In the previous researches, I found the interactive media artifacts that gained great success were of great scale and highly sensitive towards human actions, compared to the things that we are assigned to do during recitations, which were simple and of minor interactions, and  most fatally, couldn’t be even be titled as an interactive media art. Thus, I decided to make something that was of a greater portion of interaction. The project was dedicated to solve a kind of problem and the first thing that popped into my mind was to help with the lonely feeing people have, because it was often the case that partners have to leave one another minding  their own business. The lack of company could often be frustrating and unbearable. As Rudi suggested to us that the best way to eliminate loneliness was not giving artificial accompaniment but telling one that “I was really here for you,” we decided to design something that could give lonely people real company, that there is really someone out there for you. Then we thought of that the most featured signs of human which included ones heartbeat, expressions and temperature. The artifact that we were about to make was to show the other person one’s heartbeat, temperature, and certain simplest messages.

 To acquire the input of one’s heartbeat, the heartbeat senso was needed; to send certain messages, couples of buttons should be used to coordinate with Neopixel 8×8, so that when the user pushed a button, the pixel would show the corresponding message that the user wanted to send; to gain one’s temperature, a more sensitive temperature sensor to the one in our Arduino kit was needed. Our heartbeat sensors were ear clips while temperature sensors were poor in sensitivity. Thus, we bought our own materials. 

With cardboards, we made the shell of our prototype and inside, we connected our cables. By inserting the codes to Arduino Uno. It worked just fine. We succeeded in making the very early prototype of our project and we made it work, which contained only the heartbeat sensor and the message sender. During the user test, things worked fine, but it stroke us that it allowed only one users, because the input and output devices were compiled into the same cardboard box. The user gave instructions while receiving all the outputs of the machine. It was not a loneliness killer, but a self-cycle of messages. Thus, to make it into the real loneliness killer, the output devices and input devices should be distant from one another, because they should be separately had by two remote partners. Thus, we departed the prototype and clearly separated the parts of output and input. And with new cardboards, we made shells for both input and output devices. Then we connected them with long cables. The coding was not much of problem but the connections of cable for input, output, power, ground was of high complexity. We tried multiple times in connecting different devices into the circuits of three Arduino Uno boards and failed for tens of dozens of times until we finally made it work. Consequently, I colored the paper shells green and blue to apply a serious and deep tone to it. We recorded the usage of the machine, and I made it into a video clip, as could be seen below with the conclusions I made. 

         

  

IMG_2676

IMG_2690

IMG_2691

And, here are the codes:

1. Button & Sensor:

#include <Adafruit_NeoPixel.h>

#define LED_PIN   6

#define pressure A0

#define button1 13

#define button2 12

#define button3 8

#define button4 7

int pressure_val;

int button1_state = 0;

int button2_state = 0;

int button3_state = 0;

int button4_state = 0;

int prev_pressure_val = 0;

 

#define LED_COUNT 64

 

Adafruit_NeoPixel strip(LED_COUNT, LED_PIN, NEO_GRB + NEO_KHZ800);

 

void setup() {

  // 8*8 NEOPIXEL 代码

  strip.begin();          

  strip.show();            

  strip.setBrightness(255);

  Serial.begin(9600);

 

  pinMode(pressure, INPUT);

  pinMode(button1, INPUT);

  pinMode(button2, INPUT);

  pinMode(button3, INPUT);

  pinMode(button4, INPUT);

}

 

void loop() {

  pressure_val = analogRead(pressure);

  button1_state = digitalRead(button1);

  button2_state = digitalRead(button2);

  button3_state = digitalRead(button3);

  button4_state = digitalRead(button4);

  Serial.println(pressure_val);

 

if((prev_pressure_val == 0) && (pressure_val > 200)){

    rainbow1(10);

    delay(500);

    HI(100);

    wo(100);

    zai(100);

    zhe(100);

    prev_pressure_val = 2 ;

  }

  if(pressure_val > 250){

    rainbow1(10);

  }

 

  if(button1_state == 1){

    //我爱你

    wo(100);

    love(100);

    ni(100);

  }

  else if(button2_state == 1){

    //笑脸

    happy(100);

  }

  else if(button3_state == 1){

    //哭脸

    sad(100);

  }

  else if(button4_state == 1){

    //再见

    byezai(100);

    jian(100);

  }

}

 

//funtions used in the project

void HI(int wait) {

  int list_HI[34] = {0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,11,20,12,19,31,30,29,28,27,26,25,24,47,48,46,49,44,43,42,41,40,51,52,53,54,55};

  int firstPixelHue = 20000;

  for(int i=0; i<34; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_HI[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

  }

  delay(400);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void I(int wait) {

  int firstPixelHue = 0;  

  for(int i=24; i<40; i++) { // For each pixel in strip…

      for(int c=0; c<16; c += 1) {

        // hue of pixel ‘c’ is offset by an amount to make one full

        // revolution of the color wheel (range 65536) along the length

        // of the strip (strip.numPixels() steps):

        int      hue   = firstPixelHue + c * 65536L / 10;

        uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

        strip.setPixelColor(i, color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

      }

      strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

      delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

      firstPixelHue += 65536 / 90; // One cycle of color wheel over 90 frames

    }

  delay(100);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

} 

 

void AM(int wait) {

  int list_AM[36] = {7,6,5,4,3,2,1,15,16,30,29,28,27,26,25,24,12,19,39,38,37,36,35,34,33,32,46,49,63,62,61,60,59,58,57,56};

  int firstPixelHue = 0;

  for(int i=0; i<36; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 65536L / 36;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_AM[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

    firstPixelHue += 65536 / 90; // One cycle of color wheel over 90 frames

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void HERE(int wait){

  int list_HERE[44] = {0,1,2,14,17,31,30,29,32,47,48,63,33,34,46,49,62,45,50,61,4,11,20,27,26,21,10,5,6,7,22,24,36,43,52,59,37,42,53,58,38,41,54,57};

  int firstPixelHue = 0;

  for(int i=0; i<44; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 65536L / 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_HERE[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

    firstPixelHue += 65536 / 90; // One cycle of color wheel over 90 frames

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void wo(int wait){

  int list_wo[30] = {16,31,13,18,29,34,45,50,61,30,28,27,26,25,24,23,9,21,35,47,46,44,43,42,54,56,38,52,48,62};

  int firstPixelHue = 30000;

  for(int i=0; i<30; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_wo[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void zai(int wait){

  int list_zai[27] = {13,18,29,34,45,50,32,33,28,20,10,6,21,22,23,26,37,42,53,44,43,41,24,39,40,55,56};

  int firstPixelHue = 40000;

  for(int i=0; i<27; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_zai[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void zhe(int wait){

  int list_zhe[27] = {14,17,12,19,20,21,22,8,24,39,40,55,56,47,46,29,34,45,50,61,35,36,42,54,51,52,38};

  int firstPixelHue = 50000;

  for(int i=0; i<27; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_zhe[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void love(int wait){

  int list_love[36] = {2,3,14,13,12,11,16,17,18,19,20,21,30,29,28,27,26,25,33,34,35,36,37,38,47,46,45,44,43,42,49,50,51,52,61,60};

  int firstPixelHue = 50000;

  for(int i=0; i<36; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_love[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void happy(int wait){

  int list_happy[30] = {1,2,3,4,5,6,8,23,24,39,40,55,57,58,59,60,61,62,48,47,32,31,16,15,18,45,21,25,38,42};

  int firstPixelHue = 50000;

  for(int i=0; i<30; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_happy[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void sad(int wait){

  int list_sad[30] = {1,2,3,4,5,6,8,23,24,39,40,55,57,58,59,60,61,62,48,47,32,31,16,15,18,45,22,26,37,41};

  int firstPixelHue = 50000;

  for(int i=0; i<30; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_sad[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

    strip.show();                // Update strip with new contents

    delay(wait);                 // Pause for a moment

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void byezai(int wait){

  int list_byezai[38] = {15,16,31,32,47,14,13,12,11,10,9,8,14,17,30,33,46,49,50,51,52,53,54,55,40,39,29,28,27,26,19,35,44,5,21,37,42,58};

  int firstPixelHue = 50000;

  for(int i=0; i<38; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue));

    strip.setPixelColor(list_byezai[i], color);

    strip.show();                

    delay(wait);                

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void jian(int wait){

  int list_jian[28] = {16,17,18,19,20,21,31,32,47,48,49,50,51,52,53,34,35,36,37,25,23,38,39,40,55,56,57,58};

  int firstPixelHue = 50000;

  for(int i=0; i<28; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue));

    strip.setPixelColor(list_jian[i], color);

    strip.show();              

    delay(wait);                

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void ni(int wait){

  int list_ni[30] = {16,17,13,3,12,11,10,9,8,31,30,29,19,33,46,49,62,50,45,44,43,42,41,40,39,24,27,21,52,58};

  int firstPixelHue = 50000;

  for(int i=0; i<30; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue));

    strip.setPixelColor(list_ni[i], color);

    strip.show();                

    delay(wait);                

  }

  delay(500);

  strip.clear();  

  strip.show();

}

 

void rainbow1(int wait) {

  for(long firstPixelHue = 0; firstPixelHue < 2*65536; firstPixelHue += 256) {

    strip.rainbow(firstPixelHue);

    delay(wait);  

  }

  strip.clear();

  strip.show();

}

2. Heartbeat Sensor:

#include <Adafruit_NeoPixel.h>

#define BUTTON_PIN   6

 

const int heartbeat = 4;

int heartbeat_val;

int old_val = 0;

 

#define PIXEL_COUNT 64

 

Adafruit_NeoPixel strip(PIXEL_COUNT, BUTTON_PIN, NEO_GRB + NEO_KHZ800);

 

void setup() {

  // put your setup code here, to run once:

  pinMode(heartbeat, INPUT);

  pinMode(BUTTON_PIN, OUTPUT);

  Serial.begin(9600);

}

 

void loop() {

  //put your main code here, to run repeatedly:

  heartbeat_val = digitalRead(4);

  Serial.println(heartbeat_val);

  if((heartbeat_val == 1)&&(old_val == 0)){

    colorWipe(strip.Color(255,   0,   0),300);

  }

  old_val = heartbeat_val;

  delay(10);

}

//

void colorWipe(uint32_t color, int wait) {

  for(int i=0; i<64; i++) { // For each pixel in strip…

    strip.setPixelColor(i, color);         //  Set pixel’s color (in RAM)

  }

  strip.show();

  delay(wait);

  strip.clear();

  strip.show();

}

3. Temperature Sensor:

#include <Adafruit_NeoPixel.h>

#define LED_PIN    6

#define LED_COUNT 64

Adafruit_NeoPixel strip(LED_COUNT, LED_PIN, NEO_GRB + NEO_KHZ800);

 

const int temp = A0;

int temp_val;

 

void setup() {

  strip.begin();          

  strip.show();            

  strip.setBrightness(255);

  pinMode(temp, INPUT);

}

 

void loop() {

  temp_val = analogRead(A0) * (5000 / 1024.0) / 10;

  if(temp_val == 35){

    num35();

  }

  else if(temp_val == 36){

    num36();

  }

  else if(temp_val == 37){

    num37();

  }

  else if(temp_val == 38){

    num38();

  }

  else if(temp_val == 39){

    num39();

  }

  else if(temp_val == 40){

    num40();

  }

  delay(100);

}

 

void num34() {

  int list_34[30] = {0,15,16,31,30,29,28,27,26,25,24,23,8,7,3,12,19,63,62,61,60,59,58,57,56,49,45,35,44,51};

  int firstPixelHue = 8200;

  for(int i=0; i<30; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_34[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

  }

  strip.show();

  delay(300);

}

 

void num35() {

  int list_35[34] = {0,15,16,31,30,29,28,27,26,25,24,23,8,7,3,12,19,63,48,47,32,33,34,35,44,51,60,59,58,57,56,55,40,39};

  int firstPixelHue = 8200;

  for(int i=0; i<34; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_35[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

  }

  strip.show();

  delay(300);

}

 

void num36() {

  int list_36[37] = {0,15,16,31,30,29,28,27,26,25,24,23,8,7,3,12,19,63,48,47,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,55,56,57,58,59,60,51,44};

  int firstPixelHue = 8200;

  for(int i=0; i<37; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_36[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

  }

  strip.show();

  delay(300);

}

 

void num37() {

  int list_37[28] = {0,15,16,31,30,29,28,27,26,25,24,23,8,7,3,12,19,32,47,48,63,62,61,60,59,58,57,56};

  int firstPixelHue = 8200;

  for(int i=0; i<28; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_37[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

  }

  strip.show();

  delay(300);

}

 

void num38() {

  int list_38[42] = {0,15,16,31,30,29,28,27,26,25,24,23,8,7,3,12,19,32,47,48,63,62,61,60,59,58,57,56,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,47,48,44,51,40,55};

  int firstPixelHue = 8200;

  for(int i=0; i<42; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_38[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

  }

  strip.show();

  delay(300);

}

 

void num39() {

  int list_39[36] = {0,15,16,31,30,29,28,27,26,25,24,23,8,7,3,12,19,32,33,34,35,44,51,60,47,48,63,62,61,59,58,57,56,55,40,39};

  int firstPixelHue = 8200;

  for(int i=0; i<36; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_39[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

  }

  strip.show();

  delay(300);

}

 

void num40() {

  int list_40[34] = {0,1,2,3,12,19,28,29,30,31,27,26,25,24,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,10,55,56,57,58,59,60,61,62,63,48,47};

  int firstPixelHue = 8200;

  for(int i=0; i<34; i++){

    int      hue   = firstPixelHue + 100;

    uint32_t color = strip.gamma32(strip.ColorHSV(hue)); // hue -> RGB

    strip.setPixelColor(list_40[i], color); // Set pixel ‘c’ to value ‘color’

  }

  strip.show();

  delay(300);

}

Conclusively, the overall of the midterm project was a success. Although during the exhibiting presentation at last the temperature didn’t work well because of some unconscious disconnection of cables. Our project was to the definition of interaction I defined as that the machine can intake human actions and reply to human’s understanding. The interactions our project contained was not at  little amount. It was three, so it was almost for certain that the circuits we connected would be complicated. Keeping the project in one piece was of high difficulty. Thus, we did need more protection on the circuits to not make it inefficient as the temperature sensor during the presentation was. What’s more, it would be show more compliance to the ideology of our project to replace the long cables with electromagnetic signals so that the circuits won’t be so effected by our movements and increase the using distance of the device. It would be even better if we could make two same machines, so that the two partners could communicate, instead of using the single-directional information we presented.  

Question1: 

The art of kinetics ad robotics was not only on its productivity to replace human labor but also the creativity and talents that were long under human monopolization. As our physical world developed, we, the modern people, are in an increasing need of visual realities, which could be satisfied by the kinetics and robotics. The circuit that we built was almost nothing compared to the arts produced by the artists mention in this chapter of the book, as it had no reality-concerned disciplines, nor could it interact with users. The only similarity to be found was that the force they could offer to make itself run under computer’s order. the artifact shown in the article were of high value of art and human wisdom, and matches the argument the author tried to argued, to recreate visual reality with robotics and kinetics. 

Question2:

Devices that enble people to communicate better.

When one puts her hand on the heart beat sensor of the Killer hither, the other Killer would start reacting as that the light and the buzzer would glow and buzz with her heart beat, and she can press the buttons to choose which words to send to the other Killer, during which, if there happens to be someone with that other Killer she could react with the remote her in the same manner, so they can hear each other’s heart beat and receiving some simple messages from one another, as the warmth of company could be felt beyond words. 

Documentation:

We cut the cardboard and glued them together in sequence as instructed.

 

We ran the program on it, which we found quite boring. Thus, we started programming on our own. Consequentially we found out that the maximum value concerning the angle velocity of the machine was approximately 275. 

The product that we thought of was the Loneliness Killer, so obviously the topic we focus on would be devices that enble people to communicate better. The target users would be lonely lodgers, because it sometimes happens that people would be alone when others, who rent the same accommodation, are not there, and such loneliness was so depressing, which triggered us that we should use make something to kill such loneliness. 

Stranger Things, Season 4 (Duffer, M. & Duffer, R., 2022)

When one puts her hand on the heart beat sensor of the Killer hither, the other Killer would start reacting as that the light and the buzzer would glow and buzz with her heart beat, and she can press the buttons to choose which words to send to the other Killer, during which, if there happens to be someone with that other Killer she could react with the remote her in the same manner, so they can hear each other’s heart beat and receiving some simple messages from one another, as the warmth of company could be felt beyond words. 

 Script:

Scene 1

Stephen:  (pretends to be crying)

Kenneth: 

* Walks pasts Stephen and sees him crying*

*stops and switches the button to the “logical” side

*changes attitude* 

Kenneth: Hey, I see you’re upset, do you want to talk about what happened?

Stephen: Yes, I can’t finish my recitation blogs. They are too long. It was like at least 800 words for each blog. I can’t take it any more. 

Kenneth: I finished mine a really long time ago. You should catch up, you’re so slow.

Stephen: you’re so mean, “switches knob for emotional side”

Kenneth: oh, I can relate. It’s all going to be fine, I can help you do it!

Stephen: thanks bro *hugs me*

Scene 2

Flora: *trips Freddie*

Freddie: *falls and cries*

Tawan: *puts the helmet on*

*switches the button to the logical side*

*changes attitude* 

“Next time you should calculate the possibility of that happening so this wouldn’t happen to you again.”

Freddie: How am I supposed to know what she’s going to do?

Tawan: “There’s a high probability that your friend would prank you, 70% to be precise. Your mental capability is just not high enough to see that coming”. 

Freddie: “You know that most people would be helping me instead of lecturing me about what to do right?”

Tawan: “Emotions are temporary. Logics are permanent. People can change emotions, but they can’t change facts. I am telling you what to do so you can think more rationally instead of crying like a baby”.

Freddie: “I don’t like you”.

Tawan: *switches the button to the emotional side*

“I’m so sorry bro I don’t know what came over me, you good?”

Freddie: “Yea I’m okay bro, thanks for asking”

Tawan: *holds out his hand to Freddie and helps him get up*

    

 Scene 3

Stephen : *puts the helmet on with the emotional mode*

Freddie: Why don’t we go out tonight?

Stephen: Yay, lez goooo! Where are we going? Clubbing?

Freddie: Yeah, but I really don’t feel like clubbing, maybe dinner?

Stephen: *switches his helmet to the logical side*

Stephen: Yes, that sounds better. We have a lot of interaction lab homework to do. It’s a Wednesday night, Freddie.

Freddie: You’re right, we should finish all of our work today. You are so logical!!

Recording & Reflection:

Our invention was the Logic/Emotion Head Band, which derived from the second article “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” by Ursula K. Le Guin. We first read through the invention proposals by everyone of the group. Within the group, we voted to judge on the inventions of best interests and the ones of most practicality, namely, the ones that were most practical to be turned into prototypes with cardboards only. It turned out that  my third invention, a capsule to isolate people from the outside world was innovative but not so practical as Kenneth’s and Tawan’s second inventions, which were similar to one another, two helmets. Kenneth’s helmet was to create a virtual reality inside the helmet for users, but its functions overlapped with the already-invented VR contacts or lenses. Thus, we chose a more advanced invention, Tawan’s Logic/Emotion Head Band. In the given story, emotions in Omelas was officially defined by the knowledged and the experienced. With the band, people could have control over the emotional and logical ratios of thinking pattern, so when they need to think logically they could turn the logic switch to a large value while if they need to proceed things emotionally, to say, when they need empathies, they can turn the switch of emotion to a larger portion. The interactions of the machine stays not only on the special switches, but also, goes deeper into the neural system of human brain, the objective command of the brain’s processing pattern. It changes with the brain’s changing  import. It was not a one-direction information export, but an inter-relation, interaction. 

As was described by the inventor, “this helmet will allow you to adjust your logical thinking and your emotional thinking by adjusting a knob.” So far, no machine has been able to bring ion changes to the thinking pattern to human beings, apart from those that destroy certain parts of our brains. Whereas helmets might be too common for this project, because too many different functions could be applied to them while they are not that convenient to carry around. Thus, we decided to produce a head band, easier to carry around and easier to make. So, by using my head as a sample, they first cut out a cardboard bend to wrap around my head.

 

For it to be stable on the head when using, we need to leave space for ears on the bend so that the bend could be hooked on ears. As all of us had different size of heads, I proposed that the bend’s length could be made adjustable, which was to add a link on the fore head part to let it be flexible in length.  It was the very prototype of the prototype. To get into the details of it, we needed a blue print. Thus, Kenneth did his part to make sketches that we decided on his iPad.

Later on, we started to decide on the details of the band, how the adjusting link and the two switches should be designed to construct the whole of the band. Here is the link of the adjusting of ht size of the band;

Here is the switches that we designed. We thought of how to make these switches for long and finally we came to an agreement that we use a short stick to go through the band to stable the round switch while giving them enough freedom to turn. However, they fell off easily at first, so we have to thought of another way for them to stay. We stuck two round card boards on the other side to keep the switches on the band. It took us three days to think of it and finish it. Then, what came forth would be a rather big task, to show without telling, namely, the group performance. 

I came up with the first scenario that was to show someone crying of certain business while the user of the band came to react. What I needed to show was the change, what would happen if logic conquered the mind and what would happen if emotion filled the mind. I played the role as the crying guy. I reflected on it and realized quite a problem, at the same time I was showing the function of the band, I was also showing the weaknesses of the band, that the adjustment of the switches depends on both the user and others, but people who use it might not be able to tell how they should adjust the switches according to different situations, and might be trapped in the same thinking pattern forever. 

But we showed the bright sides of it later on with scene 2 and scene 3. Logic and emotion, empathy and discipline, they all showed their own strengths and short comings in different fields. But being able to jump between logic and emotion corresponding to situations could improve the deciding process by large. In scene 2, Tawan and Flora showed the differentiated effects of such, predicting the future and empathizing the wretches. In scene 3, I played the role of the student pleasure seeker, but with the band bring the change of thinking pattern to me, I could push myself back to the right trail, to work on academics prior to clubbing and drinking. With the band, I not only changed myself but also people around me, to say, Freddie who acted as a cross-bencher between pleasure-seeking and studying and was led to do his homework as he was supposed to. 

The group I would like to analyze and assess was the second group which made a surveillance and crime-detecting glasses device. The invention emerged from the first story around a futuristic delusional VR device which got people drowned in the very scene it created. The invention was relevant to the story, because the lenses could record what the user had seen and create a deja-vu for the user to rewatch. As the scene created was similar with the delusions created by the device in the story. It was interactive because it captured the vision of the users. Moreover, it could detect crime with certain AI algorithms under human criterion. Its interaction relies not only on the users but also the outside world and different scenarios of it. The invention was very advanced and innovative. But what’s more innovative washer the group performed. The members did a slow motion plot in the end to show how the crime was captured, which was never seen in any other peer performances. Films could do that by slowing the flow of pictures, but they actually slowed down their motions to make it happen, which stroke me as quite a surprise for immediate performance. What I found as a slight problem to the intention of the product was that the supervisory control has already been developed nowadays, and that it doesn’t seem very necessary that we need a pair of lenses to capture the things that happened. Thus, what’s the advance of the product would be the algorithms of surveillance and crime capturing. 

1. The challenge was kind of hard and we attempted to code it so that the circuit would buzz to celebrate the completion of the training, but we don’t know how to choose the node on the Arduino Uno board for buzzing. And here is the video for step 4.
2. Code:

int SENSOR_PIN = 2;
int tiltVal;
int prevTiltVal;

void setup() {
pinMode(SENSOR_PIN, INPUT); // Set sensor pin as an INPUT pin
pinMode(ledPin, OUTPUT);
Serial.begin(9600);
}

void loop() {
// read the state of the sensor
tiltVal = digitalRead(SENSOR_PIN);
// if the tilt sensor value changed, print the new value
if (tiltVal != prevTiltVal && tiltVal == 1) {
Serial.println(“Bicep curl completed”);
Serial.println(x);
x = x+1;
}
if (tiltVal != prevTiltVal) {
prevTiltVal = tiltVal;
}
if (x == 8){
Serial.println(“Yay, you’ve done one set of curls!”);
x = 0;
}
delay(10);
}

1. 
2. The angle for the tilt to be sensed was approximately the 60-90 degree. One serious problem we have was that when I dropped the arm the counter also stepped up by one, instead of incrementing only if I raised and dropped my arm as a set. So we have to change the code for it to count it the way we wanted, that was to include “1” and “0” as a set. One interesting fact we found was that rotating and whipping also counted.

    And when we held the wires several centimeters away and tilted it, it seems that its sensitiveness dropped and counted in a rather slow way. I think it could be used by any users for not only bicep. It could be practiced in any physical exercises that include curving of joints.