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Heres a quick video of the needle moving (link below). Believe it or not we almost gave up on this idea but i think it was worth the hard work that Mike and Phil put into it. It really does add another dimension to the interaction as a whole. Well done guys!!!!
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Moving Needle
brian
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PCB's
phil
Been a few days since the last post, but I assure you things have been getting done!
The electronics on our original prototype were very untidy and a little fragile, soldered onto breadboard with a selection of different kinds of wires of random colours. To make the project a little more transport friendly we made our own pcb’s.
We used the toner transfer method, first creating an illustrator file of our circuit then printing it with laser printer onto a sheet of acetate. Then the acetate was was placed on a copper board and covered with a hot iron to transfer the laser toner onto the board. With the toner on the board the whole thing was then dipped into an etching solution, which cleaned off any copper not coated in toner, and leaves only the circuit left in copper.
A few drill bits, and a lot of delicate soldering later the circuit boards were done!
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Shelf
phil
We’ve finally been getting to work on the shelf which houses the electronics for our project, and which the miniature sewing machines sit on, we’re making it from a large peice of elm we got from a local supplier.
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- The elm was in a very raw state when we bought it, and needed alot of work to get it ready to use for our shelf.
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- Next time… I’ll take a bigger car.
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- After planing the wood to the thicknesses we required and cutting it up to size we ended up with some really nice wood to work with.
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- We chose biscuit jointing to construct the shelf, took a bit of time to get our head around it but worked out well in the end.
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- The planks all jointed and ready.
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- Dry fitting of the joints, not quite ready to glue yet.
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Nothing like the smell of fresh glazed casts from the kiln!
chris
Here’s our lastest batch of casts. We only glazed a few so we could test the consistancy of the glaze, but they came out really well. Originally we all thought white (tin) glaze is what we wanted, but then Graham suggested the clear glaze gave a better sewing machine look, and also white gives a very clean impression which would suggest our casts should be precision made… which they aren’t! A lot of hand crafting is involved! So we warmed to the idea of the clear glaze, and these casts which are porcelain came out great with it!
The rest of this batch have been glazed and should be out of the kiln tomorrow (Saturday).
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- This one didn’t work, so I decided to decorate it! Notice the Seattle Spaceneedle!!
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mike
Hi guys,
Just a little update to let you know that the wireless sewing machine is working again! It took a lot of effort and troubleshooting, but I can safely say that nothing else will go wrong from now on. I’m testing it for a couple of hours just to double check.
Mike
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Update and burning issues!
chris
Hey Guys,
Just an update on what has been happening this week.
Casts -
We made a second batch of casts last week. We have glazed three to see how they come out, and have another 4 or 5 to glaze also. I am beginning a new batch of casts which will hopefully produce our final four! Here’s hoping! The problem is they have to be left to dry, be fired, glazed and fired again. This will most likely not be complete until the middle or end of next week.Electronics -
Mike and Phil had a bit of a nightmare with all the electronics yesterday, but things seem to be running a little smoother today! Mike reckons he can have most of it done by next week sometime. However some decisions still need made.Shelf -
Phil and I finally got down to the workshop today to chop up our lovely piece of elm. We have all the different parts cut, now we have to create the joints, sand it, cut the holes for the controls and power cable, cut the speaker grill and… I’m sure there was something else. Anyway, it’s underway. Hopefully now we’ve started it it will move along at a reasonable speed. We do however still have to go get more wood to produce the box for the stand alone machine.Wheel -
Phil got a nice wheel made up by his dad, and with a few tweaks to its design we reckon we’ll go for these and either have them produced downstairs in the workshop or go to Phils dads.Wireless Demo -
After some deliberation, we have decided to scrap the light on the little machines being controlled by Despina sitting down. This will now be done when she turns on her desk light.Actual Machine-
We have also had discussions about taking the actual sewing machine with us. While some of us, including Graham thought it would be great to have it with us unfortunately the weight of it may prevent this. Instead Graham has proposed some sort of photo of Despina to create the mood and use along with our shelf.Now…
Here are some of the things that still need decided…- Solenoids. We have had a chat about the solenoids and we are beginning to think it is becoming a burden, and with so much still to do we may have to do without motion in the needles. Graham thinks it would be a shame to lose this effect, and I do also… however we do have A LOT still to do!!
- Wheel. A final decision needs made on the wheel. Although we’ll probably go with something similar to what Phils dad produced, we need to finalise this. Also, Mike pointed out that if we are not have the needle move, we need the wheel to be really well made and very effective in delivering the interaction!
- Controls. Because the speakers that we are using currently have a potentiometer for the volume which also swtiches them on and off, we don’t required an on/off switch. However we do need to decide whatr sort of knob we are going to use and where it is going on the shelf! This is a biggy which needs decided very soon to enable shelf production to continue!
- Ethernets. On the same note, we need to decide quickly where we want the ethranet sockets to go on the shelf. So far there has been a divide in opinion between all at one side and all in the middle.
I’m sure there are others but these are all the ones I can remember! Please provide feedback on all these issues as they need resolved ASAP!!!! Also comment on anything to do with what has been done this week or really anything at all!
Not long now guys!
Chris
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Concept Video
ruth
The concept video was always going to be the last part to work on because the models need to appear in the video, so the models have to be finished…which we are working on right now!
We wanted to stick to the same storyboard, but we could have gone in two different directions, either; take the whole Greek element away and have the video/project based in Scotland, or keep the Greek element and work out a way to keep the element strong.
We knew we wanted to keep the Greek element so this developed new problems, capturing the Greek feel in a video that isn’t going to be shot in Greece. We didn’t have the time or the money to travel to Greece so we decided that we would get shots of Greece filmed by Mike’s Dad capturing the scenery from morning till night. We would use my Nana as Despina, and use her house as location for filming in Scotland, carefully working out with the scenes so in the editing stage, we can link them as much as possible to make a well refined concept video that clearly shows our product working, and keeping the greek element strong throughout.
The main element we want to have in the video is the sense that this life is everyday for Despina, and we our capturing her lifestyle as exact as possible.
Will keep the blog updated on the plans, filiming and editing of the video!
ruth
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Glazing
chris
Our first batch of casts came out of the kiln having been glazed. These were our first attempts at glazing so some experimentation went on, as can be seen through the texture variations and also the fact that several of the casts didn’t make it out in one piece!
We had a chance here to look at serval different types of glazes including a tin glaze, clear glaze and several different colours.
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- Here is an example of how much the casts shrink during the process. This makes it difficult to predict how much space we have to work with with regards to the electronics, therefore these intial casts will give us a better idea.
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- Tin glaze.
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- Glaze against elm wood
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- Blue coating
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- Too much glaze… gives a rippled texture
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- Black coating
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Studio
chris
Here are some shots of the team at work in our studio. We have since moved into another studio in the department, but we were very proud of the composition of our space here.
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mike
Everyone, please update your profiles to include images. The site looks a bit better with them! P.S. I’ve fixed the image uploading problem we had!
Richard Banks 3:33 pm on June 18, 2009 Permalink
Send me an e-mail if you want me to try and find a sewing machine from my friends in Seattle. Richard