1.The Veldt—Dimension door
In the story”The Veldt”,the main characters are able to open the nursery’s door and thus entering a virtual world with lifelike creatures such as lions.Inspired by the idea,I want to design a dimension door.A huge cardboard box will be used as the main material of the room,and there’s an automatic induction door on one side of the cardboard box.Inside the box,projectors,mirrors,lights and kaleidoscopes work together to build the moving images of the African savannah.Through sensors,the images will change as people turn their heads.Besides,electric fans may be included to simulate the winds and thus creating a better atmosphere.The idea of changing views based on people’s visions is a little bit similar to VR or AR,which is widely used in game fields.But my design focuses more on the elements of lights.In addition,there are artists inspired by dimension door,but they tend to design the interaction outside the box or devote to creating holographic portrait generator.The new problem caused by the invention will probably be immersing oneself in the virtual.
2.The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas—Bright outside,dark inside
After reading”The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”,I feel sorry for the child’s misfortune.Therefore,I want to create an artifact to imply or show the misery but not in a direct way.A house built with all black materials sets up a depressing atmohphere.Inside the black house,an old electric lamp is swinging at the top.It gives off a faint light at interval,which indicates the glimmer of hope.The most interesting part is the door:the door is nearly closed but leaves a seam of light.However,everytime a person tries to open the door,it will automatically close after a second,which means no matter how hard we try,the child in the story can’t be rescued due to his and the city’s destinies.Besides, the artifact is also inspired by the idea of “Useless Box”,a box that will automatically switch to “closed” when a person press the open button.But in my artifact,I regard the”useless” as a way to imply the child’s misfortune.The new problem caused by the invention is that people may feel amused by the door’s design instead of feeling sympathy for the child and thus the artifact lacks far-reaching implications,so it’s necessary to mention the background and brief introduction of the story.
3.The Plague—Petrifaction
“The Plague” story is about a widespread epidemic whose common symptom is petrifaction.At the moment,the world is still suffering from covid-19.Inspired by this,I want to create an artifact about the process of petrifaction.First we have to build the bone structure of a bird.Next,we may put the artificial(3D-printed)feather equipped with sensors on the surface of the bone structure.In this way,the sensors capture people’s visions. When people look from the bird’s head to its feet,all the feather will turn into disorganized and strange shape to imply offensive behaviors in society.But when they look from the feet to its head,the feather will get back into good shape.Actually,my inspiration is from the first class of interaction lab when Rudi showed us the design of 3D-printed design that catched people’s views and my design is not as complex as that one.The new problem caused by the invention is that people may think that 3D-printing is too far away from daily use and may have a negative attitude towards 3D-printing.
