Project 2 Critiques and moving forward

During the critiques we received some of the following comments:

-Some liked the rustic box, could be redone

-Some electrical bumps

-Hinges were not a favorite- looked sloppy and thrown together

-Liked the backpack/nomadic theme

-Everybody really liked the overall purpose

-Should demonstrate real world use / trials

-Could somehow scan the pictures to document each piece of art

-Liked idea of each piece of art having equal value, takes out power/money/subjectivity

-Many people thought that it was exciting and something that they would want to interact with

As a result we have decided to:

-Modify a camera to be able to take snapshot of each picture once it is inserted (this would be triggered by an infrared sensing circuit which would turn the switch to the '1' or  'on' level on the camera...thus asking it to take a picture as the new picture reaches the tray)

-New hinges/housing

-Update mechanics and troubleshoot electrical bugs

-Update and validate programming files

-Take it out into the real world for a trial run!

proj 3...inspired by blood & organs

Project 3

Concepts into First Steps!

First sketches of idea specifications:

Kevin D. fitting the backpack frame:

Taking apart the printer and analyzing how it works:

Complete frame with completely gutter 'printer':

Here I was testing the first step of the mechanical/electronic
 integration with the existing printer:
'

Instead of being fed from a tray of paper, the plan is to enable the user to input art and have another piece of art returned from the same side!  This creates a large amount of work for us because every aspect of this must be very precisely engineered to function properly.

Automated Exchange of Art...Great but how?!

The idea that my group decided on is pretty much an automated exchange of art.

We are all really excited about this, especially because it is really merging technology with a form of social change...via an exchange of art.  You dont have to visit a gallery to see or obtain art....instead we will facilitate it!

Group Defined Constraints:

-Must be portable

-Must use Arduino

-Must effectively facilitate exchange of art

-Scale must be relatively small...what we figured would fit in an oversized backpack

-Form- simple....that way it wont take away from the art itself or the beauty of the idea overall

Since one of our group members already had an oversized (camping) backpack, the scale of the project was largely catered to this constraint in terms of size.  When we went looking for components to make the mechanical system of the device, we ran across an old printer.  This could then be modified and then added to  make up the mechanical drivers! Very exciting!

Project 2 Initial Inspirations

Our initial idea was do have a donation box setup stemming off something simple like:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9EQRezJf8Q

Thinking more about technology and social change we came up with things such as :

-Creating an area where, if danced on, music would be played as a result
-A way to collect money and as a result supply the donor with a fact or statistic (awareness)

However, we really wanted to hone into an on campus issue that has an effect on many people in this department.  We decided to focus on the fact that the student art gallery is no longer available for exhibit.  Thus, we figured we could make a donation box for collection towards a new space.

But, bringing the whole issue of money and thus power into art almost defeats the purpose.  This is how our initial idea evolved from an automated intelligent donation box to an automated exchange of art.  Using technology to facilitate the exchange of art.  How fitting given the course!

A leap ahead to project 3 for just a smidge....