Proposal

Anxious Animation
Do you ever find yourself tapping your fingers on your arm or legs, out of boredom, anxiety, anger? This projects aims to convert said anxious behavior, tapping your fingers, into a more tangible output. While it may not reduce the stresses that cause us to fidget, perhaps a slightly more positive outlook could be achieved. This project doesn’t exist to fix a problem, but rather to reduce it or reframe it. This project would be considered a success if people were able to view their anxious habit as rewarding, via sound or animation, rather than as a result of negative outward effects. Form may depend on how the user taps. Perhaps they tap, but maybe they swirl their finger in circles? Final animation and sounds will be influenced by meditative imagery or sound, symmetrical and calming.
Plan:

create wearable patch that can live on cloths and upload to computer
• flora, lilypad, or particle
• capacitive touch board
• eeprom or some type of data storage for taps
• fabric
• battery

p5js or processing sketch to output the data collected
animation
• controls that influence color
• shape
• size?
sound
• tones to match taps
• controls for pitch, tone, etc.

manufacturing
• people need to be able to tap
• plug into computer
• select sound or animation
• “clear data”?

Materials:

• Flora, lily pad, particle
• capacitive touch capabilities
• eeprom or data storage of some kind
• fabric
• batteries
• conductive fabric or thread

Time:

• May need to order some things such as extra storage and conductive fabric/ink
• Leave time to program with data in p5 or processing

Deliverables:

• Need a desk for laptop and potentially patch
• Perhaps I have a jacket or lap pad that people can actually wear to tap
• Power

Media for Show:
I may want an additional flyer or poster
Monster Breath
Anxiety can consume me, making it difficult to breathe. While I have meditation and breathing exercises, I often feel I do them ‘wrong’ or am too stressed to even remember them. This project is a desktop friend that lives on your workspace, detects when you need to calm down, and starts to breathe. You can see the monster’s breath rising and falling, prompting the user to follow along with the subtle breathing creature. You can set, perhaps based on heart rate, how long the breathing lasts. Perhaps the silly form of a friendly monster will help reduce anxiety in addition to the meditative breathing. Research may include different types of breathing techniques and may influence final form. For example, 5 seconds in, hold, 7 second out, or breath counting. Lights may be involved to help guide the user through the exercise. But depending on the breathing exercise, maybe the monster has one eye..or three, form decisions like that may come after more research.

Plan:

create a monster of sorts, friendly of course
• find fabrics that allow for movement and fur like look
• figure out heart rate detection? perhaps through fitbit or other existing wearables?
• catch attention of stressed user (light? sound? haptic buzz?)
• test, bit by bit each step of the interaction
• detection of HR
• breathing
• turning on and off muscle wire
• completion phase
• maybe monster smiles
• eyes that light based on touch?

Manufacturing:
• design monster
• figure out power relay

 

Materials:

• Arduino or particle or two
• HR api, sensors
• fabric
• muscle wire
• power relay
• lights

Time:

• May need to order some things
• muscle wire, HR sensor?, power relay
• time to..
• build/construct monster
• set muscle wires and insulate
• solder

Deliverables:
  • Need a desk for laptop
  • depending on monster’s form, somewhere to put him
Media for Show:
  • I may want an additional flyer or poster

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.