Acoustic sensors make surfaces interactive

via Kevin Walker:

A series of acoustic sensors that turn any surface into a touch-sensitive computer interface have been developed by European researchers.

Two or more sensors are attached around the edges of the surface. These pinpoint the position of a finger, or another touching object, by tracking minute vibrations. This allows them to create a virtual touchpad, or keyboard, on any table or wall.

The system, called Tai-Chi (Tangible Acoustic Interfaces for Computer-Human Interaction), was developed by researchers from Switzerland, Italy, Germany, France and the UK. "We have made a system that can give any object, even a 3D one, a sense of touch," says Ming Yang, an engineer at Cardiff University, UK, who is coordinating the project.

A video produced by the researcher shows four sensors attached to a flat, vertical surface, being used to trace a researcher's finger (4.6MB, wmv format). Another video shows a simple interactive instrument developed using the system. The sensors were also used to create an interactive globe that accesses geographical information on a computer screen when the user touches different regions.
read more on NewScientist.com

PictoBrowser Makes Flickr Sickr

amazing new flash slideshow viewer that works with Flickr-- just click Info to get your own. Someone really put a lot of thought into making this nice free tool. Use it with your sets, tags, or groups (and if you want to get into the HTML, change the dimensions and the bgcolor too)

EyeTV Hybrid - Watch TV on your laptop

From Video Thing:
"One of the guys here at work just got the Elgato Eye TV Hybrid and I'm really impressed with it. It's a usb dongle for the mac that gets HD tv off the air and lets you record it and automatically outputs to ipod, dvdstudio pro, idvd, transport stream, toast, and just about anything else you can think of. It uses the mac remote and has it's own layer in frontrow. It also provides you with analog hd inputs in case you feel like plugging in your game console and playing/recording it on your computer. I'm not a big TV watcher, but this is an unbelievably slick device/software package, and I totally want one now."

check it out

Paradox Beach Interactive Installation

Children are the toughest customers to design for, and this installation is a smash hit. It's installed at the Children's Museum of Staten Island.
check out the site and make sure to watch the video.

It's a room-size interactive installation that tracks the movement of a racket that kids use to drag elements around and play games (all the games are about math paradoxes)

The reactive surface is projected on the entire floor of the room so it really feels very immersive, and from what I've seen of it in action, it's fun for a wide range of ages (including adults!)

more details from the site:
"
description
Paradox Beach is a room-sized responsive multimedia installation and learning game for kids 6-10 years. To explore the mystery of numbers, the game begins with projected animated waves rolling across the floor, washing up numbers like sea treasure. Children collect the numbers with a magic net and use them to travel through secrets of age-old riddles. A walk-in video playland, Paradox Beach slides into mathematical whimsy, tickling children into solving problems with dance-floor interaction.

philosophy

With simple rules a computer animates graphic forms so they react to people. Children make decisions with their bodies and their minds, as they navigate through a story. Our recent experience with learning games tells us that kinds benefit from the sophistication of "adult" work combined with an honest, direct approach to stories and goals. We make these works for the kind of kids we were: curious, thoughtful and challenging.

installation

The game consists of floor video projection, video tracking technology, synchronized sound, music and narration. A single player game, the child stands directly on and in the projected image. Using the "magic net", the player makes selections and drive sthe story.
"

Akihabara News - learn about japanese gadgets before they hit your local store!

the previous video I posted was found on this cool blog about technology from japan:

"Akihabara News offers regular news updates on high-tech products, mostly mobile devices like PDA's, TabletPC's, mobile phones, video and audio products, cameras and other high-tech toys.

Our correspondent in Japan presents all the novelties from the country of the rising sun and shows products a long time before they hit your local markets (if they ever make it there!)."

check it out!

Touch the wall - Panasonic Interactive Display system gives you an interactive livingroom

wow! who DOESN'T want an interactive livingroom wall?

I especially love how you choose albums from a shelf to change the music, grab the clock and change its size, move the piano around effortlessly-- and play it!

Designer Chairs for Cheap! (Well, cheap-ISH!)

Metropolis Magazine has an article about Appoggi, which you must check out if you're interested in designer furniture

pictured here is an armchair and ottoman from the NIDO collection by Arquitectonica

Nicely Done Holiday Card from Popular Front

I've seen quite a few varieties of snowflake-making Flash holiday cards, but this one takes the cake!
check out the holiday card from Popular Front
plus they have these cute cut & paste image links for you to put on your blog like this:

using time as a 3rd or um, 4th dimension? the Khronos Projector

a weird but interesting idea:

dig into a video's timeline as if into it's 3rd dimension

how much is my blog worth?

My blog is worth $0.00.
How much is your blog worth?

haha! my blog is worth 0$. how much is YOUR blog worth?

Architecture and New Media talk tonight at NYU

see the ITP website event calendar

** Friday, Nov 17 at 6:30pm - Special Event: ITP Alumna, Dana Karwas
Special Event
ITP Alumna, Dana Karwas ('05)
Friday, November 17
at 6:30pm
Room 447

Scaling Architecture + New Media

A discussion of the current intersections of Architecture and New Media shown through the work of her graduate students at the Columbia School of Architecture and her own architectural installation work as well as an insight into post-ITP possibilities.

Bio:
Dana Karwas ITP alum 05 is a new media artist with a background in architecture. Her work is defined by the overlap of art, architecture, and technology. Dana teaches Max/MSP/Jitter at Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture Planning and Preservation. She has created store front installations for Malin+Goetz NYC and the Felissimo Design house as well as collaborated with Winka Dubbeldam and archi-tectonics to create the American Loft Building Production. Dana has shown work at the Chelsea Art Museum and the Museum of Television and Radio and recently created the Visible Cities architectural performance installation with Liubo Borissov at the Center for Architecture. She teaches the Sound Image Architecture Workshop at Harvestworks NYC. Currently Dana is working on an architecture project to be built in Paris.

Happy Birthday Flowbots Event at Kid Robot, NYC, nov 17th

Kid Robot sells cuuuute and kewl little miniatures and toys -- check out their site

and they are having an event-- come have birthday cake!



Happy Birthday Flowbots

On Friday, November 17th from 7-10PM we will be celebrating the birth of artist JK5's latest mini series of toys, The Flowbots!

The party will be held at The Showroom located at 117 Second Avenue in NYC.
Join us for the birthday party and view JK5s work which will be for sale and on display until November 22nd.

Cake WILL be served. Joseph Ari Aloi, a.k.a. JK5, lives and works in Brooklyn, New York, where he relentlessly developments his visual, textual, and iconographic languages through a diverse range of media. JK5 is a highly respected custom tattoo artist and has been so for the last 12 years.

sketch furniture by Front Design

and that's exactly what it is. check it out

read more about Front design. They are from Sweden: we like.

great coverage of interieur 06 in belgium by Designboom

thanks again for the great photos and coverage, Designboom!


images: installation with ‘supernatural’ chair by ross lovegrove & ‘taormina’ for alias

ID Magazine student project --save's the environment AND your money!

i thought of this first!!! (ok, not really, but I wish I had). It's great because it turns doing something for the common good into doing something good for your own bank account-- thus motivating people to save more energy.




Janus Resource Awareness System
Dominic Peralta's Janus system raises consumers' consciousness of their environmental impact, and not by beating up on SUVs. Its hub is a wall mirror that doubles as a touchscreen to register and display, in dollars, exactly how much electricity we consume in our homes and the effect of dimming or turning off lights. The jurors thought the hub's design sacrificed aesthetics for engineering but found no fault with the concept apart from its limited scope, which they would like to have seen extended to water and gas. "Left-on lights and dripping faucets add up to a considerable burden," Williams said. "The reason we persist with these wasteful ways is because we're not aware of their impact."

—
Name: Dominic Peralta
School: San Jose State University
City: San Jose, CA

see more excellent projects at ID Magazine online

Part 1: Links to Things: Thinglinks

I found an interesting article by a Finnish blogger, HobbyPrincess, talking about using "ThingLinks" at the Helsinki design exhibit.
read about it

Basically, it talks about using special links as barcodes for products. There are a ton of other examples of things like Semapedia. Not a new idea, but i think it's interesting.

Their website is a bit hard to use (it's in beta i guess) but you can see some examples there: thinglink.org

Tokujin Yoshioka - my new favorite designer/ artist

extraordinary installations and sculptures made of different types of fibers.This guy has work in the permanent collection of the Pompidou Center.


Super Fiber Revolution -- i found a great article about it on cut n paste / designboom -- is the title of a recent exhibit.


here are some of their descriptions of his work:

fiber architecture
tokujin’s approach towards structures of the future follows the the idea that, to achieve great strength small light fibers should be systematically organized. this approach differs to the common belief that hard materials should be used. the principle is similar to that of the japanese art ‘aikido’, in which strength is generated by diverting force through a circular
movement.

snowflake rug
the rug design is made from weaving various transparent fibers together, the design suggests a crystalized snowscape.

rememberance installation
the ‘cloud installation of 550,000 transparent straws' was designed for a window display at maison hermes in tokyo. bunches of straws are tightly accumlated together to suggest clouds. the use of weightless materials expresses the idea of ‘formless’ and ‘fluid air’.

pane chair (bread chair)
a semi-cylindrical block of fibers is rolled, inserted into a paper tube and then baked in a kiln to create a chair that ‘feels like sitting on air’. the chair was shown for the first time at the milan design week in april 2006. the result of the process is a chair that has an ‘uncertain finish’ adding to the organic feel of the design. as part of the ‘super fiber exhibition’ many of the chairs prtotypes were on show each highlighting the stages that the cahir went through before the perfect recipe was found.

Tom Igoe's Sustainability Class at ITP

This is a great class with useful links and resources, all about sustainable practicies-- not necessarily related to technology.

It includes resources about how to change your everyday habits and links out to other sites on how to save on energy costs while helping the environment

check out the class website and, especially, the links page

Thanks, Tom, for this useful resource!!

Relive the New York City Marathon with a Course Simulation

This neat little app allows you to pick runners and track them on a sort of race replay.

Try racing me against Lance Armstrong, it's pretty amusing! check it out

nice chair!

cut from a single sheet of aluminum and created without any hardware or adhesives. Bonus: the minimalist modern form is 100% recyclable. Minus: $532 is a lot for a chair!

check it out, and see others in the same line

"Designing Interactions" Interviews

interesting interviews with Interaction Design superstars, including John Maeda (below) and David Kelly.

This new book by Bill Moggridge sounds like a must-read.



check out the book's official website (make sure you check out the interviews)