The final projects will focus upon further development of a previous discovery from our video, textile, and mechanical based explorations. You and another student will work collaboratively to practice refinement and further exploration of an element found within your previous assignments. This element could be, but is not limited to, a: wearable mechanism, particular movement of a piece of fabric, content or topic, or a video premise. Because we are now a web-based course, you will present a video as your final product.

Reflection and Selection

Over the last semester you and your partner have, individually and/or collaboratively, created over a dozen experiments. The results of the experiments were unique to each person or pair while still having material commonalities. Your own interests hopefully became more clear over through the experiments over the course of the semester. Reflect back on your experiences and discoveries within this class to answer these questions:

• What was most exciting to you?
• Which experiment opened up questions for you that you would like to revisit?
• What formal elements do you want to explore the meaning of more?
• What content elements do you want to try another way to present?

Choose and element that you and your partner feel excited and curious about to develop further.

Process and Approach

We are asking you to engage in a process of iterative creative development based upon your past work. There are multiple ways to do this. We offer two ways that we could like you to try:

• How – Why
  • Choose a singular formal element within your works, this is a HOW(1).
  • Reflect and write upon this formal element to explore its meaning or metaphor, this is a WHY(1).
  • Now that you have a WHY(1), brainstorm how you might formally create and present this new idea. This new physical presentation is a new HOW(2).
  • Reflect upon this second HOW(2) to discover its new WHY(2).
  • Repeat this cycle of HOW(x)-WHY(x) to further morph and develop your project into something you were not initially expecting.
    • Also, instead of starting with a HOW, you could start with a WHY. This process works either way.
  • Stanford d.school reference
  • notes on Why-How from 16-223
• Past – Future
  • Choose one moment from one of your videos. Brainstorm backwards and forwards from this moment to extend the length of the moment.
  • What happened prior to this moment?
  • What happened after it?
    • The development could be either or both narrative and abstract.

Elements of the Final Video

• final video should be no more three minutes in length
• mechanics do not necessarily need to work multiple times, but DOES need to work at least once for the video documentation.
• remember that sound is an important element, and we would like you to try something other than a professionally recorded song.

Objectives

• Use reflection to find inspiration within your own work
• Collaborate remotely on a project
• Iterate on an element or idea within your work so as to develop your work to find new discoveries.
• Use video as a final product to explore or convey your ideas
• Create a working structure with your collaborator so that you both can work simultaneously.

Deliverables:

By beginning of class on Thurs., April 9:

1. A one line statement about the element and approach you are taking with your final project.

After the first week, we’d like to see a short progress blog post from each pair with the following:

1. A single video showing the first iteration of your developed moment.
   1. Either a new HOW-WHY or one direction of the PAST-FUTURE
2. A brief statement about your project, including: a plan of how you are approaching your project, and why you have chosen this element and approach.

For the due date, each pair should please create a single post on the course site with the following:

1. One edited video.
   1. (see elements of the final video, above)
2. A paragraph or two reflecting upon your explorations: meaning, intended effect, surprises, discoveries, successes.

Criteria

The spirit of the course remains focused on discovery and creative exploration. So please keep in mind the same principles we have emphasized in every assignment:

1. Stay open and go with your discoveries.
2. Experimentation and creative exploration is more important than refinement.
3. Make clear documentation compelling images. We are now treating the ‘documentation’ as a primary creative element in the form of narrative or non-narrative cinematic production.

For this assignment, we will resume collaborative work, now with a new focus on the visual results of our moving textile explorations. Each pair will create a single video composition as a sequence of clips created separately. The result will be a type of ‘exquisite corpse‘, a traditional technique for collectively creating a composition by following rules to create each segment without full information about the work of the collaborators. We were particularly inspired for this by the ‘Exquisite Corps‘ video we showed in class, or this other ‘Exquisite Corps‘ dance video.

Process and Approach

The pair will agree in advance on the number and order of clips to put in a video sequence, along with the kinetic properties and locations of the cloth in the first and last frame of each clip. Each person will then individually use kinetic textile elements to create clips that match the conditions at the boundaries but follow their own movements and forms over the duration. These will then be spliced together into a single sequence and presented as a single video.

We can see a number of ways this abstracted description could be resolved. The result might be narrative or non-narrative. Here are a few ideas for what sort of ‘kinetic properties’ you might try to match at the boundary between each segment:

• An overall static shape within the video frame. This could as simple as ‘line across the horizontal center’ or complex like a full body pose.
• A path of movement into or out of the video frame, with an edge position and a direction. E.g. a structure of any size or shape moving diagonally to the upper right corner and then entering from the lower left corner of the next frame.
• A particular solid color filling the frame. E.g. a lateral movement of fabric across the frame which ends filling the frame, followed by different fabric filling the frame and moving off.
• A particular material state and visual form. E.g., ‘fabric billowing up in a fan at the moment it covers the lower half of the frame.’
• A particular zoom center, e.g. zooming into a point and then the next clip zooming out from the same point. (This can easily be overused.) For some ideas, you can search ‘zoom transitions’ on YouTube, there are many examples and tutorials.

For materials and form we encourage you to continue exploring any of the textile and cardboard techniques we have discussed so far. Each person will need to make individual choices according to their interests and resources. There is no need for the different clips of the sequence to use similar materials as long as they can follow the chosen linking principles. This could also be a good time to rework previous ideas or projects if you have them available.

Objectives

• Collaborate remotely on a video production
• Identify and articulate abstracted kinetic principles as rules which can be applied to two or more textile artifacts
• Create ad hoc kinetic structures using materials at hand
• Discover unfamiliar movements and perspectives
• Explore the interaction of light and fabric
• Practice composing video as moving image

Prompts

The following comments are carried over from the previous assignment to provide inspiration for how we might approach this assignment.

For a textile, you might choose a garment, on or off the body; this is a versatile solution. But you might also choose something located in the space like a rug or curtain; something useful like a towel or sponge; something discarded like dryer lint; or fabric stock (if you have it).

For a movement, please experiment with your textile. Fabrics drape, fold, stretch, crease, pleat, billow in the air. Textiles absorb and release water, tear, fray, abrade, burn (please be careful). The idea is to find something unfamiliar.

For a structure, you might use cardboard as a ‘soft’ element, or use it as an armature inside a garment or sewn artifact. You can also take advantage of the nature of video to suspend artifacts using string, either as marionettes or as structural supports.

For a location, look around your space carefully from many positions and angles. It may help to look through a camera view to see the effect of the framing; cropping the world to the rectangle of the image can be transformative. Please look high, look low, look inside, look outside. Maybe there is a surprising intersection of angles where parts of the architecture come together; maybe there is an interplay of light and shadow near a window.

Please experiment with the chosen textile movement in the selected space. The camera needs light to see, so as you practice, see how the light intersects the fabric. You may need to move light sources or the camera to shape the illumination. Light from the front will highlight different motions than backlighting. A diffuse light will create very different shadows than a sharp direct light.

As you set up each shot, please consider the full image: what is in each corner, what is foreground or background, what is in focus or defocused, is everything visible deliberately included? A video is a sequence of photographs, and each can be considered as a composition. Ideally you would find a way to brace your camera, or at least use camera motion as a deliberate gesture.

As a composition over time, please consider the nature of your movement: is it an abstraction? Does it convey mood? Is there a distinct narrative? Is it timeless, or is there a beginning and end?

Please see our new Video Resources page for more ideas and tutorials on how to create compelling videos.

Outcomes

Our expectations remain very open. But there is much to be discovered here. Here is a sampling of some potential inquiries:

• How does a house fan move a blouse?
• How do waves ripple across a towel?
• Can wetting fabric reveal hidden layers?
• Does wearing clothing in an unusual way modify body movement?
• Can you fold together towels to unwind in a sequence of colors?
• How does everything in your wardrobe fall through the air?
• Can you form a sling or trampoline from a towel?

For this assignment, we will start to explore the possibilities for making kinetic fabric works within our individual new constraints. The one thing we know you all have is clothing, so the objectives center on discovering new ways for a garment to move. This will be an individual assignment until we work out the best ways to collaborate remotely. This is intended to be a playful, low-stakes assignment to help you see your current resources in a new way. If this will pose any hardship given your new circumstances, just let us know.

The final show as previously envisioned is no longer possible. We are delaying the project start so we can begin a new path toward a different kind of final showcase. In our minds right now, the clearest path is to focus on a final product in the form of video. We have essentially been working in this direction the entire semester by using video documentation in every exercise submission. But we think a new emphasis on video would benefit from stepping back and considering the broader narrative and visual potential of the medium. We are envisioning this assignment as the first of several weekly exercises until we are ready to identify final project ideas. The main emphasis remains upon the motion of the textiles, but now considered more carefully in relation to the frame of the image.

Objectives

• Discover an unfamiliar movement within an existing textile artifact
• Discover an unfamiliar perspective within your personal landscape
• Explore the interaction of light and fabric
• Practice composing video as moving image

Process and Approach

In summary, we’d like to you pick a textile artifact, a location in your space, and create a short video clip (e.g 5-10 sec) illustrating a movement of the textile in the context of the space. There are many ways to take this, so following are some suggested approaches.

For a textile, you might choose a garment, on or off the body; this is a versatile solution. But you might also choose something located in the space like a rug or curtain; something useful like a towel or sponge; something discarded like dryer lint; or fabric stock (if you have it).

For a movement, please experiment with your textile. Fabrics drape, fold, stretch, crease, pleat, billow in the air. Textiles absorb and release water, tear, fray, abrade, burn (please be careful). The idea is to find something unfamiliar.

For a location, look around your space carefully from many positions and angles. It may help to look through a camera view to see the effect of the framing; cropping the world to the rectangle of the image can be transformative. Please look high, look low, look inside, look outside. Maybe there is a surprising intersection of angles where parts of the architecture come together; maybe there is an interplay of light and shadow near a window.

Please experiment with the chosen textile movement in the selected space. The camera needs light to see, so as you practice, see how the light intersects the fabric. You may need to move light sources or the camera to shape the illumination. Light from the front will highlight different motions than backlighting. A diffuse light will create very different shadows than a sharp direct light.

As you set up the shot, please consider the full image: what is in each corner, what is foreground or background, what is in focus or defocused, is everything visible deliberately included? A video is a sequence of photographs, and each can be considered as a composition. Ideally you would find a way to brace your camera, or at least use camera motion as a deliberate gesture.

As a composition over time, please consider the nature of your movement: is it an abstraction? Does it convey mood? Is there a distinct narrative? Is it timeless, or is there a beginning and end?

Please see our new Video Resources page for more ideas and tutorials on how to create compelling videos.

Outcomes

Our expectations are very open for this particular assignment. We’d like you to see this as an opportunity to play and settle in to our new mode, so please make your own choices about time and energy.

A minimal outcome could be as simple as just putting your hand in a sock to form a puppet, practicing a few gestures, bracing your camera on a table, and recording a brief performance.

If you have the time and energy, there is much more to be discovered here. Here is a sampling of some potential inquiries:

• How does a house fan move a blouse?
• How do waves ripple across a towel?
• Can wetting fabric reveal hidden layers?
• Does wearing clothing in an unusual way modify body movement?
• Can you fold together towels to unwind in a sequence of colors?
• How does everything in your wardrobe fall through the air?
• Can you form a sling or trampoline from a towel?

You are also free to intervene by pinning or tying items together. If you feel the itch to make something new, that is also completely fine, but please remember our key objective of framing it in a video sequence as a visual composition.

Deliverables

Each person should please create a single short post on the course site with the following:

1. One short video clip. The video should be embedded for direct viewing.
2. A brief paragraph outlining your explorations: intended effect, surprises, discoveries, successes.

Criteria

The spirit of the course remains focused on discovery and creative exploration. So please keep in mind the same principles we have emphasized in every assignment:

1. Stay open and go with your discoveries.
2. Experimentation and creative exploration is more important than refinement.
3. Make clear documentation. This is especially true now that the documentation may become a primary creative element in the form of narrative or non-narrative cinematic production.

For this assignment, you will continue to work with your same partner to reflect upon your current Parasite project (assignment #6) and to create another iteration of it for next week. Reflection and iteration are important skills for developing your project over time and with more depth. There are a few additional constraints we are including for this iteration: your parasite should have at least two separate air chambers that are activated using the MIDI controller; and your parasite should embody one of the two following prompts: cycles or character expression.

Reflection and Iteration: Your new iteration of your parasite project should be developed based upon your reflections on the first parasite iteration. Now that you have completed a first iteration, make time to reflect together on your first iteration. Here are some questions to prompt your review: What excites you about it? What was working very successfully? Can these elements be developed further, and how so? What is the conceptual essence of the project? Is there another, different or better, way to embody that concept in your project? What are five very different directions you could take the project? Can you build upon what you discovered in the first iteration or do you need to rethink the entire approach?

Two Separate chambers and MIDI Controller: This week you have been introduced to the pneumatic system that can be performed by a person using the MIDI controller. Similar to last week, your parasite should relate to a human being. This week it should have at least 2 different air chambers that can be performed or activated by one team member using the MIDI drum pads.

Embodied Prompts: Your parasite should include a new dimension of time and repeatability. Choose one of the two prompts below (cycles or character expression) to embody within how the parasite is activated or performed.

Cycles – Cycles are a repeatable pattern that has different phases within the cycle. Here in Pittsburgh, we experience each year as a cycle made up of four seasons that repeat and blend into one another. A person’s lifetime is also a cycle that has the potential to include going from baby to child to adult to elder to death. This cycle is one example of a life cycle that multiple creatures potentially experience (thus repeated). A conversation is also a cycle, a back and forth between two people, that one might generally repeat often throughout a day. All of these cycles are not the exact same in their repetitions and also include variation. If you choose this prompt, your team will embody the premise of a cycle with different phases that repeat. Is the parasite’s cycle independent of the host’s actions? Does it have a beginning, if so what triggers it to begin? Is the cycle fast or slow?

Character Expression – Your parasite may be a character that you would like to develop. The parasite’s character could be anthropomorphic expressions or it could be non-human. If you choose this prompt, your parasite becomes like a puppet that has expressions and reactions that you should show to us in your video. Is the host and parasite in conversation with each other? Is the host aware of the parasite’s reactions? What kinds of expressions are possible for your physical construction of your parasite? What does the parasite react to? What is the personality of your parasite? Does it have sensory organs (can it see, taste, feel touch, hear, smell, etc.)? How are those senses expressed? Remember how Z. Briggs said that breath was incredibly important as a communication of emotion – how does your parasite “breathe”?

We are expecting one parasite per pair, documented with a single blog post authored by the pair. Working in pairs will create new questions and opportunities revolving around collaboration. We would like you to work toward a mutual result, deciding together on the conceptual basis of the parasite, the specific pneumatic solutions, and the technical execution. It will make sense to divide the fabrication work as possible, but please be sure to continue developing your individual skill. It may be tempting to divide work along previous experience, but it would be more valuable individually and more exploratory to choose tasks based on inexperience and opportunities for skill development.

Deliverables

Each pair should please create a single short post on the course site with the following:

1. One short video clip showing the movement of the mechanism. The video should be embedded for direct viewing.
2. A brief paragraph outlining your explorations: intended effect, surprises, discoveries, successes.
3. A few sentences about the collaboration: how you go about collaborating and sharing the project? What did you learn about collaborating through this assignment?

Criteria

Below are the criteria we will be using to assess your assignment. As you are exploring the possibilities for this assignment, keep these criteria in your focus:

1. Stay open and go with your discoveries. We are most interested in seeing what you discover that is engaging and is working, not simply an implementation of an idea you have predetermined. For example, you may be trying to execute a specific idea, but along the way you discover something that is much more engaging or works more smoothly than your original idea. Put aside the original plan and go with the new discovery that is actually working.
2. Experimentation and creative exploration is more important than refinement. The purpose of this assignment is for you to use your time trying multiple experiments and ideas, rather than perfecting only a few. Your resulting experiments need to work but do not need to be highly refined. Develop your experiments enough so that they are convincing and understandable, but not so much that you get stuck in the details of perfect construction. For now, accept that you are using temporary materials to create your experiments (tape, zip ties, etc.) and that there will still be room for further refinement.
3. Make clear documentation. Your online documentation will be how we experience many of your assignments. It is very important that your documentation clearly communicates your projects. Tips: Remove distracting items from the background; make sure your camera is in focus and your lens is clean; use a tripod or other support to stabilize your camera; if you are shooting video, orient your camera in the landscape (horizontal) format; make sure your project is well lit and without distracting shadows.

par·a·site/ˈperəˌsīt/

noun: parasite; plural noun: parasites

1. an organism that lives in or on an organism of another species (its host) and benefits by deriving nutrients at the other’s expense.”the parasite attaches itself to the mouths of fishes”
2. DEROGATORY a person who habitually relies on or exploits others and gives nothing in return. “the capitalist is really a parasite on the workers”

The above is from Google Dictionary.

The theme for this week is Parasite. (While we know this is a recent, award-winning film – our reference for parasite is the definition above.) You and your partner should work together to create one parasite that interacts with at least one human body using the pneumatic system we are introducing in class. Your parasite should transform in at least one way and give the illusion of being alive. The form of your parasite should help us understand how it is exploiting a human body. Here are some questions to help move your concept along: What feeds your parasite? What are the environmental conditions that the parasite needs to survive (i.e. sunlight, darkness, silence, noise, etc.)? Is the host-body aware of the parasite? What is the relationship between the parasite and its host? Is the parasite quickly or slowly detrimental to its host? How did the host first come in contact with the parasite?

To create and animate your parasites, this week you are exploring “medium-pressure” pneumatics and heat-sealed plastic. Pneumatics offer the opportunity to create a transformation using air pressure, which is completely new to our way of working in this class thus far. Heat sealing the plastic is much like sewing in its ability to create 3-D forms out of 2-D materials, and many similar principles will transfer (i.e. creating pleats, gathers, etc.). It also creates opportunities for more indirect animation using manual control of the valves; the potential exists to create an “instrument” which a person might have to practice.

You will have access to a multi-valved pneumatic system that runs at 2 psi. While this system is considered “medium-pressure/low-volume” compared to other pneumatic systems, it is still very low pressure relative to most high-pressure applications (such as tires on a bike). The large inflatables in the inflatables course are considered low-pressure/high-volume pneumatic systems. Your parasite can use between one to four pneumatic valves for animation. Like our most recent projects, you are encouraged to consider how the parasite integrates with and actuates other textiles or clothing. Your heat-sealed form can also be a “bladder” covered in another fabric skin. For now, one of the pair can wear the parasite and the other of the pair can activate it turning the pneumatic valves. The pneumatic valves have three states: neutral/no air flow, inflate, and air release.

Please think carefully about what instigates the movement of the parasite. Are there certain human movements that wake-up the parasite? Does it just continually move on its own? How is it integrated into the host’s existence?

We are expecting one parasite per pair, documented with a single blog post authored by the pair. Working in pairs will create new questions and opportunities revolving around collaboration. We would like you to work toward a mutual result, deciding together on the conceptual basis of the parasite, the specific pneumatic solutions, and the technical execution. It will make sense to divide the fabrication work as possible, but please be sure to continue developing your individual skill. It may be tempting to divide work along previous experience, but it would be more valuable individually and more exploratory to choose tasks based on inexperience and opportunities for skill development.

Deliverables

Each pair should please create a single short post on the course site with the following:

1. One short video clip showing the movement of the mechanism. The video should be embedded for direct viewing.
2. A brief paragraph outlining your explorations: intended effect, surprises, discoveries, successes.
3. A few sentences about the collaboration: how you go about collaborating and sharing the project? What did you learn about collaborating through this assignment?

Criteria

Below are the criteria we will be using to assess your assignment. As you are exploring the possibilities for this assignment, keep these criteria in your focus:

1. Stay open and go with your discoveries. We are most interested in seeing what you discover that is engaging and is working, not simply an implementation of an idea you have predetermined. For example, you may be trying to execute a specific idea, but along the way you discover something that is much more engaging or works more smoothly than your original idea. Put aside the original plan and go with the new discovery that is actually working.
2. Experimentation and creative exploration is more important than refinement. The purpose of this assignment is for you to use your time trying multiple experiments and ideas, rather than perfecting only a few. Your resulting experiments need to work but do not need to be highly refined. Develop your experiments enough so that they are convincing and understandable, but not so much that you get stuck in the details of perfect construction. For now, accept that you are using temporary materials to create your experiments (tape, zip ties, etc.) and that there will still be room for further refinement.
3. Make clear documentation. Your online documentation will be how we experience many of your assignments. It is very important that your documentation clearly communicates your projects. Tips: Remove distracting items from the background; make sure your camera is in focus and your lens is clean; use a tripod or other support to stabilize your camera; if you are shooting video, orient your camera in the landscape (horizontal) format; make sure your project is well lit and without distracting shadows.

Integrating kinetic structures into clothing offers opportunities both for a close integration with the motions of daily life and the use of kinetic expression in a variety of human environments. We are assigning you to use an existing piece of clothing as a base to modify and extend in order to focus your efforts on the kinetic elements without also needing to fabricate an entire garment.

The conceptual prompt for the week is camouflage: we would like you to work in pairs to create a single modified garment which uses a kinetic effect to transform between two states, each of which blends naturally into a separate environment. This might be either a social or physical environmental shift, e.g. outside vs inside, work vs play, home vs party.

Please think carefully how to integrate the costume motion seamlessly into the natural motion of the body. That is, it is acceptable to include specific control elements, e.g. pull strings, but the result will be stronger and more garment-like if the natural movements of the body itself actuate the transition (rather than simply using an extra hand to pull strings). We have seen numerous examples of each approach in the assignments to date.

As usual we are offering several specific techniques you may choose to use, but any of the means we have employed so far are available. The new elements we are demonstrating in class include sleeve deconstruction and reconstruction, sleeve extension, elastic and Velcro, and Bowden cable transmission. The previous approaches are all still available, e.g. embedding cardboard or dowel rods, building Miura folds, four-bar linkages, etc.

We are expecting one costume per pair, documented with a single blog post authored by the pair. Working in pairs will create new questions and opportunities revolving around collaboration. We would like you to work toward a mutual result, deciding together on the conceptual selection of environments, the camouflage approach, the specific kinetic solutions, and the technical execution. It will make sense to divide the fabrication work as possible, but please be sure to continue developing your individual skill. It may be tempting to divide work along previous experience, but it would be more valuable individually and more exploratory to choose tasks based on inexperience and opportunities for skill development.

Deliverables

Each pair should please create a single short post on the course site with the following:

1. One short video clip showing the movement of the mechanism. The video should be embedded for direct viewing.
2. A brief paragraph outlining your explorations: intended effect, surprises, discoveries, successes.
3. A few sentences about the collaboration: how you go about collaborating and sharing the project? What did you learn about collaborating through this assignment?

Criteria

Below are the criteria we will be using to assess your assignment. As you are exploring the possibilities for this assignment, keep these criteria in your focus:

1. Stay open and go with your discoveries. We are most interested in seeing what you discover that is engaging and is working, not simply an implementation of an idea you have predetermined. For example, you may be trying to execute a specific idea, but along the way you discover something that is much more engaging or works more smoothly than your original idea. Put aside the original plan and go with the new discovery that is actually working.
2. Experimentation and creative exploration is more important than refinement. The purpose of this assignment is for you to use your time trying multiple experiments and ideas, rather than perfecting only a few. Your resulting experiments need to work but do not need to be highly refined. Develop your experiments enough so that they are convincing and understandable, but not so much that you get stuck in the details of perfect construction. For now, accept that you are using temporary materials to create your experiments (tape, zip ties, etc.) and that there will still be room for further refinement.
3. Make clear documentation. Your online documentation will be how we experience many of your assignments. It is very important that your documentation clearly communicates your projects. Tips: Remove distracting items from the background; make sure your camera is in focus and your lens is clean; use a tripod or other support to stabilize your camera; if you are shooting video, orient your camera in the landscape (horizontal) format; make sure your project is well lit and without distracting shadows.

Fabric combined with rigid materials (such as cardboard or wood or acrylic) can create robust flexure points, wearable structures, and highly dynamic shapes. Combining the fabric and stiff materials will allow you to exploit their contrasting qualities of flexibility and rigid strength.

For this exercise, we would like you to create one in-depth wearable sample with fabric and cardboard mechanisms that creates a radical response to an interaction with another person. Choose an interaction with a specific kind of movement. Use the movement of the interaction to be the basis for the response of your wearable. The response could be a direct, related response or it could be a more indirect, generalized change.

Your fabric-cardboard sample can use any of the discoveries or techniques you have developed or learned in class thus far. The response should create a change transforming the wearer in a significant way. Play with the materials and build off of the basic movement of the interaction.

You may also use other materials such as the dowels, zip ties, tape, string, etc.

Deliverables

Please create a short post on the course site with the following:

1. One short video clip showing the movement of the mechanism. The video should be embedded for direct viewing.
2. A brief paragraph outlining your explorations: intended effect, surprises, discoveries, successes.

Prompts

Please remember that ‘interaction’ can include any sort of two-person activity. This can mean social gestures (e.g. a handshake) but also cooperative tasks (e.g. picking something up together) or competitive tasks.

In a fabric mechanism, the fabric itself occupies a number of roles, including as a structural element in tension, as a flexure joint or hinge when folding, or as a loose or tight membrane interacting with air. It can form the visible surface or be bound into hidden structures. These functions may even all take place at different locations on the same swatch. It may help when laying out a mechanism pattern to consider the function at each point. So if creating a hinge, it will be most free if the entire folding line is kept flexible. If creating a rigid element, consider how the fabric tension balances the compression of the cardboard it enfolds.

The mechanisms themselves occupy several roles, including constraining movement, redirecting and transmitting movement, and scaling or duplicating movement.

Criteria

Below are the criteria we will be using to assess your assignment. As you are exploring the possibilities for this assignment, keep these criteria in your focus:

1. Stay open and go with your discoveries. We are most interested in seeing what you discover that is engaging and is working, not simply an implementation of an idea you have predetermined. For example, you may be trying to execute a specific idea, but along the way you discover something that is much more engaging or works more smoothly than your original idea. Put aside the original plan and go with the new discovery that is actually working.
2. Experimentation and creative exploration is more important than refinement. The purpose of this assignment is for you to use your time trying multiple experiments and ideas, rather than perfecting only a few. Your resulting experiments need to work but do not need to be highly refined. Develop your experiments enough so that they are convincing and understandable, but not so much that you get stuck in the details of perfect construction. For now, accept that you are using temporary materials to create your experiments (tape, zip ties, etc.) and that there will still be room for further refinement.
3. Make clear documentation. Your online documentation will be how we experience many of your assignments. It is very important that your documentation clearly communicates your projects. Tips: Remove distracting items from the background; make sure your camera is in focus and your lens is clean; use a tripod or other support to stabilize your camera; if you are shooting video, orient your camera in the landscape (horizontal) format; make sure your project is well lit and without distracting shadows.

We are shifting this week’s assignment toward research and brainstorming in lieu of a practical material sample because of the unscheduled cancellation on Thursday. This is an opportunity to review the techniques we are considering without the constraint of having to physically fabricate an object.

Part 1: Precedent research

Please find three examples of existing work which can provide insight into the development of a wearable kinetic piece. There are many disciplines from which this could potentially draw, so please make sure to consider the following prompt question: what feature of the work could specifically evolve into a technique for wearable kinetic sculpture or costume? Some possible areas to explore for source material: haute couture fashion, puppetry, soft robotics, texture sculpture, performance art, kinetic sculpture, theatrical garments.

Deliverables. For each of the three sources, please provide

1. one-sentence synopsis of the result
2. a one-sentence answer to the prompt question above
3. a link to the source, if online
4. an embedded video, if available

Part 2: Brainstorming

In lieu of creating a physical sample, we’d like you to sketch out three imaginary samples. This should be an opportunity to think about the conceptual basis for a kinetic costume without physical constraint. Please think broadly about materials, size, scope, complexity; whatever you imagine, if it is founded on a strong premise, there will be some way to evolve it into a feasible realization. We will have more brainstorming sessions before your larger projects start later in the semester, so this activity is a prelude to future idea generation.

The core premise of your brainstorming should be centered on some kind of movement. There are many possible sources from which this could be derived or based upon, including natural human activity, an interaction between humans, a group action, a natural process, animal movement, formal algorithmic process, etc.

Once you can visualize a movement, then please visualize the forms that both creates and embodies the movement. (How is the movement created? What is moving?) This could include mechanical structures; the human body that supports, powers, and activates the structure; textile sculptural forms, clothing forms, etc.

Prompts:

• What’s the scale? Could it be huge?
• What’s happens if more than one person is involved?
• Would it help to incorporate large inflatable bladders for powered movement? What about servomotors tugging on strings or activating linkages? What about lots and lots of them?
• What kind of crazy materials would accentuate the movement? E.g., billowing yards of gossamer silk, miles of glitter fringe, arches of tulle?

Deliverables. For each of three ideas, please provide the following:

1. A one-sentence conceptual statement or title.
2. One or two sketches. We highly recommend you sketch on paper and post a photo or scan. Please make these as legible as you can, although we are not expecting fashion plates or design drawings, they just need to communicate the essence of the idea. Please don’t hesitate to add arrows or symbols to help convey movement.

Cardboard and paper are an excellent materials for quickly mocking up rigid mechanical structures. They can be easily hand-cut, bent, hinged, made more rigid with folds, conform to the body, slotted and laced, torn, frayed – in addition to many other manipulation methods.

For this exercise, we would like you to create three samples that are simple mechanisms that creates a symbiotic relationship with the body. A symbiote, for our purposes, is a mechanism that lives complementarily with another organism. The complementary symbiote moves with the organism but also may have a movement of its own. The symbiote may move mirroring the organism or it might move with an entirely different movement from that of the organism. The symbiote and the organism co-habit in space giving each other additional capabilities – those capabilities may be expressive, exaggerating, practical, uncanny, illogical, divergent, useful.

Your mechanical symbiotes samples should again be short brainstorms that take advantage of a movement your body can make. Play with the materials and build off of that basic movement to create your symbiote mechanism. A few useful techniques: hinging (with crease or tape), four-bar linkages, pulling with string). A few students have began to make mechanisms for their samples for Assignment 1 (examples: Gesture Sample #3, Gesture Extension #3, Sample #3, Samples #1 & #3).

You may also use other materials such as the dowels, zip ties, tape, string, etc.

Deliverables

Please create a short post on the course site with the following:

1. Three short video clips (one per sample) showing the movement of the mechanism. The videos should be embedded for direct viewing.
2. A brief paragraph outlining your explorations: intended effect, surprises, discoveries, successes.

Examples

Here is an example of one possible sample:

Criteria

Below are the criteria we will be using to assess your assignment. As you are exploring the possibilities for this assignment, keep these criteria in your focus:

1. Stay open and go with your discoveries. We are most interested in seeing what you discover that is engaging and is working, not simply an implementation of an idea you have predetermined. For example, you may be trying to execute a specific idea, but along the way you discover something that is much more engaging or works more smoothly than your original idea. Put aside the original plan and go with the new discovery that is actually working.
2. Experimentation and creative exploration is more important than refinement. The purpose of this assignment is for you to use your time trying multiple experiments and ideas, rather than perfecting only a few. Your resulting experiments need to work but do not need to be highly refined. Develop your experiments enough so that they are convincing and understandable, but not so much that you get stuck in the details of perfect construction. For now, accept that you are using temporary materials to create your experiments (tape, zip ties, etc.) and that there will still be room for further refinement.
3. Make clear documentation. Your online documentation will be how we experience many of your assignments. It is very important that your documentation clearly communicates your projects. Tips: Remove distracting items from the background; make sure your camera is in focus and your lens is clean; use a tripod or other support to stabilize your camera; if you are shooting video, orient your camera in the landscape (horizontal) format; make sure your project is well lit and without distracting shadows.

Clothing and costume are both social and physical prosthetics: it moves with us, revealing and concealing, and expressing our identity and intentions. A central question of the course is finding new techniques to support this purpose that emphasize the movement of textiles and soft materials.

For this exercise, we would like you to create three simple samples which extend human skeletal movements into fabric. Each sample should extend the motion of a particular bone into a piece of fabric in relation to another body part (see example below). Our focus is on discovering the essential problems and brainstorming general approaches, so the materials and techniques should be crude and fast, e.g. wooden dowels, tape, zip ties, staples, cut fabric swatches.

Here is an example of one possibility:

1. wooden dowel rod taped to your upper arm
2. triangular fabric swatch, with one edge taped along the far end of the rod
3. the tip of the loose side of the triangular fabric is held in the fingertips

The result is a very simple webbed ‘wing’: with your arm straight, the dowel will be close to your hand and the fabric slack; as your elbow is bent, the fabric will extend and perhaps become stretched tight.

This particular example could be about revealing the fabric, connecting body motion to the air, or exposing a color. Other suggested directions could include concealing the body itself.

A key principle is that the sample is a prosthetic in the sense that it integrates physically with a human to extend their gesture and fulfill their purposes. We’d like to avoid the puppeteering model where the human is present to move or operate the fabric but notionally separate and invisible.

Criteria

Below are the criteria we will be using to assess your assignment. As you are exploring the possibilities for this assignment, keep these criteria in your focus:

1. Stay open and go with your discoveries. We are most interested in seeing what you discover that is engaging and is working, not simply an implementation of an idea you have predetermined. For example, you may be trying to execute a specific idea, but along the way you discover something that is much more engaging or works more smoothly than your original idea. Put aside the original plan and go with the new discovery that is actually working.
2. Experimentation and creative exploration is more important than refinement. The purpose of this assignment is for you to use your time trying multiple experiments and ideas, rather than perfecting only a few. Your resulting experiments need to work but do not need to be highly refined. Develop your experiments enough so that they are convincing and understandable, but not so much that you get stuck in the details of perfect construction. For now, accept that you are using temporary materials to create your experiments (tape, zip ties, etc.) and that there will still be room for further refinement.
3. Make clear documentation. Your online documentation will be how we experience many of your assignments. It is very important that your documentation clearly communicates your projects. Tips: Remove distracting items from the background; make sure your camera is in focus and your lens is clean; use a tripod or other support to stabilize your camera; if you are shooting video, orient your camera in the landscape (horizontal) format; make sure your project is well lit and without distracting shadows.