 |
|||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||
p r o t o t y p i n g (link) p o s t e r s & v i d e o s (link) c o u r s e p o l i c i e s (link) c o u r s e c u l t u r e (link) d e s i g n m e t h o d s s t u d e n t e x a m p l e s
|
 |
Tangible Interaction Design S T U D I O P R E R E Q U I S I T E S | E N R O L L M E N T | Cap of 12 students S Y L L A B U S | S E E A L S O M Y D E A 6 2 1 0 a n d D E A 2 7 3 0 Tangible Interaction Design Studio develops physical devices responsive to people and the planet. Three learning outcomes are expected of this course. This studio course is designed to guide you in designing meaningful solutions, while also encouraging exploration of who we are, how we engage with the world, and our place within it. "In order to understand things, we have to build them." R E A D I N G S - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - • Paul Dourish. Embodied Interaction. MIT Press, 2001. T H E P O W E R O F A S M A L L C L A S S - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Unlike a large lecture class at Cornell, this small class offers a unique opportunity for meaningful conversation, discovery, and collaboration. Don’t miss out on this chance to engage! To ensure attendance, a sign-in sheet will be available during the first ten minutes of each session. Additionally, a significant portion of your grade will be based on your active participation in collaborative learning and discovery. C L A S S O R G A N I Z A T I O N - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - A typical class follows this sequence: 0. Ahead of each class session, each student (assignment-1) or student team (assignment-2) will upload to our shared folder documents (if any) they would like reviewed by the class, and will come prepared with specific aspects of their developing work thatthey would like considered by the class. Your status report can be a physical model, a powerpoint slide, a digital image (e.g., a 3D model), a Word document, or any other document that communicates the status of design development. For demos, you simply share your current physical prototype; or, you can take a smartphone video of your working prototype, upload the video (or a URL to it) to our shared folder, and share the video with us. 1. At the start of class, the professor will make announcements (if any) and present pertinent content (if any for that given class session) 3. Following the status reports by students, the professor and TA will work with each student or student team to help develop their work. About class organization, more broadly, please also review course culture: link. S C H E D U L E B Y W E E K - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Week 01.20 | Course Intro | Assignment-1 Intro - - - - your design concept should be clear; time to laser-cut, 3D-print, order stuff - - - - A S S I G N M E N T S - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - There are two assignments for this course. The first assignment, undertaken by each student, is intended to be a fast-paced engagement. The second assignment is undertaken by teams of 2-4 students and provides a longer, deeper development of the design following a trajectory like this:
Team composition for the second assignment will be formed by the instructor(s) based partly on proposals pitched in class by class members. Keep in mind: this course asks you to develop interactive, physical artifacts that have at least one input and one output which moves physical mass. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Assignment-1 | An interactive box offering temporal and emotional connectivity. The first assignment will take inspiration from Richard McGuire graphic novel, Here (1989). The book presents the same location in space at different points in time --mostly a living room in a home (this room, empty, is pictured above). In the images showing the room in 1995 and 2015, we see (presumably) the same five people posing together for a portrait. The images of the same people at two different points in time offer a rich source of inspiration for creating interactive devices that explore temporal and emotional connections. Using the Grove kit you are provided, develop an interactive, physical device at small scale that connects either (a.) one person in the portrait speaking to him/her/their self across time (e.g., an adult female speaking to herself as a girl), or (b.) one adult speaking to another as a child (e.g., the youngest adult speaking to the oldest child). You will be asked to write a scenario that offers the circumstances (regrets, wishes, gratitude, loss, ...) of the person or two people you are designing for, addressing the themes of time, memory, and human connection. Practically, you will develop an interactive device that offers a minimalist yet expressive way to communicate time, memory, and connection through simple hardware components. The focus here is on using limited hardware and physical materials to create a meaningful interaction between the past and present, whether it’s through gradual transitions, feedback loops, and/or symbolic physical movement. The kind of artifact you are striving for is small in scale, whimsical/poetic, beautifully fabricated (in hi-fidelity), interactive in simple ways, and meaningful and purposeful. You are encouraged to construct your box enclosure from the corrugated plastic panels provided in class. If you need a different size or shaped corrugated plastic enclosure, or if you wish to cut-out or engrave the surfaces of the panels, or if wish to use MDF or acrylic instead of corrugated plastic, work with our partners in the D2FS on laser-cutting panels to-size from digital files you generate using CaseMaker. In any case, your finished product must not have ink-pen writing or coloring on it, or use craft materials like cotton balls or craft paper; any inscriptions should be subtracted by laser-cutter engraving; color should come from the LED stick provided. You are permitted (and even encouraged) to cut material away from the panels by laser-cutter or mat knife. You may also add on to your box other features that are meticulously fabricated and purposeful. The battery pack provided must go inside your box with all your electronics; design an elegant way for users to recharge the device. You do not have to generate code on your own: you can select one of the codes provided under the heading below, “Arduino Codes You Can Copy & Paste.” (An effective way to tailor your code to your wants without coding experience is to use ChatGPT as described below.) "Design is the process of creating solutions within constraints." Limit yourself to using only the Grove electronics and box panels provided. Ensure that the battery and all electronics fit inside the box, and that the battery is accessible for recharging. If you diverge from the panels provided, generate your cut-files using CaseMaker and work with the D2FS to have these cut. Don't make the mistake of creating a prototype that is not meticulously designed and fabricated; prototypes that look like craft projects created by a child will be graded accordingly. Intellectually, your "small" assignment may take inspiration from the boxes of artist Joseph Cornell (one such box is in Cornell's Johnson Museum of Art), the words of Brian Eno (producer of, e.g., Coldplay's "Viva La Vida", ambient music pioneer, and member or the band Roxy Music), and three perspectives on affective computing / designing for emotion:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Assignment 2 | Flux Furniture Chapter 6 of my book, Architectural Robotics (MIT Press, 2016) poses the question, "How can things...as familiar as insects or furnishings reconfigure themselves...to be something else? How can "A" become "B"? As considered in my chapter, this was a question that perplexed Aristotle, the ancient Greek philosopher and scientist. According to Aristotle, the process of metamorphosis demonstrated that neither A (e.g., caterpillar) nor B (butterfly) are sufficient, “whole” entities in and of themselves; they are, instead, mutually dependent—coupled, bound—with A anticipating the arrival of B, and B following from A. Later in the same work, Aristotle equated the process of metamorphosis with the workings of robots ("'miraculous' automatic puppets") and with the building of a house: It is possible that A should move B, and B move C, and that the process should be like that of the 'miraculous' automatic puppets: the parts of these automatons, even while at rest, have in them, somehow or other, a potentiality...just as the activity of building causes the house to get built. For Assignment 2, you are asked to work in teams of 2-4 students to design a table, stool, or bench that physically transforms based on changes in the environment, such as the number or behaviors of people in the room, changes in ambient light or sound levels, or .... The table might extend or retract, change shape, or adjust its surface texture and/or color in response to these stimuli. This furniture, while inspired by the metamorphosis of caterpillar-to-butterfly, is different in that it does not transform from state A to B, but is instead in flux: a fluid, adaptable nature—ongoing, seamless changing from A to B (to C?), (back to A?), to [...]. This project challenges you to think about adaptive furniture that responds not just to user input but to the broader context in which they exist, blurring the lines between object and environment. Draft a scenario for why the furniture you design is transforming in the ways it does, for what purposes, where, at which times of day, for whom. For a fun inspiration, and a great example of a GIF, here is one take on flux furniture: Loop chair. You are encouraged to construct your furniture mostly from MDF with (maybe?) details in acrylic, plastic, or ..... You are encouraged to consider cutting-out or engraving the MDF surfaces of the panels. Work with our partners in the D2FS on laser-cutting panels to-size from digital files you generate using CaseMaker or otherwise, if you wish. As with Assignment-1, you do not have to generate code on your own: you can select one of the codes provided under the heading below, “Arduino Codes You Can Copy & Paste.” (An effective way to tailor your code to your wants without coding experience is to use ChatGPT as described below.) G R A D I N G / G R A D I N G R U B R I C - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Please review carefully the Course Policies (link). These policies are not negotiable except under grave circumstances. Throughout this course—an intimate and intensive “conversation” across students and the professor— students will have ample opportunity to receive feedback on their work. Here is my grading rubric for the two major assignments. The list that follows names and describes the graded components for this course. Each component is worth so many points, as shown in red type. The sum of all of these components equals the final grade of 100 points. The numerical scale for grading is as follows: A+ (98–100), A (93–97), A- (90–92), B+ (88–89), B (83–87), B- (80–82), C+ (78–79), C (73–77), C- (70–72), D+ (68–69), D (65–67), D- (below 65). [10 points] attendance, participation.
[45 points total] Assignments 1 and 2 [rubric], each of three components:
|
 |
||||||
 |
|||||||||
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Metamorphosis: Caterpillar - Chrysalis - Butterfly.