One of my favorite pieces at this year’s Ars Electronica / MIT Media Lab exhibit is an electronic pop-up book made by Leah Buechley’s student Jie Qi of the High-Low Tech research group. She has layered the traditional materials with copper films, conductive ink and lights and speakers to add a digital dimension to the […]
Category Archives: tangible
Electronic Pop-up Book
Also posted in 2d, 3d, fabrication, interaction, materials, open objects, soft/glowing
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magnetic chips
Ayah Bdeir launched ‘Little Bits‘ last week at Eyebeam: a kit of magnet-studded circuit components that naturally snap together with the right polarity. The idea is to make prototyping of simple interaction possible for those outside the electrical engineering profession – such as this example of a product designer experimenting with lights on a mock-up […]
Also posted in customization, fabrication, lighting, materials, product design
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ill robots
While in Inverness I visited the Center for Health Science where I witnessed their state-of-the-art medical simulation equipment, including these incredibly sophisticated (and creepy) medical dummies. Doctors and nurses in training use them to train for real-life scenarios, so these life-like dolls have a temperature, a pulse, a voice and can undergo a number of […]
Also posted in evil robots, livingbreathing, materials, possessed products, soft/glowing
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light pipes
The tangible representation of light as material makes it fun – and intuitive – to add it and to take it away. We saw an adult version of modular light blocks at this year’s Salone Satellite; now a children’s bedside lamp by beingblease that allows the child to configure colorful magnetic tubes that bend and […]
Also posted in children, lighting, product design
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odorous oeuvre
Soap Opera is a conceptual product by sovrappensiero meant to act as a painting for the blind. A picture frame made of perfumed soap is touched with hands moistened by a sponge under the upturned corner of the frame. While offering different colors to the sighted viewer, they provide a far richer experience to the […]
Also posted in art, materials, perception, universal design
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interfaces for museumgoers
While on vacation in France recently, I had the fortune to visit a few of the world’s leading museums, both in terms of the art displayed and the incredible quality of the exhibit design itself. Museums serve different roles for different people – as tourist destinations, research institution, and entertainment complexes. The spatial complexity of […]
Also posted in art, augmented reality, exhibit design, universal design
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touch map 2
Another beautiful bronze map in Braille – this time in my favorite city (Firenze), in the middle of Piazza Repubblica, a large cast map of the city center with tactile labels on monuments and ridges on the river to indicate the direction of the current. More on Flickr.
Also posted in 3d, architecture, perception, universal design, visualization
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