Our first project were to create a vending machine. I teamed up with Morten and we sketched out some rough ideas. We wanted some kind of movement to be an eyecatcher that would intrigue the potential buyer, and we landed on a automated slinky-vendor. 

One of the first sketches were we wanted the machine to be manually operated. The customer would pay to get the entire experience of operating the machine and buying the slinky. We were thinking of a escalator with interesting mechanics.

After paper prototyping and guidance we found there were too many operations and points that could go wrong, resulting in a bad experience for the user. A quick redesign and the vending-machine would continually go until the customer stops it by paying. We changed the escalator to a simple threadmill with a slope. 

Sowing the running belt before the finished vending machine.

Filmen av appen Ruter Rundt.  Med denne appen kan du gi ifra deg og hente rester av enkeltbilletter i Oslo sone 1.

BRIEF 10 // URBAN DELIGHTERS

Budsjettkontroll from Marte on Vimeo.

So this is the finished product of brief 13 - a budget monitor that illustrates whether or not you have managed to hold your daily budget. How much your budget is, depends on what you enroll in the "budget monitor website" (which I have not made). Every time you swipe your credit card, the shaft opens, and sand will run out of the container. The sand represents the budget, and the amount is always the same. The amount of sand running out will be relative to the budget you have decided for. 

The shaft is driven by a servo. Since this is a theoretical product that's connected to your bank account, I had to create my own bank terminal as well for the exhibiton. That is the input. When swiping the credit car a random value, representing a transaction will be sent to the arduino that controlls the servo. The time the shaft is open depending on this value, and less or more sand will run out. 

The bank terminal. Copper card closes the circuit, the blue led lights up and the servo open the shaft and sand runs out.

Inside of the bank terminal. I decided to hide electronics - Arduino and breadbord inside it. 

Here is the code:

#include <Servo.h>

Servo myservo2;

int sand;

int transaksjon; //verdi som styrer transaksjon int buttonPin=3; int val; //variabel for å lese button fra pin int led=7;

void setup() { Serial.begin(9600); myservo2.attach(9); pinMode(buttonPin,INPUT); pinMode(led, OUTPUT); digitalWrite (led,LOW); }

void loop() { val = digitalRead(buttonPin); //leser av verdien til button delay(20); // transaksjon

if (val==HIGH) // transaksjon, gjør dette: { // sand=map(transaksjon,0,200,10,3000); digitalWrite(led,HIGH);// led lyser transaksjon = random(10,3000); //når du trykker på button, sendes en random verdi som representerer transaksjon. Serial.println(transaksjon); //leser av verdien i serial monitor delay(2000); myservo2.write(60); //åpne delay (10); //hvor rask delay(transaksjon); // hvor lenge den er åpen myservo2.write(90); //lukke

delay(500);

} else { myservo2.write(90); //sjakt åpnes ikke digitalWrite (led,LOW); //led lyser ikke

}

}

I have already posted some photos of the finished product, but here are a few more. 

The gap between the budget container and the "money out" container can be bigger or smaller. I like when there's a big distance between the two, and you can se the sand fall a long way. It makes it more visible. 

Photo from the top down. The pyramide is empty, meaning you have reached the limit of your budget. When the day is over you simply remove the lower container and pour the sand back in the top container. 

I started this brief with no idea of what I wanted to make, and had a hard time deciding for a concept. It was first when I found out that I wanted to make something physical out of something abstract that things loosened up. When the concept was ready (transactions), I started to build stuff, and things went easier. Specially when I decided which electronic component to use - servo. Further I spent a lot of time sketching on how I wanted the product to look like. For a long time, I operated with two containers of same shape. I didn't need them both to look the same though, and found out that two different containers was as illustrative as with two - even more actually, cause there was only one input (money out). As long as you know how much money going out of your account, you don't need to know how much money you have left. Therefore I went for one container where you could see the difference before transactions and after transactions. The lower container simply tells you that you have spent money. Much or little. I also like the idea of it - you coming home seeing that little pile of sand telling you that "this is the money you have spent today". 

One of many many sheets of sketches.

So who is my product meant for? 

Students with a short budget Big spenders.

On the expedition I heard many people say "Oh I need this!".