TSL230R Light to Frequency Converter

Category : Computation Research, Nano Bio Art, Physical Computing

This is a first try at using TSL230R to measure HRV (Heart Rate Variability) levels. It will be used as part of a larger project to collect users’ heart rates and translate this data onto a mobile (potentially wearable) screen as a non-verbal messaging system that reveals a somewhat hidden state of ‘being’. The messages will be set to be sent according to the value range of the heart beats as dynamic visualizations (for the time being I will be using Processing). In addition to this, each message will have a specific time span and a specific ‘mood’ or ’emotion’ attached to it. To do this I will be using a second variable EEG: Electroencephalography. HRV and EEG are interesting values to juxtapose as they symbolically represent the physical, biological, and social connections existing between the heart and the brain. This second variable will add a level of randomness to the system, which will enable messages to have a wider visual scope.

more articles

Golan Levin

As a quest for expanding the vocabulary of social practices and of the object-subject relationship, emotional technology (smart, intelligent) simulates human behaviour and creative energy. It revisits the environment anew for new types of interactions and explorations.

Golan Levin is a software artist who creates screens and robotic objects that study sound, speech, movement, and gaze.

Read More...

How to Plan, Design, and Conduct Effective Tests – Jeffrey Rubin & Dana Chisnell

Testing has two main objectives: on the marketing level, it aims at improving sales; on a user-centered level, it aims at minimizing user frustrations and maximizing a product's usability. As the authors point out, testing goals inform the design of a product; those work in terms of the usefulness or relevance, learnability, efficiency, effectiveness, and satisfaction factors.

Read More...

Designer/Artist + Co-Creation

With the advent of new technologies and the rapid dissemination and accessibility of information, artists and designers develop increasingly sophisticated ways of thinking about the world in visual forms and of approaching open-ended questions or specific problems in new and exciting ways. It seems that design and art now represent blurred categorizations: artists and designers grow more apt at interchanging roles and are increasingly willing to collaborate and co-create.

Read More...

Paper Prototyping: The Fast and Easy Way to Design and Refine User Interfaces – Carolyn Snyder

Carolyn Snyder proposes a definition of paper prototyping as 'a variation of usability testing where representative users [...] [interact] with a paper version of the interface that is manipulated by a person "playing computer" ' (italicized in original, p.4).

The aim of her book is to extend the practice of paper prototyping to a variety of HCI platforms for non-expert users to adopt as a practical tool for creating and testing their products during the development process.

Read More...

Sketching User Experiences (1)- Bill Buxton

In "Interacting with Paper," Bill Buxton proposes paper prototyping which he calls 'paper interfaces' as an alternative and a better solution to testing user experiences before starting the design process. The author suggests that paper holds powerful affordances that represent systems of control that users respond to and experience, both in terms of a sketch's control over users' actions (control commands) as well as its faculty to lead users to focus on the 'experience' and 'usability' of an interface rather than on its aesthetic feel or design.

Read More...