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CTEC502 Intro to Creative Technologies - Final Assessment 

For my final assessment I decided to write about Technological Determinism, Technophilia, Technophobia and Prototyping.  

Here are few fragments of my Reflections and some interesting findings in my research: 

Our present world is facing the fastest technological advances in history. Technology happening to be accessible almost everywhere, represents great opportunities for our society, we have already extended our life expectancy and quality, reduced illiteracy, poverty, and improved international relationships, to name just a few (TEDx Talks, 2018). At the same time Technology is growing faster than our capacity to adapt. Technophilia, Technophobia and Technological determinism are symptoms of this disproportionate growth.

Technophilia

Relates to the attraction or enthusiasm about technology, however, this affinity for technology can lead to different attitudes, behaviours, and emotions one should be mindful of. For example addictions to social media, dependency to your phone the need to constantly purchase the latest technologies, Have you ever wonder where do old phones go and how much impact this has on the planet? 

Technophobia

Represents in the other hand, the fear and anxiety people usually feel towards advancing Technologies and the consequences to humanity. Further studies are being done, to understand and find ways to address this phobia better. (Reynaldo C. L.Jr.2018).

I had the impression that technophobia would be most popular in older age groups, than in younger generations who have been exposed to technology since a young age, or birth, although research in the US have shown 70% of the population presents technophobia signs (Reynaldo C. L.Jr. 2018), misinformation and ignorance on the uses of technology are big part of the problem.

Technological Determinism

Proposes that Technology determines or produce the outcome or change, on society and culture. This concept though cannot be attributed a “good nor bad nor neutral” meaning (Martin Hilbert, 2015); depending on the hat you are wearing, the social, political, or economic interest, you could argue what and how technology is involved in the course of society, taking into account the little we understand of technophilia and technophobia. All these arguments can be endless discussions and completely different from each other, although one thing they would have in common is, that they are produced by humans, who remain in control of design, so we can agree that it is on us to determine the course of our lives and how we utilise the great power of Technology as a tool, can offer us.

All this knowledge and uncertainty can be understandably worrisome but by no means is the future written, knowledge is power, and a lot of people, with the integration of technologies, are using it wisely, working towards a more honest, inclusive, fair, circular, and sustainable world. We all take part in shaping society and as creative technologist we have a big and exciting role to play.

Fortunately, the first steps everyone can take to ensure a better tomorrow, are pretty simple, there is already a considerable amount of help to get started and what is even greater, technology is not required.

Start with, working on your Emotional Intelligence!

(Psychology Today, 2021) defines that “Emotional intelligence refers to the ability to identify and manage one’s own emotions, as well as the emotions of others”.

(ExploringYourMind, 2017) explains Daniel’s Goleman, psychologist, and important figure of Emotional Intelligence study, four basic dimensions of his approach to emotional intelligence:

“The first is self-awareness. It refers to our ability to understand what we feel. To be connected to our values, to our essence.

The second aspect is self-motivation and our ability to orient ourselves towards our goals, to recover from setbacks, to manage stress.

The third has to do with social awareness and empathy.

The fourth link is undoubtedly the philosopher’s stone of Emotional Intelligence: our ability to relate, to communicate, to reach agreements, to connect positively and respectfully with others.”

The meaning and importance of emotional intelligence has been discussed since 1985 (ExploringYourMind, 2017). Recent different studies have demonstrated the value of emotional intelligence, its impact on people and the co-relation with technophilia, technophobia, the negative assumptions against technological determinism, as well as highlighting the importance of openly speaking about them.

For example, (Odai, Y.K., 2018) studied technophobia, emotional intelligence, and its influence on technology acceptance in the workforce, concluding emotional intelligence is a big factor companies need to consider when implementing new technologies. A high EI on employees is a determinant of how well they will communicate, adjust, or react to new technologies. (Quintana-Orts et al., 2020) investigates if loneliness and emotional intelligence play an important mediated role in relation with suicidal thoughts, cyberbully and traditional victimisation in adolescents, which results suggested that teenagers with higher EI skills, even when feeling lonely are better prepared to deal with bullying, consequently avoiding self-harmful thoughts and feelings of loneliness. The study also stressed, the application of polices and strategies in schools to improve EI in the students is crucial; responsible discussions on Technological determinist should be applied too.

Building Emotional Intelligence, in relation with advancing technologies might not only help us, to operate and respond better under stressful, unknown, or challenging circumstances, in our workplace and school, but in our life in overall, including the digital world, where we are susceptible to be fooled and becoming trapped by a cyber reality if we do not know ourselves well and care for others.

Analysing all the above and the four principles Goleman discusses, we can really associate the practice of building emotional intelligence and understanding what technological determinism entails with everything we have been learning through the semester, I think if we work on our EI we could learn from our studies and vice versa, consequently improve our contribution with Technology. Some of the lessons we could relate to are, reflective practice, the 4E cognition, empathy, futures thinking, the acknowledgement of soft and hard skills equitably important, growth mindset, the concept of circular economy, effectuation, causal, inductive, deductive, and abductive reasoning, and the paradoxical combination of confidence and openness to embrace failure and success.

Another potential of emotional intelligence with technology

Rana El Kaliouby, scientist, entrepreneur, author, and AI thought leader, saw the potential on emotional intelligence with technology. Rana along her team is developing an Emotional Intelligence technology, an AI called Affective which can detect nuanced human emotions, cognitive states, activities, interaction and objects people use. (Affectiva, 2021).

Although, we must consider all scenarios, question issues around cybersecurity, surveillance, consent, reliability, accuracy, and primary can emotions be read from someone’s faces or behaviour, and do all faces and behaviours represent the same? (TED, 2017), which some of these are answered in an interview with (WIRED UK, 2020), it is still a promising development.

This technology is already being implemented in different areas, for example in vehicles which allow monitor the state of the driver and passengers with the aim of improving road safety, in businesses, to understand not only what costumers say but how they feel and in psychology, contributing to human behaviour studies. (Affectiva, 2021).

Prototyping

Prototyping is creating early examples or mock-ups of the final product, idea or experience you are working on, evidently is an important part of the design and thinking process. (G, Ruchi, 2017)

Transporting your ideas into the physical world is beneficial for different reasons, one important thing we have learned is the earlier we start the better. Early testing allows you to create a better idea of the outcome, to receive feedback, consider different materials, means of production, costs, identify possible obstacles or even give enough time take your idea in another direction or to change it completely, before is too late.

Fortunately, there are few prototyping strategies to suit different needs:

Low-Fidelity: After putting some thought and doing some research you can start with an economic and accessible approach, for example illustrating or translating your ideas into paper, draw a storyboard, a diagram or/and build something with cardboard.

Medium-Fidelity: Once you have received feedback from your early tests, done further studies, you can continue exploring different prototyping ideas, for example transform your paper storyboard into a PowerPoint presentation, experiment with different tools/software and materials.

Hi-Fidelity: Although starting from low, moving to medium then to high-fi prototyping is not a rule, it is a path that works, but it can be adaptable to your project requirements or/and skills. (G, Ruchi, 2017)

Another strategy is to consider what can you prototype? On many occasions you may not have a final product visualised, or it is out of your skills to prototype, you could then target the actions, experience, service or emotions and prototype those.

Challenges:

Work on my EI and Learning practice

Find ways to interact with my class fellas

How can I utilise my 10 self-study hours better?

How can I identify and articulate the help I need?

Improve my skills on Adobe Creative

CTEC501 Creative Technologies Studio I - Final Project

The project my partner’s and I are presenting, Polline, is a hand-held pollination device. 

The main aim is to assist people pollinating their home garden and/or greenhouse, with this product we also hope to facilitate and encourage people to plant their own garden, even if it is in a busy and compact area. We realised having your own garden brings multiple benefits, such us, grow your own vegetables, keep a healthy lifestyle, it’s a great hobby and it acts as food source for our natural pollinators who many are in decrease like bees species; endangering the balance of our whole ecosystem.  

Reflection 

Studio I Final Project – Brief: Designing for the future.  

Our final assignment was to develop or design a project directed to community and/or environment, based on the given brief. We had six weeks to achieve this

The main points I can highlight from this project were present in different stages of the design process.

Practicing a Futuristic Mindset

Brainstorming: it was a big surprise to find out no one shared the same thoughts; I had to pick other’s idea or carry out alone. The advice of Luka and Rachael after this realisation was my first lesson, basically it taught to leave my ego and assumptions aside, be opened to explore others’ ideas, and consider the opportunities, learnings and paths I might not be able to see yet.  

Finding a partner and coming into terms for a project idea: However, my partners’ and I’s ideas were completely different, we focused, not in the idea each wanted to explore but rather in the areas or practices, we had a common interest.

We used different approaches to come up with ideas, listed common interests and current issues. This helped us choose a topic and start with our research, even though we did not have idea what the outcome was going to be.

Design thinking and problem framing  

We decided to first research about our target topic, find out who and how was being affected, questions and investigate what could be done, propose different solutions and the means we could convey them, such as art installations, E-textiles, digitally, then prototype the idea we liked best, be brave and ask for feedback, evaluate and repeat the process.  

Using problem framing, we were able to identify and break down the issue giving us more clarity of the areas we should focus on, the project started shaping itself.  

The value of early prototyping and feedback: We decided to create a lo-fi storyboard prototype for our first idea and after receiving some feedback we were able to hear a different perspective we were overseeing, consequently it led us to point our focus to the real source of the problem and re-shape our idea.

Prototyping strategies: Our limited technical skills were becoming a barrier, understanding the different prototype approaches, that not only the product can be prototyped but also the user experience or service was a game changing.  

Resilience, commitment, and teamwork: even though deciding to re-design our project was a stressful situation, we reassured each other, were honest and open with each other, and carried on.

Our group dynamic ran smoothly, we both were actively contributors to the whole project, we met up during the week and weekends, and collected information on our own. Having a strong personality, it was very pleasant to work with someone who speaks up his mind, is respectful and hears others’ opinions, it was easy to retributed in the same way. The only areas we delegated a task for each of us, however we still consulted each other, was in the videomaking where Quinn took charge, and I chose to work on the photo making.  

What I will do better next time is, to make sure to read and continue going back to the slides content from every session, create a checklist to help me stay on track and document the progress better.  

Early Ideas - First Prototype

The first idea we decided to elaborate more on, was a video podcast channel where we could educate people about the importance of bees and other pollinators, create awareness and provide information on what we can all do to help.

We were quite excited about this project idea as video podcasting is something fairly new in the media and we see a lot of potential for future ideas,  however after peer review feedback we realised perhaps this wasn’t going to bring much action and that we should look deeper into the source of the issue, pollination.

This was a good lesson, early prototyping early testing and receiving feedback is very important part of the process, you will get others opinion which will help you see what you don’t but others do, put yourself out and reduce the fear of being laughed at or mocked. Though it requires practice !

COMP570 Final Project S1 

For my final Programming for Creativity project, I decided to create a escape room!

I was interested in applying what we learned this semester in class, for example: class, Arrayslist, strings, for and if statements, images, audio and webcam input although also added few new inputs, rotation (translate, pushMatrix, popMatrix); fonts input, cursor shapes, learned from my research

It is a simple game with a final twist! aiming to give a more important message! 

Game’s storyline:

We Finally did it! It's 2030, we reached a 3°C global warming, which resulted in a chain of natural disasters, a major scarce of food and all resources, consequently leading to a 90% extinction of this planet’s species.

 Our only hope is CyborEinstein, who's travelled from the future with an answer, unfortunately he calculated wrong the landing coordinates and has ended up trapped in a nuclear plant.

Help him get out!

Answer:

"The greatest threat to our planet is the believe someone else will save it"                                                                                                   -Robert Swan

Intro to Creative Technologies

This week we dive into the different reasoning or logic methods important to learn and apply in our careers and life.

Causal reasoning and Effectual reasoning or logic

The Effectuation Theory developed by Saras Sarasvathy based on an intense study on entrepreneurs across the US, proposed, unlike what is commonly taught in business subjects, as the best thinking and decision making method, the causal or predictive reasoning, most successful entrepreneurs use a different method which she calls effectuation reasoning.  (Sarasvathy, n.d) (An Entrepreneurial Journey, 2016).

Causal reasoning is based on setting an ultimate goal, specific means or specific alternatives and steps to reach it, seeking the most optimal, fastest, cheapest, efficient way of accomplishment. Which it is a useful method to apply however further in the project, where it is becoming bigger, and you might have a clearer vision.  (Sarasvathy, n.d) (An Entrepreneurial Journey, 2016).

Effectual reasoning in the other hand is a more exploratory way of seeking success, it is not based on a set goal, instead it takes in account what is on hand, the skills and knowledge owned and not known and allows goals to come over time from different ways, interactions, interests and trails. Saras recognises this method is most useful when starting up a new idea or business as it gives way to greater possibilities and unpredictable outcomes. Many entrepreneurs’ final successful products were never what they first thought the outcome would be. (Sarasvathy, n.d) (An Entrepreneurial Journey, 2016).

Saras highlights 5 entrepreneurial principles:

BIRD IN HAND PRINCIPLE - start with the means you have available –

AFFORDABLE LOSS PRINCIPLE - focus on the downside to reduce risk, risk that can be afforded to lose -

CRAZY QUILT PRINCIPLE - form partnerships with people interested, it can contribute to the development of the idea with funds or direction –

LEMONADE PRINCIPLE - leverage contingencies, downsides are inevitable, but can be seen as new opportunities –

PILOT IN THE PLANE PRINCIPLE - control versus prediction, take small steps, learn, and grow, keep creating the future in a conscious way-

EFFECTUATION.NL. (2021), Innovation English. (n.d).

Deductive Reasoning

Starts with a general statement, investigates the facts to prove the statement is true or false, then offers logical conclusions and recommendations (Based on Theories). Stratechi. (2021).

Inductive Reasoning

Starts with the opposite, takes the facts, makes different observations and hypotheses from them (Based on observations). Stratechi. (2021).

Abductive Reasoning

A third alternative that tries to overcome the weak points from the inductive and deductive logic, a process of selecting the best hypothesis in order to solve a problem which a specific solution cannot be found. Bradford. A. (2017).

All three reasonings are important thinking methods, if we wish to find out the root of a problem deductive reasoning is our best shot, however inductive reasoning is useful in creating great point, alternatives or solutions to a problem and abductive reasoning is best applied on finding the most likely solution or cause to a wide or wicked problem.  Bradford. A. (2017).

We were advised to try applying all three reasoning to our thinking process and deduct what is the best method for each problem. This strategy would be of great practice to teach our brains selecting the appropriated reasonings.

Understanding the different logic thinking methods and learning how to implement them is a big deal. I aspire to become an entrepreneur one day, currently I feel I apply inductive logic the most to my daily life, I see now, one method alone isn’t the best practice I restrain myself from taking actions or risks due to my predictions whereas I could take careful steps, be open to new opportunities learn from results and continue improving.

References  

An Entrepreneurial Journey. (2016). The Effectual vs.  Causal Entrepreneur. The  Effectual vs. Causal Entrepreneur – An Entrepreneurial Journey

Bradford. A. (2017). Deductive Reasoning vs. Inductive  Reasoning Deductive  Reasoning vs. Inductive Reasoning | Live Science

EFFECTUATION.NL. (2021). Introducing the effectuation  principles: The 5 Principles. Effectuation  - Effectuation

InnovationEnglish. (n.d). Sarasvathy’s principles for  effectuation. Sarasvathy’s  principles for effectuation – Innovation and entrepreneurship in education  (ku.dk)

Sarasvathy,  S. D. (n.d). What makes entrepreneurs entrepreneurial? :What  makes entrepreneurs entrepreneurial? Microsoft  Word - What makes entrs entl.doc (effectuation.org)

Intro to Creative Technologies

How is my creative practice changing?

I just keep reminder myself, the brain never stops, you can feed it with more information, another chapter, another podcast, another documentary...

I’m more conscious of what I choose to invest my time on, I’ve changed music for podcasts on technology, science, design, I recognise the ones I enjoy the most relate to the mind and social behaviours, I’m giving Drag Race a break and instead watching more documentaries, I’ve promised Kvothe from The wise man’s fear and Sapiens from Yuval Noah I would come back soon, to finish their books, right now I’m engaged with Creative Technologies for Multidisciplinary Application.

Finally I picked up my PC’s pen and played with it.

How am I experiencing the difference between having an idea in my mind vs growing an idea in the world?

Recently I’ve been giving a better use to features that I normally would never use but are very helpful, like using the browser bookmarks to store and organised information I find useful or want to come back to, I’ve started to use my phone’s notes app to write down ideas, projects, issues that come up to my mind, for future projects and not just leaving it all on my head.

An experience I want to highlight was making my vlog video through animatron, although I wanted to do so much more but my knowledge was limited, it helped me imagine myself creating something better and fun in the future. I’m such a big fan of animated series meaningful and innovative like Big Mouth. Maybe they’ll hire me one day...

I’m developing more nuanced views on…

The meaning Technology, uses, influence, and responsibilities with it. It’s a broad understanding to grasp, but I think we must think harder on our actions around it, for example with social media, what do we want to really achieve with it, what is the purposes of having a social profile, what information do we want to share and how does it benefit in any way, how can we avoid young generation’s potential go to waste and instead optimised it. Another example is with my professional life, the opportunities that Technology offers me to fill me with knowledge and use it for good purposes, to not fall into the technological determinism trap and instead be the future shaper.

These are some things I learned this week:

Technological Determinism refers to the idea that technology dictates the future of society and not homo sapiens, however it can be argued that technology is just a human tool like any other and therefore is our responsibility to use it for our benefit and to shape our own future, but to do so it requires our collaborative work and understanding of the challenges daily presented.

APA referencing, was more of a refresher.

A strategy for problem framing, which is ask and answer the what, why, who, where and when of your project.

Bees are important pollinator insects and honey producers that also help maintaining the balance on our ecosystem and the richness of our nature (flowers, trees), fruits and vegetables.

An example of professional practice that I find interesting.

RainbowYOUTH a charitable organisation that seeks out the wellbeing, provides education, support, information, and advocacy for the LGBTIQ+ community in New Zealand.

RainbowYOUTH offer a range of support and information services for the LGBTIQ+ community as well as allies, for example offer gender and sexuality support, homelessness support, online support, awareness and support events, has multiple resources like  InsideOut  a free video-based teaching resource that aims to reduce homophobia, transphobia and bullying focusing in educating kids and young people in school years 7-13, although can also be used to educate adults.

I find rainbowYouth’s mission and work very important for New Zealand and an exemplar worldwide, I consider education, inclusiveness, diversity and offering a save environment for our youth and people in general fundamental for the development of our society, in our present and future; our technology is rapidly improving and so should be our thinking.

I can now see the ethical issues behind.

Social Media, has become a great tool to communicate with people, a message, promote businesses, provide information, give an understanding of the different cultures and behaviours in the world, it connect us, however it is also increasing the influence power over society in different ambits, political, social, behavioural and ethical. Unfortunately, with the among of information being streamed right now is making it almost impossible to be able to filter and identify it as truth, false, useful, good or bad influential; everyone’s opinions and interests differ, making it hard to control what the young, uneducated, naïve people, really anyone is receiving and doing with it.

Among many issues, a simple like, or watch can make you an accomplice of promoting a wrong message or supporting an influencer with unreliable or absolutely bullshit information, something you cannot take back easily.

CTEC502 - Intro to CT Week 5 Lessons 

Technological Determinism Is the theory that Technology determines the outcome or change, generally understood, in a society, however this concept can’t be attributed a “ good nor bad nor neutral” meaning, as explained  by Martin Hilbert in this video DT&SC 1-4: Technological Determinism vs. Social Constructivism - Bing video. He also highlights the importance in understanding the big role we humans play in society and our responsibility to shape Technology as our tool for growth and benefit.

https://www.communicationtheory.org/technological-determinism/

Learning about the concept Technological Determinism, the fear of being “govern” by technology and losing our humanity characteristics urges me to be in this field, equip myself better to avoid for this to be our only reality. As I’m positive or better “possibilist” that it won’t be.

These are few podcasts that helped me see different future possibilities which I want to work towards and so I encourage too. At the same time, I think it somehow relates to this topic

https://open.spotify.com/episode/6zqDREmBnmKxQUiXm2ZLE2?si=mh5oaZ3BTpGRRtWofLD1Bw

Episode 04: Climate on the menu

Can design save us?

Here is where I heard the concept “possibilist”, from Pasi Vainikka, CEO of Solar foods, a company that is refining a technology to produce a superfood “made from thin air” a promise to fight against climate change, agricultural footprint and to rethink the food industry as we know it.

Solar Foods - Food out of thin air.

 Spotify – Episode 07: Design vs diversity - Can design save us? | Podcast on Spotify

Episode 07: Design vs diversity

Can design save us?

Up-and-Coming designer Mitzi Okou, founder of “Where are the black Designers?” a platform for Black designers to connect from different fields and to start a dialogue about change, talks about the importance for a systemic change, moving away from the typical racial concepts and victimisation, and focusing on diversity itself, which can lead to a change in society and businesses, an example of society shaping the future.

About - Where are the black designers?

 https://open.spotify.com/episode/3SzmXYJwarY5CWuoYYaqLW?si=hNc3HWttR6a1vHo2QAY9nA

Open windows to the future where new kinds of developments that we can imagine today are possible

Jason Tester: Queering the Future: How LGBTQ Foresight Can Benefit All

Jason Tester, futurist gives his vision of the potential a queerer future upholds, he revisits important activism and resiliency moments in history where the LGBTQ community has come together, teaching us all lessons of resistance, questioning, and rebelling the mainstream system, making us wonder how  marginalized groups can challenge what is seen as “normal” and start to shape the future in a new way.

CTEC501 CT Studio I -  Designing for the Future 

For our coming assessment #2, we are ask to design/develop a project that responds to environment or community topics

We all may have heard, bees population is in decrease... well this is an issue that affect us all

My group and I will be investigating more about bees, how they work, their importance for our ecosystem and therefore for us, and what can we do to bring awareness and help save the only insect that produce food for humans! 

Week 2 CTEC501 lessons - Continuation

Hacking Darkwing Duck

After week’s 2 papertrocnis and Makey makey lessons we were given the task to hack a board game, forming groups. My team chose Dawking Duck

Materials:

The Dawking Duck board game

Conductive copper tape

Regular tape

Clips

3V coin cell battery

scissors

Planning:

The group discussed different ideas on how the board game could be twisted, on Thursday 11th, after makerspace inductions, one of the lab assistances suggested us to first learn how to play the original game this would give us a better idea of how the board and components could be best utilised. After playing the game we proceeded to list what we liked and didn’t from it and improvement ideas

We kept the main idea of the game, roll the dice, move to either directions the exact number of spaces the rolled dice numbers, discover the cards piles spread in different sections of the game, you win once you have collected two special cards and return to the start point unharmed

New Rules and additions:

More action cards were added to the action cards piles:

Duel (The player who finds this card can challenge another player member to a thumbs war in the middle of the board. Whoever wins would be next in turn

Shuffle (This card could be use to request all owned cards by every member to be shift to the next player)

Sounds and LEDS light were added to the board:

Every time a player would land in a special space it would produce a relative sound e.g.: applauses of disappointed sound and light up a LED light

How?: We created a circuit with coper tape under the board, that would connect to LEDS, the battery and the Makey Makey triggering the sound production, we added the same coper tape under the players’ tokens, they would play the role of a switch activating the electricity to flow through the circuit and to the Makey Makey producing the sounds and lights.

Results:

The game was playable, some of the other teams interacted with it, however we presented few difficulties with our circuit, preventing the sounds to play in occasions and lights to light up. The sounds worked however the conductive links between the switches (tokens) and the circuit were somehow faulty so it would not always produce the sounds, in regards the LEDs light, we aim for 4 lights to light up in the middle, unfortunately only one was on, we suspected it to be lack of stronger energy and the circuit set up.  

CTEC501 Studio I Week 4: Conductivity and Materiality, Tactile Surfaces and emotion and E-Textiles

We learned the importance of choosing the right materials, how you wish to present them, the perceptions and emotions you aim to generate in your audience/users, at the same time to be conscious of the material sources, the environmental impact and to look for sustainable means of production

E-Textiles: (Fibretronics, smart textiles or interactive textiles)

Fabrics that enable digital components such as a battery and a light (including small computers), and electronics to be embedded in them. E-textiles - Wikipedia

I realised E-textiles are an exciting topic to me, I enjoy DIYs and designing my own outfits or costumes, I could now expand my curiosity to something bigger, in a more professional scale. It’s amazing how many E-textiles practices and materials there are already, though is still fairly new, it’s definitely an industry with a lot potential

Group Activity: Create a Team flag incorporating a Team name, Logo and at least 3 working stitch-able L.E.D’s into the design

We were shown how a LilyPad Arduino works and how is incorporated to the fabric, it follows the same principles for creating a circuit, which we learnt in the previous weeks.

We were offered the follow materials to work with:

LilyPad: The Microcontroller (“The brains”)

Conductive Thread: Input (Sensors)

Stitch-able L.E.Ds: Output (displays/Actuators)

Watch Battery: Power Supply

Different texture and colours fabric

Normal threat and needle

Planning

My group was formed by Usha, Quinn and myself.

Keeping in mind colour, shape, form, texture, and tactility, we selected different colour and texture fabrics. We thought red with golden or orange would be attractive

But first we had to decide our group name and logo; we realised the three of us were “fire zodiac signs”, our selected colours would be a fire theme perfect match, then we thought of Avatar the air bender and that is how we came out with Fuego Nation, other options were Aut’s fire nation, but then we considered that including a foreign language would be cool, we felt Fuego (Fire) sounded better

Materials

Lily Pad 

Conductive thread

Battery

LED lights

Black fabric for the background

Red fabric to trace and cut a big flame

Golden see-through fabric to bring a 3D dimension and second layer to the flame  

Orange see-through fabric to bring a 3D dimension and third layer to the flame  

Yellow wool used to trace the logo’s name

Team work:

While Quinn was to draw and cut the flames and logo name, Usha was to design, sew or glue the logo name, I was to sew the circuit and allocate the LED lights

Initially we wanted to add the LEDS to each tip of the flowing flames, but for aesthetic purposes we agreed they would look nicer in the middle of the flame, we would then add on top, the orange material crumbed together imitating the internal flame, it was gratifying to see our circuit working on the first attempt.

We then moved to the Maker Space and glue all the parts together

Finally we felt extremely proud of the results and believe we fit the brief, with the time and resources given

The group communication and collaboration made the whole process very pleasant, we all three helped each other and gave our input, at the same time we laughed and had fun, I took pleasure even in the stressful moments. At the same time we are learning a lot of technical and theory skills, we are also acquiring social and communication skills; learning how to operate under stressful circumstances and socialised with different types of personalities is as vital.

CTEC501 Studio I Week’s 3 topics were Sound and Information/Emotion, Audacity, Scratch and MakeyMakey

We reviewed Emotional Icons such as Emoticons, IRL icons, colour emotions, Auditory icons emotion/information and non-musical sounds (Three types: Iconic or Nomic, Symbolic and Metaphorical) and sonic logos. These can be used to express or evoke emotions when read or listen to. So often, they become universal

After being introduced to Audacity (Sound Editor) and played around with few sounds we recorded in our break, we moved to interact with Scratch (a block-based visual programming language and website primarily used as an educational tool for coding)

 Group Activity: Make a Musical Instrument

With the new skills and tools acquired we were asked to make a musical instrument that evokes a mood or provides information through sounds

Ideas:

Quinn, Usha and I joined forces for this project, we started brainstorming and we brought up ideas such us imitate an indigenous instrument such sounds normally transport you to nature, we also suggested an instrument that produces a day life routine (producing clock alarm sounds, making a coffee, driving so on) and  a tank drum thinking in meditation.

   Our final choice was a prototype of a tank drum:

Initially we thought we could use a normal salad bowl and add buttons with playdough which would be connected to the MakeyMakey

Usha had a better idea, she owns a similar instrument to the Tank drum, so we decided to utilised it instead ( We hacked an instrument and make it a “new one”)

We then decided our instrument to play relaxing sounds, thinking it could be used in a meditation space to transport users to nature environments and/or to tell a story

Preparation:

We selected the sounds: Thinking of sounds that could evoke a sense of nature and relaxation or simply “gives you the chills”

These are few of our selected ones: We only recorded few seconds of each:

Olena UUTAi. The Call of Shaman - YouTube

Kulning - Ancient herdingcall - A farewell song to the cows - YouTube

AMAZING NATURE SOUNDS BY HUMAN VOICE! OLOX - YouTube

Leo Rojas & Gheorghe Zamfir Greatest Hits Full Album 2020 | The Best of Pan Flute - YouTube

 We converted the sounds to mp3 and uploaded them into our Scratch project, then proceed to programme the sounds according to the MAKEYMAKEY key controls (Up, down, left, right, space, A, F, S)

Our Tank drum is made of metal so there was going to be a conductivity issue, we addressed it by adding black tape spots to isolate where the energy flows, we added conductive paint on top of the tape, then with the cables we connected the makeymakey’s key controls to each taped spot

We also had drum sticks to play the instrument with, which were also tin foil wrapped, taped and conductive ink painted ensuring the energy flowed and activated the key controls

Results

 It worked!!, we had few issues with conductivity, we assumed the conductive ink wasn’t even and the cables were a bit loose avoiding the energy to flow 

We appreciated our interesting project as it gave the result we were hoping for, the chosen sounds flowed nicely together when played, the reactions from our classmates and lecturers were rewarding as the emotions produced were the intended, they also interpreted the use of the instrument easily, another tick

Our Lecturer Rachel, suggested it could be an interesting tool to teach kids, for example by allocating animals sounds to each key control and making the kids repeat the animal name while playing the sound

WEEK 3 CTEC502 – Birthday Paradox and Marshmallow Challenge

The Marshmallow Challenge

Set up:

After running a little experiment to understand the birthday paradox we were asked to make groups of threes with the classmates that have a close or similar birthday to you. Each group was to sit in a separate table and were given :

20 uncooked spaghetti sticks

1 long strip of masking tape

1 string strip

1 marshmallow

18 Minutes to complete the challenge

Simple instructions and objective

Build the tallest freestanding structure

The whole marshmallow must go on top of the structure

The team can only use the given materials to build the structure ( no smart ideas, like looking online for tips )

The challenge began:

My first thoughts were, we need a strong base, we could use the tape to bind the spaghetti around to support each other somehow, I only lightly considered the weight of the marshmallow.

Between my group mates we discussed few ideas, mainly on the base of the structure, and then afraid of running out of time I suggested we started testing them as to see if any would work or not

We planned to make a square base with the spaghettis, stand and tape four spaghettis against each corner of the square, build a second square on top of the 4 spaghettis and continue with the process until having a tall structure then add the marshmallow on the top

We weren’t successful on our plan; we ran out of time and the structure never really stood, this was the case of most of our teams

The lesson:

Our failed attempts left a lesson however:

We learnt that people with most success on achieving the tallest freestanding structure are children, why? Because kids are curious they use all their senses to explore the world, usually they would play with the marshmallow from the start and realised the obstacles, they would prototype and adventure sooner than adults, as adults get stuck on the planning and analysis first and consider the marshmallow until last

Identifying the “marshmallow” to every problem, is the first step in solving it, meaning identify the hidden assumptions

Design requires to apply all our senses to the task, thinking, feelings and actions

Prototyping is key, early testing our ideas beyond our brain, words and drawings will facilitate the success of our projects or even better may bring up a new idea to live and make the project go into a different direction. Prototyping does not have to be expensive or flashy

Teamwork and time management cannot be left out

Tom Wujec: Build a tower, build a team | TED Talk

Tom Wujec explains the Marshmallow challenge value better, but few highlights I take from his research are:

The capacity of play and prototype are essential

Teamwork and time management, specialised skills and facilitation skills are the combination that leads to strong success

Nature of incentives and success: High stakes bring a strong impact but not always positive if it does not come along high skills

Learning about the Birthday paradox and how to identify the hidden assumptions “Marshmallow challenge” made me think about the docuseries on Netflix 100 humans, 100 Humans | Netflix Official Site , which I recommend to watch

Reference:

How to Run the Marshmallow Challenge

WEEK 3 #CTEC502 – Birthday Paradox and Marshmallow Challenge

Intro to Creative Technologies Week 3 started with 2 activities that really makes you think how much assumptions can affect the way you see the world

The birthday paradox

We were asked to form a line and situate ourselves in order according to our birth dates, BUT we were to do so without speaking or signing to each other, just to have a guess on where our right spot in line would be

Once we knew everyone’s date, some happened to be a bit off and at the end almost everyone had to relocate, different assumptions  

We then were asked how likely we thought there’d be people having the same birthday between all 60+ students

Many were skeptical of finding even a match, some people said %80 others %10 and the reasons vary from a linear mathematical perspective to a life experience perspective, personally at school I shared the same birthday with 3 more people so I thought there’d be a good chance for at least a pair to share birthdays. Although my assumptions were very likely, my reasoning was still quite narrow as I was just thinking of my own experience and the possibilities, I would share a birthday, not of everyone having the same chances.

Indeed, there were at least 3 groups of twos who shared birth dates

Well the “Birthday Paradox” isn’t really a paradox there is actually a mathematic formula that could give us an answer, using exponents.

But why did the majority thought it to be very unlikely?

We are intuitive, but our brains are not normally trained for quickly changes, we are also selfish so we only considered the chances of ourselves having the same birthday(365) against 60 people, but we failed to consider that everyone in the room had the same number of chances against each other.

It is not all about you 😉

Reference

I want to be a Creative Technologist Because... by Stefa Castaño Galvis

May I present to you an insight on my decision to pursue a career in Creative Technologies, a milestone that fills me with joy, passion and expectancy about the future.

https://imagineitbetterbct.tumblr.com/post/646580100921425920/i-want-to-be-a-creative-technologist-because

#CTEC502 Intro to the Creative Technologies Assessment 1 - 4-minVlog

For our first assessment we were given the task to record a 4-minute Vlog with the title I want to be a creative Technologist Because….

You would think a 4 minutes video on this topic, should be easy to achieve, it was not! But I feel proud of my final product

Here is a little bit of the behind scenes

Process:

Planning and execution

I Made sure to read the rubric

 What did I want to say…?

I thought it was important to share a bit of my background and the journey that led me to NZ and to choose this career path, as I see it’s interconnected

What questions would I make myself?

Who I was?

What do I think of education and university?

How have I developed through the years?

How did my interests match the BCT description?

What are Creative Technologies?

How did I choose AUT and consequently found out about BCT?

 The research and envisions that motivated me to enroll for this course?

*I didn’t mention this in the video, but I had done my research, compared with other providers, even considered moving out of Auckland and made the decision since 2019

How did I wanted the video to be?

I wasn’t very keen in recording myself, I wanted it to be more illustrated

I chose Animatron Studio to create my video on, as animation/storytelling is one of my biggest interest to explore and I definitely have loads to learn

I enjoyed making the video through Animatron a lot, it has very interesting features, there is so much more to explore and their tutorials are short and clear, I didn’t  have enough time to utilised them all though; I had to be realistic and simplify my ideas a little

I also included external videos to explain my ideas better.  *See references at the end

I used OBS studio to screen video record and Microsoft video editor to edit the external videos  

Storyboarding

First week, after having wrote few questions down, I drew few scenes on my sketch book to give me a visual idea

I wrote down my first script, after I read it, I cried, I was so proud of my path up until now

I decided to use the power point storyboard template given in the assessment brief; each slide had three sections, images, script, and production notes

I then started creating each slide in Animatron, searching for content inside and outside of Animatron

Second Week we were given more information about the assessment and shown few videos from previous years, after watching these videos I realised my content spoke a lot about me but not much about Creative Technologies, so I re-wrote it all, however kept the same purpose so it took me less time, I changed it a third time...  I took some inspiration from Ted talks to make it simple and concise

I continued creating and upgrading the scenes

During the weekend I recorded my script and adjusted it to each scene, I repeated this process over and over, I wasn’t very happy with my voice I tried to make it sound as natural and even as possible

Once I had done the recordings and edited the video for everything to match, I recorded my voice again, another 100 times...

Conclusion

In this video I hope to express

How since at a very young age, I have been interested in exploring and expressing my creativity, aware of the world problematics and wanting to make a positive impact 

How my path has been marking itself, up till this point

My conscious decision to choose the Bachelor of Creative Technologies, which rather feels, as it chose me

My future envisions

I want to be a Creative Technologist because… I just know it!

Sources and references:

University VS College - What's The Difference? Education Comparison - YouTube

AUT website: Mission, Bachelor of Creative Technologies, students’ testimonies

Why Study at AUT - AUT

Creative Technologies Examples

Third World vs First World Countries - What's The Difference? - YouTube

Museums Test New Technology, Interactive Exhibits - YouTube

technology | Search Results | TED

Definition of Creative Technologies

Britelite Immersive | News, Insights, and Experiments

Alejandro Davila, AUT’s student testimony inspiration

Meet the Team | CONICAL | Virtual Reality, AR Apps & Mobile Games

This week in CTEC501 Studio I we were introduced to Papertronics!

Paper circuits are made with accessible craft-like materials and becoming more popular in the creative electronics world, is increasing the demand of innovative interactive projects using papertronics.

I was surprised to learn about the many substitutes for wires’ conductive materials already available, such as conductive fabric tape, paint or ink, these materials offer bigger opportunities to the way we create projects and their aesthetics.

We started experimenting with a basic paper circuit. The goal was to light up a little led light, powered by a small battery.

My team and I used the follow materials:

·        An A4 piece of paper as the base

·        Copper tape as the conductive mean

·        A paper clip to simulate the switch cutting the link between the copper tape and the battery

·        3V coin cell battery to power our circuit

·        A little led light

The key was to make sure we were connecting + with + and – with -.

Here are the results: Yay!

 On the Second part of Studio I, we learnt about the MAKEY MAKEY!

A MAKEY MAKEY is an electronic invention kit that basically functions as an external keyboard or controller, plugged to the PC or any device through an USB port. This invention is so creative that has formed a whole maker movement! Check it out here: Makey Makey – Joylabz Official Makey Makey Store

For our next activity we were asked to come up with an idea of a controller, connected to the Makey Makey that would allow us to play a computer game.

My team and I first thought were to make it interactive and that it would need few people to be involved, possibly all of us six.

First, we thought in connecting each arrow of the makey makey to our chairs, so each member would be in charge of one of the directions the character would go.

Our second idea was still to connect each arrow of the Makey Makey to a member of the group, but this time, it would be connected to a metal bracelet each member was wearing and each member would just represent the controller buttons, we included a fifth participant, which would take the place of the player.

The player would hold the wire “earth”, each member would link a wired connected to each arrow from the makey makey, the player would then need to touch the players hand to move the character in the game.

Demonstration Below: