An experiment in rapid prototyping. Vase models were rendered in Maya and 3D Printed at the Advanced Media Studio. The outcome was a voronoi topology which combined individual pieces into a meta structure.

Phil @ Make: asked me to create an intro which used influences from the “Magical World of Disney.” The full 720p HD file is hosted at Vimeo.

Membrain is a project made by Yasser Ansari, Bruno Kruse and myself for the ITP Winter Show 2008. The installation explores the idea of a collective memory and challenges the traditionally separate notions of the past and present. Membrain constructs a reality that is based simultaneously on the past and present experiences of a group.

Membrain was recently featured on the front page of MAKE Magazine!

Membrain reconstructs the present with images and events from the past. Through this process, observers are reminded of the connection to their past memories and the impacts those experiences have on their perception of the current world. Additionally, membrain explores the idea of a collective memory.

At the center of the Membrain project is a live video display and an interactive object representing a communal brain. Observers interact with the communal brain through proximity and touch while the live video display shows what the brain is seeing. In its default state, the brain is constantly scanning for people and possible social interactions. Once the brain detects presence, a series of carefully scripted events take place. As observers approach, the brain will begin to glow brighter. When an observer touches the brain, the brain achieves full brightness and the video display will zoom into the individual pixels that are being used to construct the live video. These pixels are all previous images captured by the brain. If the interaction is sustained and a face is detected for longer than a few seconds, a new snapshot is taken and added as a memory. This memory becomes part of the communal or collective memory. Once the snapshot is taken and added to the collective memory, observers will be able to view the most recent image by touching the brain and zooming in. The video will zoom back out as the observer’s hands move away. Once the observer walks away, the brain will fall back to its dimly lit state awaiting further interaction.

I’m excited to be working with Phil Torrone, the senior editor of MAKE Magazine. He made a post about it today on the MAKE blog! Can’t wait to meet the MAKE crew and all the amazing people related to the industry: hackers, artists, tinkerers, designers, DIY’ers, et al.

Utilizing Soyoung Park’s condenser mic report, serial data was sent to Processing and analyzed. Within Processing, the Ess library is set up to play specific wave files when a microphone level is reached. The intention was to make a beatbox machine but the condenser microphone is limited in scope. 

Great colloquy with Jennifer van der Meer, addressing sustainable innovation and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). With an arsenal of industry experience, her facts were accurate and opinions poignant. This acute awareness is indispensable when differentiating between idealistic cultural/mental shifts regarding sustainability and attacking the problem head-on during early phases of LCA. She believes that responsible design plays a significant role in reducing the footprint of a product. 

        As an experiment in experience discovery, the M5 is an inexhaustible source of sensory substance. The ebb and flow of chaotic randomness reveals itself to be a complex oppidan dance of a highly orgranized organism. Amorphous shapes blurring into each other and lacking distinct outlines, existing purely in a state of metaphysical homeostasis.
        Neoteric monoliths engulf the skyline. Evidence of the multidimensional and esoteric nature of Manhattan, as viewed from the window of a bus. Private lives colliding in a public sphere as a minuet choreographed by a limitless flow of interactions. A dance of chaos indiscernible to most. Existing in a fine balance between the micro and macro fabric, where human trajectories are real and beautiful endeavours of self-pursuit and external cooperation. An ambiguous melange of cultures, identities, and ideologies.

Utilizing galvanic skin response, Bruno Kruse and myself developed a reactive interface. The intention is to measure the difference in skin resistance between two people. In doing so, we determine those who are closest in resistance and thereby appropriate a “love connection.” Check out the Flickr set. And the code is available here.

This was my first ever Ignite and I must say it was entirely enjoyable. Meeting Bre Pettis, was one of the highlights, but there was also a cupcake decorating contest and an open bar! The format of the talks is especially attention grabbing, since each speaker only has five minutes.

Ignite NYC @ New World Stages
Krikorian Raffi: Open database for energy consumption
Deb Schultz: Alley vs Valley
Jennifer Pahlka: Technology Anxiety: Jello and Web 3.0
Sam Lessin: A brief history of privacy in our data-deluged world
Don Carli: Carbon Footprint of Banner Ads, Emails and Websites
Andrew Schneider: Experimental Devices for Performance
Audacia Ray: Porn as a front runner in technology innovations…

This is an attempt to get a biometric reading using an IR LED  and IR detector. The code is relatively simple, in which a threshold is set by a pentiometer to get an accurate reading by amplifying and thereby mapping the analog signal. Here’s a quick and dirty video of it in action: