Last March I had the opportunity to teach an openMaterials workshop at the very special École Supérieure d’Art d’Aix-en-Provence (France). It was part of a larger event in which the school invited researchers and artists from several fields to lead a one week class for 2nd year art students. The goal was to show them different technologies and materials, which they’d later use on an art project. Besides my smart materials class, there was also an astrobiology workshop by Andy Gracie and a video class by Douglas Stanley.

I was so impressed with the work done by these young students that I can’t resist sharing some photos and descriptions of their projects. These were kindly sent by the very talented artist and teacher France Cadet, who guided the students during the making of their final projects.

Barbed Wire by Morgane Guiard
Morgane wanted to represent barbed wire on her art piece. At first she tried to work with fiber optics: the images on the screen were supposed to drive the might to the fiber optics and make the data travel trough. This structure turned out to be really nice and poetic but also very fragile. She eventually broke it and decided to go with red EL wire. This time she put the display behind the barbed wire and made the EL blink according to the speed of the increasing number of victims shown on the screen (the number of victims barbed wire made during 3 different wars).

Interactive Tapestry by Sarah Martinis and Caroline Geneste
Sarah and Caroline made an interactive tapestry (a bit like “toile de Jouy” with some bone sprinted on it). The patterns were fitted with copper electrodes connected to several capacitive sensors. They were playing 8 different yelling sounds and used a sport electronic hacked device with a few electrodes around the wrist.

EL Dress by Amélie Djellel
Amelie used EL wire and a few handmade conductive fabric sensors to create a touch sensitive seethru dress. Each sensor triggered different strands of EL wire shaped inside the dress and representing forms between the meridians, the veins and the organs. The brightness of the EL changed according to the pressure applied on the sensors.

Color Changing Suit & Dance Performance by Lou Feraud
Lou created a suit sprinkled with UV active (color changing) beads and ink. She then wore it during a dance performance, in which she held some UV LEDs at the tips of each finger on one hand, and bright LEDs on the other hand.

Color Changing Stickers by Mélanie Cartier
Mélanie also used UV active ink to create stickers with the radioactive logo to evoke the memory of the radioactive accident and its invisible repercussions.

Animal by Huna Ruel
Huna used conductive fabric sensors to create a little animal that moves when touched (contracting its head and tail). She then covered it with latex. Unfortunately, once dry the latex shrank a bit and caused the sensors to be on at all times.

During the workshop, Amélie and I made some cards with different types of handmade sensors (using paper, conductive fabric, and velostat) to be kept at the school as a reference. The beautiful drawings and neat handwriting are hers :)

Thank you to all the fun and talented students and their awesome teachers France Cadet, Jean Pierre Mandon and Laurent Costes for a really great week!

More than a photo

Augmented Photography- is questioning the meaning of photography and going beyond still image. The installation is audience aware, it means when someone approaches the photograph, doll on the picture opens her eyes and starts to blink to a viewer. If none is looking at the picture the doll’s eyes are closed. Only time-to-time, she is waking up and asking for attention. Thus, my idea is to bring life to printed photography and challenge its form.

Briefly about the technology behind:

And here you can read more about the process. ]]> http://openmaterials.org/2010/03/20/augmented-photography/feed/ http://openmaterials.org/2010/02/24/the-cardboarduino/ http://openmaterials.org/2010/02/24/the-cardboarduino/#comments Wed, 24 Feb 2010 19:33:51 +0000 catarina http://openmaterials.org/?p=2899

Inspired by the paperduino, the cardboarduino is a physically larger version (with space for a 9V battery), designed by Allegheny College’s faculty member Matt Jadud, as way to introduce students to the fundamentals of soldering and working with physical computation.

The Cardboarduino is intended to be printed, cut out, and glued to the front and back of a piece of 5″ x 6″ piece of posterboard.

The builder pokes holes through the posterboard everywhere there is a dot on the top side of the design. It also labels the locations of all of the components, including color bands for the resistors.

Download the printable PDFs from concurrency.cc

(via guibot)

Currently the site offers three designs; a stool, a chair and a rocker.

The OpenStructures project is an open and modular construction system where everyone designs for everyone on the basis of one shared geometrical grid:

It is an ongoing experiment that wants to find out what happens if people design objects according to a shared modular grid, a common open standard that stimulates the exchange of parts, components, experiences and ideas and aspires to build things together.

When we look at modular construction systems we can clearly distinguish two different models:
- Closed modular systems, where one entity designs a complete system for everybody, and which operate according to a hierarchical (vertical) model.
- Open modular systems, where everybody contributes a small piece to a common system, and which operate according to a (horizontal) network model.

Within current hardware constructions we observe the existence of various closed systems:
- Designer A designs modular system 1
- Company B designs modular system 2
Although all these systems enjoy the benefits of modularity within their system, they most of the time are completely incompatible with one another.

Within software constructions however we are witnessing the emergence of open modular systems.
- Wikipedia, open knowledge sharing
- Linux, open programming

The OS project tries to find out what happens if we would initiate an open modular system for hardware where different entities design different parts and components but all according to one shared modular grid.

Conceived by designer Thomas Lommée, the project was first shown at Z33. The exhibition was comprised of several OS project scales, starting with “open parts” - which are the smallest OS - elements comparable to cells. These “open parts” are then assembled into functional self-sustaining entities: the components or organs of the OpenStructure-system. Following, different components are composed with frames and joints to form structures. Structures then have the capacity to develop and can eventually grow into an assembly of different structures that together function as a superstructure.

The exhibition in Z33 follows the story-line of the different scales and furthermore highlights a collaborative installation as a first “BetaTest” of the system. Just like software, that is reviewed before its launch, the model is tested by setting up a fully-functional kitchen. It demonstrates the streamlined process between different functional entities on the one side and is a vivid patchwork of various personalities, materials, inspirations and motivations on the other.

In preparation for the exhibition, Thomas Lommée collaborated with the KHLimburg and the Hogeschool Sint Lukas in Brussels. During several workshops, students were told about the topic and the first tests took place. This process is going to continue next year through collaborations with Sint Lukas Brussels and the Design Academy Eindhoven.

Thomas Lommée has invited the following designers, craftsmen and enthusiastic autodidacts to collaborate on this project and design within the grid: Laurens Bekemans, Biogas-E vzw, Nicolas Coeckelberghs, Kar Yan Cheung, Brussels Cooperation, Alistaire Dewit, Lise Foré, Christiane Hoegner, Bob Jacobs, Fabio Lorefice, Lucas Maassen, Jeroen Maes, Samyrah Moumouth, Karl Philips, Thermopolnv, Unfold, Jo Van Bostraeten.

OpenStructures is a collaborative effort (open to everyone), originally conceived at the Institute without Boundaries and now being further developed and tested by Intrastructures in association with the research group 4Dimensional Design of the Department of Architectonic Engineering Sciences at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel.

Learn more about and participate in the project @ the OpenStructures site:
:: purpose, goals, and potential
:: grid
:: parts
:: components
:: structures
:: designer platform
:: blog
:: participate

The Z33 art center also has an upcoming show titled Design by Performance which will feature, among many other interesting works, Unfold’s Claystruder (paired with a virtual trowing wheel that scans 3d hand movements and generates virtual objects to be printed at a later time) and David Bowen’s Growth Modelling Device. If you’re in the neighborhood (Hasselt, Belgium) or can make it there, don’t miss this exhibition!

UPDATE :: The Open Structures project is currently part of the ‘Up to You’ exhibition @ Stroom (The Hague, Netherlands).

The night starts at 8pm @ dock18 which is at Rote Fabrik, Zurich. Other presenters include members and friends of SGMK (Swiss Mechatronic Art Society).

You can also watch a live stream via the dock18 site.

Researchers at Stanford University seem to have done it again. This time, a paper titled “Highly Conductive Paper for Energy Storage Devices,” published on the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, describes a technique for using ordinary paper and coating it with a special ink, composed of carbon nanotubes and silver nanowires, to create a highly conductive storage device. Here’s Stanford’s press release, written by Janelle Weaver:

Stanford scientists are harnessing nanotechnology to quickly produce ultra-lightweight, bendable batteries and supercapacitors in the form of everyday paper.

Simply coating a sheet of paper with ink made of carbon nanotubes and silver nanowires makes a highly conductive storage device, said Yi Cui, assistant professor of materials science and engineering.

“Society really needs a low-cost, high-performance energy storage device, such as batteries and simple supercapacitors,” he said.

Like batteries, capacitors hold an electric charge, but for a shorter period of time. However, capacitors can store and discharge electricity much more rapidly than a battery.

Cui’s work is reported in the paper “Highly Conductive Paper for Energy Storage Devices,” published online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“These nanomaterials are special,” Cui said. “They’re a one-dimensional structure with very small diameters.” The small diameter helps the nanomaterial ink stick strongly to the fibrous paper, making the battery and supercapacitor very durable. The paper supercapacitor may last through 40,000 charge-discharge cycles – at least an order of magnitude more than lithium batteries. The nanomaterials also make ideal conductors because they move electricity along much more efficiently than ordinary conductors, Cui said.

Cui had previously created nanomaterial energy storage devices using plastics. His new research shows that a paper battery is more durable because the ink adheres more strongly to paper (answering the question, “Paper or plastic?”). What’s more, you can crumple or fold the paper battery, or even soak it in acidic or basic solutions, and the performance does not degrade. “We just haven’t tested what happens when you burn it,” he said.

The flexibility of paper allows for many clever applications. “If I want to paint my wall with a conducting energy storage device,” Cui said, “I can use a brush.” In his lab, he demonstrated the battery to a visitor by connecting it to an LED (light-emitting diode), which glowed brightly.

A paper supercapacitor may be especially useful for applications like electric or hybrid cars, which depend on the quick transfer of electricity. The paper supercapacitor’s high surface-to-volume ratio gives it an advantage.

“This technology has potential to be commercialized within a short time,” said Peidong Yang, professor of chemistry at the University of California-Berkeley. “I don’t think it will be limited to just energy storage devices,” he said. “This is potentially a very nice, low-cost, flexible electrode for any electrical device.”

Cui predicts the biggest impact may be in large-scale storage of electricity on the distribution grid. Excess electricity generated at night, for example, could be saved for peak-use periods during the day. Wind farms and solar energy systems also may require storage.

“The most important part of this paper is how a simple thing in daily life – paper – can be used as a substrate to make functional conductive electrodes by a simple process,” Yang said. “It’s nanotechnology related to daily life, essentially.”

Cui’s research team includes postdoctoral scholars Liangbing Hu and JangWook Choi, and graduate student Yuan Yang.

Some things are so simple we don’t even think about writing them down. We assume everyone knows them. Well, that may often be true, but not always.

The materials 101 series is our attempt at systematizing, through a series of thematic blog posts, some basic materials-related knowledge that is ‘out there.’ The series will thus provide brief intros to the usage of several interesting, fun and useful materials, and will include descriptions, applications, links, and tips & tricks from the DIY community. Our selection criteria will not be based on the simplicity of the materials themselves (in fact, some will be very complex) but on the simplicity of their usage.

The idea behind this series is twofold. First, we seek to encourage those who are curious about materials and DIY techniques, but are still afraid to go hands-on, to actually start experimenting. Secondly, we’d like to contribute to a written repository of these wonderful, albeit simple, techniques the DIY community has been using and sharing for a long time.

Let’s start with the staple on every maker’s workbench: hot glue.

Sparkle Labs just announced their new business card micro kits: a paper base with embedded LEDs that light up in the dark. Check out their site for more photos and PDF instructions. We love paper circuits - please keep them coming :)

Teaching Resources at Middlesex University (MUTR) is a UK-based online store with a mission to support technology teachers. They provide wonderful materials at affordable prices: from expancel, carbon nanotubes, SMAs, SMPs, photochromic and thermocromic materials, paper-making sets, to motors, solar panels, electronic components, as well as traditional materials such as paper, wood, and metal - everything your heart desires to explore creative uses of materials:

(…) We want to help drive our subject forward, but at the same time retain the vital skills that enable young people to engage with materials and turn ideas into real products.

MUTR also works closely with the Technology Enhancement Programme (TEP) and the Science Enhancement Programme (SEP).