Ideation and presentation

Ideation process

I used music as my theme and started looking for inspirations. The reason I choose this theme is because I think music has become an essential part of everyday life and music plays a big role in regulating people's emotions. There are also many interesting interactive devices designed around the theme of music.

Based on this topic, I watched many examples that inspired me. I will list some ideas that inspired me most.

Interactive sound exhibition--Line

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hP36xoPXDnM

The designer use lines to represent novel music instruments. People can interact with it by touching lines on the wall or hanging on the ceiling, stepping the lines on the floor.

Advantages: Easy operation and novel interaction mode

Limitation: Not very friendly to users without music theory, it is less likely to create pleasant songs due to unfamiliarity with musical instruments. People will lose interest in it because of uncoordinated melody created.

Inspiration: In my idea, I can consider the innovations that are user-friendly to the zero base users.

ARASHI Live Tour 2014 THE DIGITALIAN

https://www.bilibili.com/video/av5176824?from=search&seid=3752956218064935948

This is a clip of a concert, it shocked me a lot. The accompaniment of the song in the video was done through the singer's clothes. This coat can create different melody according to the state of the user's muscles and different vibration frequencies. When performing this song, the singer needs to adjust his posture to cooperate with the members to complete the unique accompaniment.

Advantages: Very novel way to interact with music. Every rhythm is a unique tune.

Limitation: Requires constant experimentation for team collaboration music creation.

Inspiration: Is there an interactive form that is easy to operate for more people to join in the melody creation?

Given the above inspiration I have come up with my idea which name is Melo Catcher aiming at create simple ways for users to diy their own melody. Detailed description of my idea can be found on the previous journal entry.

In-class presentation and reflection

In class, I conducted a 2-minute idea presentation session. I got inspiration from many interesting ideas in this activity. I also got a short evaluation after the presentation, which inspired me a lot.

Personal pitch feedback and summary are reflected in the following aspects:

• The concept is a little off the brief. The interaction mode is simple and the rhythm performed by each handle is fixed which make the interaction less novel and playful.
• People are not provided with the unlimited choice. As the music performed by each handle is fixed, users can only adjust the speed of the music which will make the machine less playful.

Inspiration from other work

Punching Bag Fountain

A really eye-catching idea to bring music and punching bag together. The installation share the same theme with me, that is, music. The interaction mode is novel and allows multiple people to come around to perform the unique piece of music. The usage of fountain to display the rhythm being created is romantic and eye-catching. If the installation exists I am very willing to have a try.

Also there are some concerns, the size of this installation, how users can control the quality of the cooperation, I mean, how to ensure that the music played by people working together is pleasant, because the discordant rhythm will reduce the user's favourability.

Works to do

In week3, I will make changes to my ideas based on feedback from the teaching team and inspiration from other students' presentations.

Also, I will do some background research on this theme to clarify what need to be done, what can be done, how can it be improved.

Soldering things

This week we learned how to perform soldering on circuit boards based on circuit diagrams. Here under are the works I have created in the class.

I was exposed to do some soldering things in high school interest classes, so this event is not too complicated for me. Through this tutorial session, I found some key points in conducting the soldering process.

• Safety-related problems

When the soldering rod starts to work, the temperature is very high. The correct use of the instrument when soldering seems extremely important. Always wear goggle and covered shoes to prevent possible damage.

• Well-designed circuit

Make sure the circuit design is reasonable before soldering, as it is difficult to change once soldering is completed.

• Think over before soldering

During the tutorial, the soldered circuit board could not work because of my wrong reading of the circuit diagram. The soldered work is difficult to change, and it took me a long time to correct it into the correct circuit.

• The right amount of tin wire

Too little tin wire may cause disconnection of the circuit, on the contrary, too much amount will cause unnecessary connections and cause the circuit to malfunction.