At the ITP Show!

Our Final Project in the ITP Show!

Our final project made it to the ITP Show!

Zoetry In Motion

Robert Clark, Dave Gordon, Florica Vlad

Witness high-tech three-dimensional animated sculptures operating in real-space and real-time, inspired by early motion-picture devices.

http://itp.nyu.edu/~bmy1/video/eyeball.MOV

See here for a full discription:

http://itp.nyu.edu/show/spring2007/detail.php?project_id=1458

Arthur Ganson

This week the artist Arthur Ganson came to give a lecture at ITP and our class was very lucky to be able to go listen to his talk. His work is very quirky and whimsical and highly inventive – it also uses technology in a very unconventional way. His work does not focus on electronics – his pieces are engineering feats. Gadgets and gizmos are in the service of poetry. His works are set to motion by hand-cranks and gears and all the functioning apparatuses are very transparent. They have fascinating titles like “Machine with Artichoke Petal” or “Dododecapede”. They are “karmic” machines set off by fate, machines that correspond with the user by writing cursive notes and machines that love oil, fabric, feathers, baby dolls and wishbones.

To see his work: http://www.arthurganson.com/

Here is one of my favorite pieces:

Photosensors

This week we worked with photosensors. See the video here: http://itp.nyu.edu/~fv237/ICM/photo/photosensor.mov 

Week 5 – Processing

This week we worked with Processing. Wiring up the Arduino with a potentiometer and using the visualization environment of  Processing to move a ball on the screen – up and down depending on how you manipulate the physical device.

Week 2 – Arduino

This week Tim and Ben and I teamed up to set up our Arduinos. First we went in the woodshop and cut out wooden stands for our Arduino boards, then we installed the Arduino environment.

For the lab we set up two alternating blinking LEDS. Which can be seen here: http://itp.nyu.edu/~bmy1/video/arduino001.mov

Next we wanted to set up two rows of LEDS so that we could race them. But because we were running low on resisters we decided to use a block LED with rows of lights embedded within it – one switch would control the first four lights on the display, the other the last four – so in a sense, whoever could get the center first would win. We incorporated the two standing LEDS from the previous setup and used the green light to signal go and the red light to signal stop.

Here is a video of our lab: http://itp.nyu.edu/~bmy1/video/battle2.mov

Week 4 – Analog Out & Servo Motors

This week we are working with servo motors. Creating a moving mechanism is very exciting and opens up many possiblities. A while back I was very interested to see the movie Science of Sleep by Michel Gondry, which utilizes a lot of physical computing projects and do-it yourslef gizmos. One of the most fascinating objects that was made for the movie is a piano that has a video screen attached to it – when you press a key you see a video of another person playing that same key, if you press two keys you see two videos, and so on and on until a maximum of 16 frames of video is displayed. It is very whimisical and clever. The piano was part of an exhibit at Deitch Gallery and was titled “The Science of Sleep: an exhibition of sculpture and creepy pathological little gifts”.

a p-comp piano at the Deitch Gallery as part of the Science of Sleep show

Here is Tim and I playing with servo motors: http://itp.nyu.edu/~ts1200/Pcomp/Week4Lab/Servo.mov

Week 3 – Analog In

This week I partnered with Ben and Tim to create a little game. Tim has purchased a set of  joysticks that he plans to use for the final project and we decided to test them out as variable sensors and with that produce a processing display on screen. What we ended up doing is using the monitor feature in the Arduino environment to make a “love meter.” Each joystick had a different value and when you touched them you could see a live result on screen. It could read “indifferent” or “adorable” depending on how you moved the joysticks.
You can see a small video of the results here: http://itp.nyu.edu/~ts1200/Pcomp/Week3Lab/PcompLab3.mov

Here is a picture taken on the computer as we are working.

Observation Assignment Discussion

In class we discussed our observation assignements and since mine was such a vast topic – the computer itself – we talked at length about technology and notions of progress. We talked about haptic response and the recreation of tactile experiences despite technological advances as an important notion in interaction design. I questioned the progress that seperates us from the natural world and our instincts. I feel cities are in a constant battle against the natural world and technology itself should not be taken as a given – there are many pleasures in seeminlgy mundane tasks – but beyond this simply becuase the technology exists does not necessarily make it progress.

Observation Assignment

Back slanted and hunching forward, shoulders up and arms bent, eyes fixed. Using the computer demands that you sit down for long stretches of time. Breaks are infrequent. Eyes are unblinking for large periods and concentration is immersed on a stretch of screen, the light of which emanates out and covers everything in an unnatural hue.

 The computer requires the user to sit down and access information by use of a keyboard and a mouse – the only inputs through which the machine senses the human presence. Computer use isolates the human – the human must come to the computer and sit down to interface with the computer in its environment – it is a solitary action that fixes attention and isolates activity to a few movements.

 All humans of the developed world interact with a computer in this way. Enslaved to a desk, suffering from back problems, eye problems, inaction and obesity. Very few take the recommended amount of breaks – very few explore alternative ways of accessing information. Reliance on computer technology increases and increases – and human quality of life diminishes in this unnatural environment.

 I am dreaming of an unconventional computer – one that will give me access to information while allowing me the freedom of movement that is natural to me. I am dreaming of a computer that improves my quality of life and does not restrict me to sitting down behind a desk.