I’ve made a thing.
It is part of Jie Qi’s research for her PhD at the MIT Media Lab into the way in which artists and makers approach circuitry in a creative way. We were given these materials to play with:
And made a big mess.
It’ll be on display in Boston in the summer. Here it is in action:
I got home the other day and found this *wonderful* book on my doorstep. It is a Digital DIY book for girls, called Hack’s Selbst!, edited by Chris Köver
It is full of projects that could inspire girls, most of the authors are women working in tech, and there is almost no pink (even though I like pink). A tutorial for the laptop sticker I made a while ago is featured in the “hacking” chapter, the layout is beautiful, which is about all I can say as I do not read German.
Such great news: my work has been selected to be part of a residency-professional-development-seed-funding programme called MV Works, which has been created by Makerversity and is funded by Arts Council England and Innovate UK through their Arts and Technology Pilot Programme.
This means that I am now a member of one of the coolest spaces in London to make stuff: Makerversity. It also means I’ll have some support in the new year to develop the phone+book project I was working on in the summer. There are 8 other artists or companies also on the program and I’m looking forward to getting to know them -they are a talented bunch!
In October I was invited to the other Cambridge in MASSACHUSETTS. I grew up in Cambridge ENGLAND and it has been a life long dream to go to the other famous Cambridge city. And apart from enjoying the view from the other side of the Atlantic, I was working at NuVu studio, an “innovation” high school where students learn through the design process.
I ran a 2 week studio based on making interactive tools for the local bus route #1. We started the studio by riding the bus, and then went through various design processes to end the fortnight with some really interesting projects.
NuVus is a really unique place, I love the community, and hopefully I’ll be returning in 2016 for more studio fun.
Hey peeps. It’s been quiet on the blog.beccarose.co.uk front for the past few months due to a wonderful journey I started this September. I got back to England and moved my things to London to start an MA in Design at Goldsmiths. I am in the Education group and we are studying modules like “Radical Pedagogies” and learning about design and education, and education and design. Fascinating stuff.
Rad.
If you are interested, I’ve made a micro-site where I am documenting the things I make this year. Have a look here –> http://research.beccarose.co.uk/
The idea behind Human Breadboards grew out of the Education group discussion at the 2015 eTextile Camp (there is a detailed post the about breadth of these discussions here). Working collaboratively, we developed a non-kit-kit called the Kit of Process, which is a online library of swatches designed for educators to learn and teach eTextiles. We spent a lot of time sharing experiences and ideas, and the Human Breadboards came a bit later.
Human Breadboards came about when we started to think beyond the idea of a static swatch, and centre ideas around learning in multiple dimensions. As a concept it was not as developed as much as some of the other ideas we had, however discussions were (are) happening right at then end of the camp, on the train home, and on email, so we are hoping to developing this idea much further. For now though, I’ve made some illustrations that punctuate some key points we discussed to give an overview of the idea surrounding Human Breadboards.
Step 1: THE SWATCH
As part of our teaching we use swatches to illustrate concepts. 28 of us laboriously made, and lovingly exchanged 28 swatches for the eTextile swatch exchange. Hannah and Mika’s DIY site, How to Get What you Want, is crammed full of intricately sewn swatches, and is a huge inspiration. A swatch is a microcosm: a small insight into a much bigger picture. It is the tip of the ice-burg, and it holds a world of potential inside. In creating a new swatch we are simultaneously cataloging knowledge and developing skills, which is the premise on which our education group developed the Kit of Process.
We love swatches. However, we also understand their limitations. One of which is that a swatch is an abstract object: through their non-representational form (usually square) and static nature, swatches could be confusing or misunderstood by a learner.
Step 2: MODULAR SWATCHES
So how about we get our swatches and link them to each other. We make them modular, a swatch connects to a number of different swatches: inputs, outputs, processing -kind of like a fabric little-bits. We give our swatch more dimensions, possibilities, and functions. And we start to tell stories.
Step 3: SPATIAL SWATCHES
And what happens if we go even further, and we give our modular swatches space?
This is what we started to test, and began to ask at the camp: what do we learn when we are leaning with reference to people, the body, the space around us? and how do we are respond to movement, to the heat of the summer, and moisture of the air?
An underlying foundation to eTextiles is that it is a spatial discipline: it is either about the body, place, or environment. And, more often than not, it is movement based. This is where Human Breadboards exists, it is a prototyping tool, just like a regular breadboard, however the prototyping exists in the same dimensions as the discipline. This is the beginning of Human Breadboarding.
4. TESTING
Above are some of the thoughts and ideas we discussed in our group, but did we actually make a “human breadboard”?
Yes! At least, we made some initial tests to develop a prototype of a Human Breadboard* that uses connectors, wearable swatches, and wearable sensor readings (in progress) on the body. Testing the swatches was more complex than we had anticipated. The big issue was connections (as always), and we developed some custom connections as a solution.
*a prototype of a prototyping tool, now that’s some meta goings on!
Custom connectors up close.
Some quick sketches of formats: swatches on a belt, a top, or as gloves.
A wearable swatch in action.
The Human Breadboards concept resonates with a lot of the work I’ve been doing in education over the past year or so, and I hope to research more into how multi-dimensional learning* could be used in teaching traditionally technical subjects (such as programming and electronics). I’ll be starting an MA course this month (more on that soon), and I’d like to take the multi-dimensional-technical-learning road in my research.
*a term I just made up, but as with most things you think up, I am pretty sure there must be a whole body of research with the same name, and I hope to find that soon.
A few weeks back I arrived safely home from what was an inspiring, fascinating thought provoking, and utterly delicious eTexiles Summer Camp. The camp was geared around eTextiles and soft-circuitry, and is an annual event for practitioners, artists, and researchers making work in those areas. Almost 40 of us camped out for a week in the French countryside. We were staying at Les Moulin de Paillard, a beautiful mill-turned-potters-studio-tuned-contemporary-art-space over looking a corner of the Loir, now run by artists Shelly and James. The week was was stacked full of geeking out on materials and processes, fascinating discussions with focus groups, workshops, huge dinners next to the river, chickens, much wine, new friendships, and bloom the cat.
I am going to attempt to briefly summarize some of what happened at the camp. If you are interested in finding out more about the camp in general, have a look at their site. Or you can see at the images on flickr in the links below.
1. Education Focus Group
For most of the camp I joined a group that focused on Educational Toolkits for eTextiles, I collaborated with Emilie, Anja, Lara, Zoe, Liza, and Wendy and we disused and shared our ideas around etextiles education.
2. Kit of Process
Our group discussions lead us down the Kit of Process path: a kit that functions as a learning and teaching tool. It is not a “kit” in the traditional sense, as there are no components, but it is a kit in that it is a collection of parts that can be assembled to make something. We were specifically interested in process, not final outcomes, so when using the kit you would not be making a product, instead you are making “swatches” which are part of the process of making of a product (hence the name).
The format of the kit would be an online library of resources, and through the process of making the kit, you are learning, and also developing a physical library of your own resources for teaching.
If you are interested in learning more about the education group, you can check our group post, which goes into much more detail and has lots of lovely pictures.
3. Human Breadboards
Human breadboards (HBs) grew out of the Kit of Process discussions. We didn’t have a lot of time to develop the idea, but the initial concept is that HBs are real-time-real-space prototyping tools that allow students to learn in context. eTextiles by nature is a spatial, environmental, and physical discipline, and we spent some time trying to understand how this translated to education tools.
I’ve written a bit more about HBs here, and I am really interested in developing some of these ideas further.
4. Printing Galore
I was very inspired and fascinated by the techniques the print focus group were making. The image above shows some of their experiments.
I tried out some tests using liquid crystal and thermochromatic, and really excited about integrating these techniques into some of my live animation work….but I am somewhat put off by the hefty price tag on a jar of this paint. May have to get a piggy bank. See more pics of the print room here.
5. Laser Looms
Zoe lead a wonderful weaving workshop using laser cut looms. Laser looms are an accessible way to make some lovely weaving quite quickly. The design is simple and can be reproduced by anyone in the world (providing you have some kind of CNC cutting device. See more image of the workshop here, and some of the looms I made at the Bristol hackerspace after the workshop here.
All the way back in April I made this rather fun “concept” film about how blooming wonderful our hands are, and the absence of this wonder when using a phone.
The film was part of an application for the Ideo Fortnight residency. And low and behold the lovely folk of Ideo liked my ideas, and I was selected to be one of the Artist in residence in Ideo’s London office.
I was the fourth and final artist to be part of the studio last July (the other artists were Alan, Jacob, and Natsai). And although I loved every-designery-minute of the fortnight, it was incredibly challenging. Through the input of the studio, and (somewhat unfair?) pressure I put on myself, I achieved more that I thought would be possible in 2 weeks.
I spent 2 weeks working on some ideas gearing around storytelling, books, and embedded technology that I have been tinkering with for a few years now -some of which I presented at BV studio back in 2012. In the end I made a really lovely book that tells stories by connecting to a phone (or this this case a tablet), and we had a wrap party (which included lots of pizza, beer, and interactive edible music) to share the ideas we played with over the fortnight. There is loads of room for development and I am working on the next phase of this concept. More details and picture of the process can be found on the Fortnight micro site.
Testing and developing ideas with the wonderful and lively Ideo team.
Small prototypes of the pages
The book unfolds like a paper theatre
Device in place and the pages trigger animations to tell the story.
All images by Alex Whiting
The summer is nearly over, and I have finally planted my little feet back in Bristol. Dave and I moved ourselves via various European destinations back to sometimes sunny sometimes rainy England.
I am sad to leave SF, but my summer has been so busy that I have been distracted* by what that actually feels like, and I am just starting to process the loss of a city we made home for 2 years. A lot happened in that time, and we both grew, in ourselves and in our work. And whist I try to process what it all means, I’ll try not to wax too emotional on you all and leave you this with picture of Dave and I, with our friend Justin, packing up our little Mission apartment. Very serious business.
*Posts about the summer “distractions” coming up!
Series of paper switches I designed for the second part of the e-luminated paper circuits workshop at SFCB. I used the Silhouette to pre-cut paper samples that students could use in the workshop to learn about some of the possibilities.
The sampler as constructed by one of the class participants
Spin switch
Tab switch
Push Switch
Slider switch
Diagram of the circuit.
Things made by Becca Rose 