this scent, into the form of a wearable air freshener.
The materials: A motor and fan, dry sheets and a jacket.
I bought a handheld, electric bubble blower for my hack a toy assignment, but didn't end up using it. So I took apart the bubble blower gun, resoldered some connections hot glued the fan on top of the battery holder and had my own portable, pocket fan. Then I cut open the pocket of a jacket, incorporated the pocket's button into the motor switch, added a dryer sheet and then I was done.
Here is my wearable, dryer-sheet scented fan powered jacket.
Some Simple Reflections on the Body by Paul Valery
The first time I ready "Some Simple Reflections on the Body" I honestly was not quite sure what I had read, or what it all meant. The reading carried a lot of depth and detail; especially for it being such a short passage. However, after going back, and dissecting the thoughts of Valery I felt enlightened.
On the first take of reading about the four bodies, I was not sure how this passage could relate to our wearable technology class. At a second glance, I became intrigued and thought a lot about movements and gestures, and how conscious we are each time our body makes a physical change.
How do we know things? And what is the process that leads us to education and enlightenment? Our "second body" is aware that we all have a brain, heart, liver, etc. but how? And on the flip side, what physical changes occur that we are not aware of. And could we be aware of them if we were under surveillance?
For my final project I would like to explore unconscious movements, and how they can invoke some type of reaction. For the next week or so I am going to observe: myself, friends, stranger, etc. and think about the relation between conscious and unconscious notions.
February 14, 2007
The Design Process by Susan M. Watkins
I completed reading the "The Design Process," and took away from it two important concepts. The first was that I already had the intuition to perform most of, if not all of, the design process steps described by Watkins. I am not sure that I knowingly go through each step when I am planning and creating a project, but my love for putting things on paper before I physically build anything, has definitely assisted me in this area. I spend most of my time in the Analysis phase. Picking things apart, whether they are situations, problems, devices, etc. has always been a fun exercise for me. I think that the more thorough you are in the initial stages, the more fluid your project will be. However, I know that spending so much time in this stage sometimes takes away from the final steps: evaluation and conclusion. I would like to plan for more time at the end of my next project, so that I can spend more time on thinking of improvements.
The second concept that I took away from the reading, was that there are so many different techniques to perform each step, that it almost seems wasteful to continue along the same route for every project. Watkins described many techniques that I would like to try out. These techniques include: lateral thinking (when you explore least likely paths in a project), synectics (joining together irrelevant elements as stimuli) and manipulative verbs (using verbs such as magnify, minify, rearrange, reverse, etc. to enhance a project).
Hack a Toy
This week I combined my assignments for two classes: Wearables and Assistive Tech. My assignment for Wearables was to hack into a toy, and make it of course, wearable. My assignment for Assitive Tech was to create a device that would allow someone who could not speak, the ability to communicate in a social setting.
For Assitive Tech., I worked with Rosie Daniel and Evrim. When we met to discuss our project, we tried to think of how we could communicate with each other in a bar setting without speaking. Our immediate response was to text message; which of course is awkward to do when you are standing next to the person you are trying to speak with. After thinking through the concept a little more, we came up with the idea to use a wearable, dry erase board, that could be worn easily on your arm.
I bought a couple of toys for my Wearables assignment and had begun to hack into them. One of the toys I bought was a globe that emitted light and changed colors. Once I cracked it open and realized how tiny the perf board and chip was, I immediately thought to combine this idea with my Assistive Tech assignment. How can someone write back and forth with someone at a bar, if the lighting is bad?
Here are some pictures of the process and the compeleted proejct:
Claymation
Growing up I had a green cheek conure (which is a small, fancy parrot) named Walter. Walter was great. He, or should I say she, (we later found out that Walter was a female, long story) was one of my greatest pals. I had Walter for seventeen years, I had him since the third grade. When I graduated from college I decided to make one of my biggest dreams come true. I got a lovely, little bulldog named King. When King came home with me to New Jersey, there was quite a bit of rivalry! Here is one segment of many to come, of the adventures of Walter and The King. Enjoy!
February 08, 2007
"Reflectionism" and "Diffusionism": New Tactics for Deconstructing the Video Surveillance Superhighway by Steve Mann
I can appreciate Mann's standpoint on video surveillance, and I believe that there is a line between safety and invasion of privacy. However I am not sure that Mann's views on surveillance were accurately expressed in his performance pieces. Mann is expressing some very valid, and real points, but is doing so in such a way that his views may become lost in translation. While reading this excerpt, I am able to clearly identify what his main goals are and what the message is, but I am not sure that the viewers of his performace pieces necessarily receive the message. Some of his experiements are so in your face that I am not sure the audience ponders the issue that is at hand: questioning totalitarian video survelliance. Instead, my concern is that the audience is hung up on his appearance and is wondering what he may have in his bag, hat, glasses, etc.
February 07, 2007
Final Project Ideas
This past week I have had an ongoing dilemma: Do I develope an existing idea or work on something entirely new, for my wearable technology final project? Two existing projects that I would like to continue working on are as follows:
-Friendship Bags ~ Which are handbags with embedded LEDs that light up when their "other half" is in close range. I used arduino microcontrollers and XBee radios to create this effect. They worked well when I initially developed them; the only issue being how many wires were used. If I continued to work on this project, I would want all curcuits to be soft. http://mandyphyscomp.blogspot.com
-Sneakers to Assist Those with Neuropathy ~ Neuropathy is a condition in which the nervous system is affected. It is a common side effect for chemotherapy patients, and can cause numbness and tingling in the toes and feet. With the help of these sneakers, the user will be able to see where their weight is shifting. LED strips will light up to designate where pressure is being applied on the sneaker, and their level of brightness will designate the amount of force that is being exerted. This will assist users when going up and down the stairs, and for walking in general. This sneaker could also be used for athletes that want to improve their footwork. It will ideally look like this:
My new idea incorporates the wireless technology from my friendship bags, but creates a much more interactive environment. I would like to create a Game of Tag for Athletes. The idea stemmed from thinking back to my days of playing lacrosse, and staring at the gym clock during our cardio workouts. Running was never one of my favorite parts of playing a sport, but it is absolutely a necessity. A popular cardio workout we had, was a "game," and I am using this term loosely, in which we gathered into groups of six. We would all "follow the leader" at the front of the line, and all run in a single file. The person at the end of the line would sprint forward, until they had run in front of the leader. This would continue on for about thirty minutes or so, and needless to say was very boring at times.
To reinvent this game, I would to create a game of tag using a flag to denote the person that is "it." All players will wear jerseys, that the flag can stick to. Once the flag has been attached to a jersey, the player's jersey will light up and a whistle will blow, to designate who the "it" person is, and that the "it" person has changed. Of course there would have to be a set of rules. A few that I have thought of are as follows:
-All players would need to run in a constrained area. (i.e. A gymnasium, so that people are around to tag.)
-All players need to constantly run, even if they are not "it" and are not being chased.
-You cannot tag the person that has just tagged you. (To prevent you from ripping the flag off quickly and putting it back on the person that just tagged you.)
There are some basics that I need to sort out:
-What kind of wireless device would be suitable. I currently know how to use an arduino that can be linked to an XBee radio, but I recently found out that arduino has come our with a model with bluetooth capabilities. http://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoBoardBluetooth
-What fabric will I use? If I use conductive velcro for the flag to be attached to the jersey, will the entire jersey have to be velcro or does velcro stick to other fabrics?
-How will I construct the jerseys so that they can be easily washed?
-How can I use this technology without hindering the activity of the athlete?
I found a project by Rob Seward, an ITP alumnus, that created a game of tag with an LED matrix. http://stage.itp.nyu.edu/~rus200/blog/archives/2005/05/tag_documentati_1.html
January 31, 2007
Wearable Assignment-Use Conductive Fabric
I began the assignment, with the idea that I wanted to include some element of fun into a garment. The final idea was to create a handbag that moved. Here was my process:
I started with a plain, blue/green handbag.
I found a picture of hula dancers, printed them out on transfer paper and ironed the image onto the handbag.
Then I wired up my breadboard to a servo motor, and attached an Arduino for my microcontroller, and wrote code for the motor to move back and forth.
Then I cut a hole into the image on the bag, inserted the top of the servo motor, and screwned the bag and the servo together. Later, I glued fabric onto the top of the motor to form the image of a hula skirt.
I then made a switch for the motor, in the form of a handbag closure. I used metal snaps, with conductive fabric on the back of the snaps, and stitched the fabric to the inside of the bag.
Finally, the bag was finished!
Dress Codes-Meanings and Messages in American Culture by Ruth P. Rubinstien
Rubinstien explains that there are four main motives for personal dress: to validate personal identity, to protect the personal self, to portray a wished-for identity and to proclaim one's personal values. I thought a lot about validating one's personal identity from a corporate standpoint. I worked at Rosenbluth International, a travel agency, right out of college. The CEO/owner, would drive to work on his motorcycle and cowboy boots. The building had about 800 employees, and about 90% of those employees dressed very casual; it was our corporate culture. Jeans were appropriate - even sneakers. After about a year of working there, Rosenbluth was bought out by a large corporation. There were many layoffs, and slowly by slowly the eight hundred employees widdled down to about fifty. As the fifty or so employees began to work for this new corporation, we (myself included) began to adopt a new corportate culture. Jeans were not worn anymore, and collared shirts and dress pants became the norm. What I found so surprising about this transition, was that nothing physically changed, but our attitudes in regard to dress, did. Nobody new from the other corporation came into our building. We were a part of new company, but our day to day activities and interactions only changed in the virtual sense. (Via the phone or email.) I believe that the adoption of this new corporate culture was resulting from the need to validate corprate self importance. Over seven hundred employees had already been let go, and the few that were left still standing, felt the need to assume new physical identities even though nothing in their job description had changed.
January 28, 2007
Stop Motion
I met one of my dearest friends, Emily, in the fourth grade. She had just moved to Eastampton (New Jersey of course) and she had the leading role in the school play, "The Wayward Witch." Needless to say, she was a hit. So here is what happens when old childhood friends get together on a Friday night, with a stop motion assignment.
January 24, 2007
The American Journal of Sociology ~ "Fashion" by George Simmel
Simmel made some interesting points that surprisingly still hold truth, after being written nearly fifty years ago. However, I do not agree with all of Simmel's assessments, as some are extremely antiquated.
One of the points that I found most interesting from the reading, relates to the fashions that can be found in Vogue magazine, and how these overly exaggerated fashions relate to us realistically. "Judging from the ugly and repugnant things that are sometimes in Vogue, it would seem as though fashion were desirous of exhibiting its power by getting us to adopt the most atrocious things for its sake alone." Reading this quote immediately reminded me of the film "Mean Girls." There is a clip where the "outcasts" of the school, try to embarass the "popular girl" by breaking into her gym locker, and cutting two holes into her shirt exactly where her breasts will be when she wears it. The "popular girl" returns to her locker after gym class, puts on her undershirt, and then puts on the shirt with the two holes in it, and walks confidently through school as though she just created a new fashion. The clip ends with all of the girls in school imitating her look, and wearing shirts with two holes cut out where their breasts are. A hilarious clip, but also in many ways very true. I think sometimes the most ridiculous fashions are adopted by the masses, because a company found an A list celebrity to endorse their product.
The above mentioned quote goes on to further explain that these exaggerated fashions are viewed as elegant, because they are generally displayed on people that are very elegant, and "pay the greatest attention to their physical appearance." I agree with this assessment, as it reminds me of Sarah Jessica Parker in Sex and the City. The main fashion designer of the show, Patricia Field, dresses up Parker in the most outragous outfits and somehow it really works. Parker always looks fabulous. Of course Field's eye for fashion has a lot to do with it, but the main reason that these looks convey such beauty, is because of the canvas: Sarah Jessica Parker. It is not just the clothes that make her look fantastic, its the entire package. She is a trained dancer and radiates such elegance when she walks. Her hair and make-up and just her general style and personality, all make these outragous clothes seem extremely glamorous.
I disagree with one of Simmel's main points: that the upper class creates fashion, and when the lower classes imitate this fashion, it is time for a new fashion to be created. I do not know that it is the "upper class" that creates fashion. Nor do I believe that the "lower class" imitations of the fashion, warrent a fashion change. The industry, is what dictates when a new fashion should be born. Fashion magazines are published each month, spring, summer, fall and winter lines of clothing need to be released in stores, widely publicized hollywood events occur every couple of months, etc. All of these things contribute to the need for a new fashion. Money is generated from all of these entities; which is why new fashions are released so frequently.
I also disagree with Simmel's assessment that "In a certain sense fashion gives a woman a compensation for her lack of position in a class based on a calling or profession." Simmel goes on to explain that men are not as interested in fashion, because they are inherently given a social power with their class. This view is extremely antiquated for obvious reasons, but I would like to argue why this statement is wrong both in present day, as well as fifty years ago. In many ways it could be that professional men, are making a fashion statement, simply by their lack thereof. It is as if they are saying, "I am too important and too busy to bother myself with clothing choices. And I want people to know this about me."
I found the journal to be extremely interesting, and enjoyed agreeing with Simmel just as much as disagreeing.
Create your own Venus of Willendorf
Per wikipedia, a Venus of Willendorf is a high statuette of a female figure, discovered at a paleolithic site near Willendorf, Austria, in 1908 by archaeologist Josef Szombathy. It is carved from an oolitic limestone that is not local to the area, and tinted with red ochre. As of 1990, upon a revised analysis of the stratigraphy of its site, it was estimated to have been carved 22,000 to 24,000 years ago. Very little is known about its origin, method of creation, or cultural significance.
For my own Venus of Willendorf, I decided to take on a different approach. I wanted to create something that you could wear, and something that was both very explicit and also very vague at the same time. I thrive on contrast, and wanted to express this in my work. I began my undergraduate career as a fashion design major, and was a member of the Division I lacrosse team. I was the only athlete in my design classes, and would many times come to class with my cleats tied on my backpack, and my clothes covered in sweat and dirt. (Needless to say, this type of "style" was not typical of my fellow fashion design students.) Although I switched from a fashion design major to management information systems, I continued to design handbags and also create ceramics when I was not working on my PC.
To convey this notion of contrast, I began with the idea of using a T-shirt and somehow incorporating many, many small pictures. I copied and pasted approximately 200 small pictures onto a word document (some were very clear, and some were construed to others but clear to me) and and printed out this large rectangle of pictures onto transfer paper. I then cut out the shape of New Jersey (where I am oringinally from) to play with the idea of an explicit statement.
To take the idea of contrast further, on the back of the T-Shirt I formed the number 18. (My college lacrosse number) All images that created the number one, were of my handbag and ceramic designs, and all images used to create the number eight, were of my physical computing projects. I wanted to converge the ideas of design and technolgy into one, single element.
Here are the images of my finished T-Shirt:
January 22, 2007
Methods of Motion-Sleepwalkers
January 21, 2007
Methods of Motion-Optical Toy
During the first Methods of Motion of motion class, we made thaumatropes! Which is an optical tool that combines two images, using only a string and a flipping motion. For my thaumatrope, I drew a dog and a doghouse with a bone. I then cut out both drawings in a cirular shape, taped them together so the images were facing outward (and one of the images was upside-down), punched a hole on each side of the taped circle, and tied a string to each hole. To view the illusion, you hold both strings, one with each hand, and flip the strings back and forth with your fingers. The flipping motion creates the illusion that the dog is in the dog house.
Our assignment for this week, was to create an optical toy, either a flipbook or a zoetrope. Since I wanted to draw, but also wanted to construct something new (I love projects that have anything to do with glue) I decided to make a zoetrope. My first step was to make the example zoetrope; which had the images for annimation already printed on it.
Before I had completed the example zoetrope, I began brainstorming as to what types of annimation that I may want to make. I thought about repetitive motions, like a monkey swinging from vine to vine. Then I somehow stumbled upon a website that had videos of silhouettes.
After viewing silhouette site, I started to think of a silhouette annimations that I found visually pleasing. The very popular, ipod commercial commericial came to mind. I found the commercial online, and decided to draw the silhouette of a man with dreads, smashing his guitar.
To start I drew all 10 images on a large scale. Then I scanned them, copied and pasted them into a word document (so I could resize them on the fly) and then printed out the 10 squential images in a row.
They came out pretty well. The printed version came out a a dark gray. To make the images pop out more, I decided to trace the outline of man with a fine black marker, and color in all guitar images.
Here are my zoetrope images:
Here is the finished zoetrope:
December 18, 2006
Final Project2 - Canoodling Cougar!
I wanted to learn more about motors, so I decided to work on a second project, headed by the great mind of Meredith Silverman! Ben also joined our team, and we all worked together to great a six feet tall hugging machine! We used a DC gear head motor, some pulleys, a ton of 2 X 4's, an arduino and heaps of stuffing! Click here to see the presentation/documentation that Meredith put together!
What's inside
Final Project - Friendship Bags
For my final project, I decided to get familiar with Zigbee radios, and use them in a wearable application. My project, Friendship Bags, consists of two handbags with embedded LEDs, zigbee radios and arduino microcontrollers. When the two bags are within line of sight, their LEDs will light up, and complete the shape of a heart. To check out my documentation, click here!
Final Project - The Time Telling Game
Meredith Silverman and I worked together on our final project, The Time Telling Game. It is a Java application that teaches children to convert analog to digital time. There is a counter that goes up in increments for correct entries, and a "New Player" button that starts the game over.
Here is our code
Here is a screenshot of the program:
December 15, 2006
Assitive Tech Assignment
I started the “Everyday Technology Use Chart” as the first part of this week’s Commlab assignment. The chart illustrates the technological devices that I used within the last five days, and then rates the Difficulty of Use and Ease of Modification for different categories. The categories are, Use Without: Hearing, Vision, The Ability to Walk and The Ability to Use Hands.
For the second part of the assignment, I began to analyze the chart, and try to determine where efficiencies could be made within the devices that I listed. I came up with a few ideas, but was not overly excited about any of them. So for the third part of this exercise I began to think of ideas that I had a personal association with, and aspired to come up with an idea that could be developed under the assistive technology umbrella.
I began to think of when my mother was undergoing chemotherapy. The treatments were extremely beneficial, but of course had a number of side effects associated with them. One of the main side effects was neuropathy. Neuropathy is a condition in which the nervous system is affected. In this case, it meant the numbness and tingling of my Mother’s fingertips and feet. Some of this was reversible, but unfortunately some was not.
Due to neuropathy, my Mother experienced a lot of discomfort, and her ease of use when interacting with certain things declined quite a bit. The main problem that my Mother experienced was getting up and down the stairs. While climbing the stairs it was hard for her to determine exactly how much force she was exerting, and in which part of the foot the force was being exerted. This particularly presented a problem when moving from one step to another. There were times when my Mom would think that she was pressing down on her entire foot, when in fact she was leveraging all of her weight on either her toes or her heel. This caused her to become unbalanced, and made climbing the stairs an unsafe activity.
My idea to combat this problem is to embed an LED strip, beginning at the toe of the shoe, and extending to the top of the tongue. (So that the entire strip is visible while walking.) The LED strip will designate to the user which areas of the shoe that force is being exerted on. The lights at the top of the tongue, closet to the ankle, will signify that force is being exerted at the back heel. The lights at the tip of the shoe, closest to the toes, will signify that force is being exerted on the toes.
Another feature that I feel would be helpful, would be to make the lights brighter, or dimmer, depending on how much force is being exerted. For instance, if the lights at the top of the tongue are bright, and the lights at the toe are dim, then there is a lot of force pressing down on the heel of the shoe, and not as much force pressing down on the toe of the shoe. These signals should allow the user to adjust their weight appropriately while climbing stairs, thus making them more stable.
A mini microcontroller will make all of the technology possible. It can be inserted inside the heal of the shoe, so that it is hidden and will not interfere with the user. The microcontroller will be linked to several force sensing resistors, that will be inside the bottom lining of the shoe, stretching from the heel to the tip of the shoe.
The fourth and final part of this assignment is to sketch the invention. Please see the picture that I have drawn, which illustrates the how I would like this design to look
December 04, 2006
Flash_Week_11_Assignment
After watching the Flash demo in class on Monday, I was really excited to start on an annimation. But I knew in the back of my mind that programming Flash would not be nearly as easy as it had looked in class. (I was definitely correct.)
Meredith Silverman and I paired up on this assignment. We spend a few minutes after class brainstorming on ideas. But we did not decide on a topic until I received an email from Meredith a day or so later. Meredith wrote a short story, about aliens (or wheelies) that came to Earth to absorb all of the candy in town. After I read the story, I started some wheelie sketches, and then got really excited about the possibility of annimating them in Flash.
Meredith had already started to work in Flash and was making a lot of headway. So before we met up, I wanted to play around in Flash, and try to get some of beginning questions/problems out of the way. Even though I took great notes in class, getting started was much harder than I had anticipated. I wasted a good half hour, drawing images and saving them as symbols, but not understanding why they disappeared from my library. It was not until Rosie Daniel walked by the computer lab, and I asked for some help, that this mystery was solved. Apparently, I had been creating a symbol, but not selecting the image first. So, I just kept drawing over each symbol that I thought I had saved. After that, I opted for a break,
The next time I attempted Flash, I sat with Meredith. (Whom by this time, had become a Flast master overnight.) We sat in main area at ITP for quite awhile, as Meredith gave me a tutorial on Flash. We covered tweens, layers, symbols, internal annimation, rotating objects...you name it.
I found some great alien sounds for the project, but because of limitied time, did not get to incorporate that into our final project. Hopefully, next time.
November 26, 2006
Video_Assignment_Weeks9_and_10
The Story:
Susan Buck and I collaborated on an audio assignment, and while doing so, we remarked that the sound file would be more interesting if it were set to video. So, when we heard the assignment for the subsequent week was for video, we decided to roll out a second edition to "A Day in NY."
The first step in the video process was to decide on a story, and develop a cooresponding storyboard. The concept was easy, our sound file had already laid out the ground work: a day in New York City. Our sound file begins with an alarm clock, and then proceeds with the usual morning sounds (showering, teeth brushing, drinking coffee, etc.) with the upbeat tune of "Tango" in the background. However, once the apartment door closes, the city sounds (traffic, honking, people talking, etc.) set in, and an entirely different tone begins to unfold. The beat picks up, drums kick in, a field recording of a subway conductor begins and a mixed version of "Reprieve" starts up, all to signify how crazy, and exciting a day in New York can be.
To put this idea into video, Susan and I also collaborated with Rosie and Tamara; a very solid team! We began to hash out some ideas about how this song could work into a photoshoot, other that stating the obvious: we would be filming someone going through their day. We decided to take a slightly different theme after our discussions. The story would not just be about a generic day in New York. It would be about how four different girls start their days in the same fashion, but then they are each presented with the myriad of opportunities that New York has to offer, once they leave the subway platform. Our round about strategy was to film each of us doing all of the same things: getting ready in the morning, walking down the street to the subway, getting on the train and finally beginning a day of opportunities. Then we would splice it up, and place each like sequence together.
The Shoot:
We really lucked out weather wise; a beautiful day! The equipment had been checked out the night before, so Saturday morning we were ready to go! We all met at Tamara's to begin our shoot. The first obstacle was setting up the camera. (Not a huge deal) And then setting up the tota lights. (Not quite a huge deal either to my surprise) Our only initial hiccup, was the camera being on some sort of setting that panned the view of the screen from right to left, every time you focused. After a few moments, we figured out how to turn it off, and were ready to shoot.
We turned off all of the regular lights, closed the shades and began shooting in the bedroom. We moved the tripod many times, and took the same footage from many different angles. (Which we greatly appreciated later in the week once we looked at the footage and began editing.) The bedroom shots went well, but the bathroom shots did not go as smoothly. The bathroom did not have a window, so all of our lighting was artificial. We had a hard time getting the lighting to look realistic, so we crossed our fingers and took a mental note that we may need to take more bathroom shots at the other apartments.
After Tamara's shoot was wrapped up, we took some footage outside, as we walked to Susan's. And while we were outside, and it was beaufiul out, we decided to start the subway shots as well. We got on the train at 14th Street, and basically rode back and forth on the subway until we were convinced that we would have enough footage to edit.
By the time we got back to Susan's, we were exhausted and decided to try to cut down on some traveling time. So, we shot scenes of Rosie in Susan's apartment, and decided to use Rosie's footage from the bathroom and Susan's footage from the bedroom. (Since no one will know that both of those rooms are in the same apartment.) To cut down traveling even more, we decided to use Tamara's neighbor's apartment as mine. So, we trudged back to Tamara's building and began to shoot the final sequence. After all of the practice that we had had during the day, with putting up the equipment and taking it back down again, the last shoot only took about thirty minutes. We called it a day and then headed back to school.
The Edits:
Our biggest challenge with editing, was making the video fit in with the sound. (Since we already had the audio for the video.) The blade tool became our best friend, and we used it to cut out what parts of the footage we needed. Surprisingly, a lot of shots seemed to flow together without us having planned them. (For instance there were many times that one of us would complete an action, like brushing their teeth, and then bend down slightly. Then there would be another shot of one of us getting up from a bent down position.) We tried to work in as many of these instances as we could.
We did not use many special effects. The blade tool was used most often. We copied and pasted some footage to create a repeat effect, and we controled the speed of some actions that were moving too slowly. (i.e. the train taking off from the track)
We were all very pleased with the outcome! If I could do it again, I probably would have filmed on two separate days, instead of one long eight hour day. That way we wouldn't have been too tried, and could have gone to all of our apartments. But, I really am happy with the video, and had such a great time during the process.
November 18, 2006
Midterm Project - Bike Lights!
For my midterm project, I teamed up with Eric and Chul. Our task was to find an existing problem/product and fix/enhance it. At first we wanted to create a wearable project, a Hokey Pokey suit came to mind...but then we settled on a more practical creation: turn signals and brake lights for bikes! To see our documentation, click here!
Midterm Project - Picasso!
Meredith Silverman and I teamed up for our midterm project. It is a drawing program, built with processing, that allows the user to draw with three different brush sizes, nine different colors, and an eraser.
Here is a screenshot
October 30, 2006
Week_7_and_8_Music_File
For week 7 and 8's assignment, Susan Buck and I first got together to make some plans. We decided that during the first week (week 7) we would begin to collect sounds by ourselves and then regroup. Our collections were to consist of 2 songs, and 3 sound files. My two songs were "Let Go" by Frou Frou and my favorite Moby song, that I have yet to figure out the title of. My sound effect collection consisted of some sounds that I recorded: my alarm clock, my cell phone ring and various sound recordings from the subway. (Only one of which actually came out clear enough to hear.)
After our ICM class last week, Susan and I got together, exchanged sound files, and played around with Audacity and GarageBand. Our next plan of action was to individually record one minute of sound, using a combination of our sounds and music, and regroup in a few days.
At our final meeting, we had both chosen to use te subway recording, and the song "Reprieve" that Susan had chosen as one of her song selections. The song begins by talking about Manhattan, which we both felt coincided well with the subway noises.
Susan had done some fabulous mixing, and we wanted to incorporate it into our other sounds, but needed to think of a commonality. Since we both had collected an alarm clock sound, we came up with the idea of making the sounds illustrate a day in Manhattan, from getting up in the morning, to getting on the subway, and finally, arriving at your destination. We combined all of our mixes, and sound recordings, and downloaded some clips from findsounds.com to fill in any musical gaps.
Here is what we came up with, I hope that you enjoy it! Click here to hear "A Day in NY"
October 23, 2006
Week_6_File_Sharing_Reaction
I thoroughly enjoyed this week's readings, for many reasons. One, my boyfriend is a lawyer, and I used to hear about this copyright class for hours on end, but I never really read about the issue in any context that appealed to me. Two, I randomly came across an album the other day called the "Black and Blue" album. (A mix of Jay-Z's the Black album and Weezer's the Blue album) Which, by the way I found more funny and actually artistic. I just love Weezer too much to get into any cut up version of it, but I do commend the DJ for his efforts. Pretty amusing stuff.
I went into reading this articles with a little personal background in file sharing. When I was a freshman undergrad ('98) I used to be able to download music from my dorm's network neighborhood. It was fantastic! Now, remember, this was before Napster. (Not sure if Napster actually existed then, but it did, it was not as that popular yet) I downloaded hundreds, if not thousands of songs, and probably used about 80% of my little PC's memory. Then about halfway through the year, the network could still be accessed, but all Music files had to be taken down. Apparently if you had music files on the drives, then Drexel would issue a sanction against you or something. So, no more network neighborhood.
Then, Napster hit its peak! We all continues to download free music. Fantastic again! The Napster got taken down, and no more Napster.
Then Limewire came about, free music again! My point to this story, I swear there is one, is that if someone can get music for free, then will.
October 15, 2006
Week_5_Assignment
Week 5's assignment was to animate digitial pictures, using iMovie. I teamed up with Tamara, and we met to discuss potential projects. At first we planned to take progressive pictures of a haircut, which initially seemed like a fantastic idea. So we ventured out to a salon around the corner from school, and asked the manager if we could take pictures of a haircut. They surprisingly agreed, and only asked to see our NYU ID. After about 20 minutes, a woman walked in for a trim, and agreed to let us take her pciture! We took about 20 pictures, but then started to feel awkward that we were continually taking pictures of both the hair dresser and the woman getting the haircut. Since we did not have complete control of our subject, and the speed that she was traveling, we decided that the pictures were not good enough to animate for our project. Our next idea was to take pictures of someone getting a manicure. Luckily, there was a nail salon right next to the hair salon. But unfortunately the manager would not let us take pictures, even when we offered to pay for a manicure for ourselves. Since we still liked the idea, we ventured off to Tamara's apartment to do our own nails, and take pictures. Our first take had some problems: the nail polish was peach in color, and did not stand out in the shots, and the camera was slightly out of focus. After a long day, we decided to take a break and reconvien on Sunday.
On Sunday things went much smoother, we had bright pink nail polish and a different camera. The shots went smoothly, and we uploaded the pictures onto my Mac, and then into iMovie. We had difficulty setting the speed and transitions, but eventually got the movie to flow very well. We added some music (Tamara edited the song "Supermodel" to only play the chorus) and our project was complete!
October 07, 2006
Week_4_Assignment
Our Week4 assignment was to create a single image which contains 3-5 disparate elements and combined a convincing new whole. Meredith and I worked together, and created this fabulous pictures! 
Here are the layers:
October 01, 2006
Walter_Benjamin_Reaction
Walter Benjamin’s views on mechanical reproduction, state that once a piece of art has been reproduced, that its “aura,” or domain of tradition, has been detached . Before I came to an opinion of my own, I tried to find instances in which the “soul” of a piece of art, could be taken away. I immediately thought of my pottery teacher, David. David is an amazing artist. He creates the most beautiful ceramic pieces, that are both functional and decorative. Some of his work that is thrown on the pottery wheel, is so precise and perfectly proportioned, that it looks as though it could have been caste from a mold. To “mark” or “sign” his work, he sometimes puts a smudge on the bottom of the piece. The “smudge” is a simple wisk of his thumbprint. Thus, explicitly showing that his work was not mass produced.
Then I began to think about how I would feel if David’s work appeared on a shelf in Macys. My initial reaction was that I would be disappointed. But then I began to think a little more about why. Would I be upset because I think that his work would not look beautiful in a display window, or because I know that mass production bothers him? And then answer was simple: because I know it bothers him. I actually think that his work is so beautiful, that it could brighten anyone’s home, and brighten anyone’s mood that is engaging his pieces. So why not sell his work to the masses?
After dissecting this particular instance a little more, I think it comes down to the artist’s personal preference. If an artist does not wish to circulate their pieces because of the loss of aura, then I would have to respect that even if I do not agree.
September 25, 2006
Week_3_Summary
The first part of class was spent visiting my classmates' blogs. I found this exceptionaly helpful, as I was not able to accomplish one of my goals. (To upload an image of the King on my blog) When re-designing my blog I spent a majority of the time in the "Style Sheet" template, and overlooked the Main Index template, which is where I would load an image to appear the border. (Thanks for showing me how to do this, Daniel!)
The second part of class was spent discussing Marshall McLuhan's Understanding Media. Personally, I think McLuhan is not an easy read, but it was interesting to read someone's views on technology from years ago. (1964)
Lastly, we explored image distortion. Some examples were Katie Couric's 20 pound shave off and the addition/deletion of contestants on a Project Runway ad.
September 18, 2006
Week_2_Summary
Today's topic was html and cascading style sheets. I have never written html so this will be a challenge. I am planning on downloading BBedit to edit my html.
To re-design my CommLab blog, I plan to edit the colors of the site, and upload a picture of the King. (My old english bulldog)
September 17, 2006
Week_1_Article_Reaction
“e-learning 2.0 – how Web technologies are shaping education,” by Steve O’Hear, was particularly enlightening, mainly due to the timing in which I read the article. I am embarking on a new educational experience that fosters creative learning through online media sharing; a concept that I was not familiar with prior to attending the Interactive Telecommunications Program. The article gave me a chance to take a step back, and appreciate all of the resources that are now available to me as a student, and as an Internet user.
Prior to two weeks ago, I had never read or created a blog. I had heard of blogs, but had deemed them to be merely social networking tools. The article’s explanation of how teachers are utilizing them to “provide up-to-date information and commentary on their subject areas, as well as posting questions and assignments and linking to relevant new stories and websites,” really emphasized how this tool can be highly educational. By logging on to some of my course instructor’s wikis, I was able to look at various ITP students’ blogs, and get an idea on how my current assignments were conducted in the past.
Flickr is another media sharing tool that I was just recently introduced to. I am volunteering for the Inspiration Festival; a yearlong project (and an upcoming event) that fosters creativity in various forms: scientific discovery, technology, art, innovation, culture, inventions, human potential, and the future. My task was to find pictures on Flickr that were inspiring, and then write the artist to see if they would like to “tag” their photos and enable them to appear on the festival’s website. Prior to reading this article, I had only thought of Flickr as an enormous file-sharing tool. It did not occur to me to use this resource for presentation images, or discussions on artwork. I am now considering using Flickr, to post handbags that I have made.
O’Hear’s article on how Web technologies are shaping education, was informative and insightful. It summarized the positive impact that media-sharing can have on education, and highlighted the many uses that certain tools can help facilitate.
Week_1_Summary
Week1 of Communications Lab explored media-sharing resources in the form of search engines, blogs, wikis etc. We also read many different articles that commented on how different forms of online communication have shaped our lives, from both a positive and negative standpoint, and we wrote a reaction to one of these articles. One of the main points that I took away from this exercise was how useful blogs and other media-sharing tools can be to education.
Although we did concentrate on the vast amount of information available to on-line users, we also discussed how minimal information can also be very descriptive. Part of week 1’s assignment was to read several 55 word stories and then write one of our own. Both of our assignments (the article reaction assignment and the short story) were to be posted on a personal blog. I used blogger to create mine. I had never created a blog and enjoyed the process.
September 15, 2006
Week_1_55 Word Story
One car, three people and 1200 miles of driving made me irritable, overwhelmed and claustrophobic. Driving was intense, I wasn’t thinking clearly, and my face was as red as the flashing light on the dashboard. I pulled over. Grabbed the gun. Went to pull the trigger, but I heard, “Stop! You’re about to pump diesel!”