Monday, March 26, 2012

Week 12: Final Sketch Research Presentations

This week we will be presenting our ideas and research for our final project.

Our group has decided to create a running jacket with feedback LED's that will assist in training for marathons such as the Sun Run.

The initial feedback and programming will be based off of the Sun Run training program.

Found some interesting projects that were sort of similar to ours, specifically an LED lit bike jacket. The bike jacket's only purpose is to give extra light for riding at night. We wanted our jacket to have further function by giving feedback on training.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Week 11: Final Sketch Prep

This week we have formed our groups for the final project. We have 5 members in our group now, each of us with strengths that we can use towards making an amazing project.

For monday our group will be handing in a deliverable, our first chance to showcase our groups talents, and work together.

This week we also handed in our final reading assignment. We were to choose 1 reading out of a selected list. The reading I chose was on Sprout I/O. I found this extremely interesting. Sprout I/O is intended to be an interactive textile interface. It was inspired by the way threads in a carpet react to weight when they are stepped on, and how they retain their shape once the weight is removed.

I chose this one not only because I found it extremely interesting, but it reminded me of another project that I had learned about, an interactive display where the colour shapes and textures change depending on the light and speed of the display.

The display is made up of multiple small spinning discs with black and white patterns on it. Depending on the speed and direction that the discs spin, it creates the illusion of texture and different patterns. The intended purpose of this installation, is to create an interactive art and display experience, something that may be found in museums or even night clubs.

I first learned about this projet at Siggraph 2011 here in Vancouver, I worked with the creator Yoichi Ochiai for the majority of my time at Siggraph. Here I learned all about his explorations in interactive media and arts.

More can be found on his work here: http://96ochiai.ws/cyclonedisplay.html

Overall I would love to see more works such as Sprout I/O and Cyclone Display, and to learn more about the ideas and technologies behind them.

Week 10: Sketch 2 Presentations

This week we handed in our sketch 2. Our group managed to finish an awesome scarf, completely hand knitted by my partner Francesca. Sewn in was a small servo motor that was re-programmed to rotate 360 degrees, in order to tighten the scarf comfortably around the wearers neck.

The servo motor that we used was originally intended to only rotate 180 degrees, which was then reprogrammed so that it would go 360 degrees.

there was a thread tied to the wheel on the motor, that would slowly wind around the motor, pulling the inside of the scarf closer to the users neck.




Overall our presentation went well. We were asked to bring the project in again to lecture Wednesday for further inspection, as during our initial presentation the motor had burnt out.

Monday, March 5, 2012

Week 9: Motors

This week in lab we will be focusing on working on sketch 2, and learning about using motors with arduino.

Servo Library : Library for controlling motors in Arduino
examples: servo: - here you can find different example patches for the different motors.

For our sketch 2, we will be using a round servo motor. it has 3 wires.
Black - ground
red - 5volt arduino
yellow - signal wire

The following week will be working on sketch 2 in class.


For the rest of this class, will be showing off our in lab assignments of our first textiles.

For our group, we got the code fully working with the bread board, using a button to turn the lights on and off, alternating between colours.

But when we connected the arduino to our headband, the program didn't work. We had difficulty figuring out the circuit with the conductive thread, but spoke to Greg about our project.

He was impressed with the sewing skills used on the textile, and explained what we would want to do and focus on for our sketch 2 in order to get the textile with the arduino code working together.

We are going to be focusing on making clean circuits in the textile itself, incorporating resistors. Especially making and tail ends of thread extremely short in order to not short out the circuit.

Sketch 2: Progress

Sketch 2 has been going quite smoothly, and from the help of our lab exercises, online resources and teaching staff, we've been heading on the right track with this.

We've settled on creating a scarf that will curl up around your neck to keep you warm when it detects that the ideal temperature in the area around the wearer has dropped down.

So far Francesca has knitted an infinity scarf for our Sketch.

After talking to Greg, we've decided that we are going to use a small round motor that is at the bottom of the scarf (hanging from the wearer's neck) this way, we will be able to create a pully system.

The motor will pull on a string or thread contained within the scarf, winding up to pull the motor closer to the wearers neck.

More updates later.

Week 8 - Learning Wearables

This week the goal is to start working on planning our Sketch 2, as well as working on our soft circuit lab project.

 Our group is planning on creating a bracelet for the soft circuit assignment due Wednesday in lecture. By using a slider, we will have the LED light blink faster or slower depending on where the slider is moved.

For our sketch, we are planning on creating a Toque or a scarf with a flower on it, the flower will contain a sensor that will detect either light / moisture or temperature. We are aiming more towards the temperature. The higher the temperature is, the flower will open, but the lower the temperature goes, the flower will close.

The original thought was a hat that detects rain.

Friday, February 17, 2012

Week 7: Reading Break

This week has been coming up with ideas for our sketch 2: interactive textile.

We've decided to create a touque that will be able to detect whether its raining or not. using a moisture sensor, or temperature sensor.