Poor Clares, York | Photograph © Interaction Research Studio, Goldsmiths

This week the work of the Interaction Research Studio featured on the BBC’s World Service Program ‘Digital Planet’.

“A community of nuns in the north of England is using a digital dot matrix display that gives a news feed of global events and updates of the emotions and feelings of bloggers around the world. For the last 18 months the Poor Clares nuns from St. Joseph’s in York have been using the device designed by Goldsmiths, University of London to guide their prayers. Bill Gaver from Goldsmiths explains how.”

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BBC Digital Planet

Thermal Aneometer | Photograph © Interaction Research Studio, Goldsmiths

A quiet summer, but last Friday we deployed our first experimental sensor node in a house in Lewisham. The sensor node is a combination of multiple sensors that monitor various environmental factors. The device is battery powered and the sensor readings are  wirelessly sent to the Pachube web site, by way of an Arduino set-up. The sensor will be in this house for a couple of weeks before we move it on to another home.

Sensor Node | Photograph © Interaction Research Studio, Goldsmiths

Gas Sensor | Photograph © Interaction Research Studio, Goldsmiths

André Knörig, who is working with the Interaction Research Studio on the ERC funded project ‘Legible Landscapes’ and who works for IxDS (Interaction Design Studios in Berlin) and coordinates the Fritzing project, brought in the experimental sensor modules we’ve been developing together.

André Knörig | Photograph © Interaction Research Studio, Goldsmiths

Fritzing is a really useful project that enables designers working on electronics to make the step up from prototyping, using breadboards for example, to producing PCB’s. It’s something that could be beneficial to introduce to students who are interested in employing electronics in their work, using Processing and Arduino for example.

Experimental Sensors | Photograph © Interaction Research Studio, Goldsmiths

More

http://www.ixds.de/
http://fritzing.org

Last week the Interaction Research Studio deployed the Photostroller at a care home for the elderly in York.

The Photostroller is an image slideshow device that allows you to drift through photographs from the internet. Much like daydreaming, the slideshow wanders through streams of images – some related and some more random.

©Interaction Research Studio, Goldsmiths

The team took a lot of care in designing the Photostroller for the appropriate level of interaction with the residents. A tuner was designed to enable the residents to tune the slideshow with a dial and slider designed for hands with limited mobility. A moment of wonder for us was seeing a 99 year old arthritic resident handling the controller with relative ease.

©Interaction Research Studio, Goldsmiths

Who knows what they will make of it as time goes by but for the moment the residents seems very happy with it.

Yesterday the Interaction Research Studio hosted a workshop on developing research funding bids. The workshop was led by Bill Gaver and featured an overview of the conditions and climate for research funding in the UK and in Europe provided by Justin Davin-Smith from Goldsmiths Research Office. The workshop focused on how to turn an interest or idea into a research proposal, focusing on key elements of the proposal writing process such as establishing a context for the research, defining aims and objectives as well as detailing methods and work plans to form a cogent narrative for the proposed research.

Here’s some useful links from the day’s event:

http://www.gold.ac.uk/research/research-office/
http://www.gold.ac.uk/media/research-enterprise-strategy.pdf
http://www.gold.ac.uk/media/Horizon_Vol2_03_0910.pdf
http://www.researchprofessional.com
http://www.gold.ac.uk/interaction/

Please come along and see this year’s degree show: Curious

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ASTROTAGGING BOTS AND CITIZEN SCIENTISTS

8th March 2010

4 – 6 pm

Ben Pimlott Lecture Theatre, Goldsmiths

Fiona has a background in producing community platforms and multiplayer games for the BBC and Disney. Natasha studied science communication and developed exhibitions at the Science Museum. Their recent projects, Astronomy Photographer of the Year and Solar Stormwatch, are developing the Observatory’s first online community, with spin-off exhibits, planetarium shorts, and events. Fiona and Natasha will talk about the challenges of designing distributed experiences for astronomy enthusiasts that play against the context of the Observatory’s historic site.

All ‘Design Means…’ lectures are open to the public.

Sam Hill graduated from the BA Design in 2008 after completing a wonderful project on experience value. Sam was recently asked to post on Boidus about his experience at Goldsmiths [read the article in full]. I really appreciate his reflection, I think it captures both the spirit of Goldsmiths and the underlying philosophy of the programme:

‘Learn how to learn’

Design needs to create and be created by dialogue

Somehow, all the descriptions of the course I do, in all the different mediums – lectures, prospectus descriptions, open day talks, I never manage to articulate this as simply… In the future, I’ll quote Sam Hill.

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Vicarious: performance, psychophysiological monitoring and broadcast technologies to thrill an audience

25th January 2010

4 – 6 pm

Room137a, Richard Hoggart Building, Goldsmiths

Brendan Walker is “the world’s only Thrill Engineer”. He originally trained as a military aeronautical engineer, before researching and teaching in Interaction Design at the RCA. Brendan now runs Aerial – a design practice specialising in the creation of tailored emotional experience, with clients such as The Science Museum, Merlin Entertainment, and Disneyland. Brendan is a visiting Senior Research Fellow in the Mixed Reality Laboratory at the University of Nottingham.

All ‘Design Means…’ lectures are open to the public.

We are looking forward to visiting For The Blind Man In The Dark Room Looking For The Black Cat That Isn’t There at the ICA on Monday 25th January with the 3rd year BA Design students. We have been allowed to take over the lower gallery for the morning to conduct a design debate framed around themes from the show.

The Blind Man was an art and Dada journal published by the New York Dadaists in 1917.

Design Real at the Serpentine Gallery

26th Nov – 7th Feb

I haven’t been yet but this exhibition promises to be good – catch it now before it finishes on the Feb 7th. The exhibition has been curated by Konstantin Grcic and focuses on mass-produced objects designed in the last decade.

The Serpentine are also running a Design Real seminar series discussing themes relating to the exhibition, the next one on Thursday 21st January will be by Alex Rich, who was a collaborator on the exhibition design, and Tim Parsons.

It’s taken quite a long time to get around to this post. The end of term has been pretty busy and exciting – we’ve had the best Christmas Ball ever, the third year BA students did an amazing job organising a brilliant party to raise funds for their degree show: the Ball included the amazing University of London Big Band that made the night feel extra special.

Second year students finished their Anti-Social brief, from a quick look around the studio there are some brilliant results.

Final year’s finished a tough term with ‘work in progress’ presentations – the range and depth of work was really encouraging. A lot of effort has gone into the development of their projects. Only a few weeks ago we saw Quique Corrales come to Goldsmiths to run a film making workshop. The brief was broad – explore your final year project through the medium of film. The results were great. Students had three days to design and produce their movies. Below, are a few examples of the difference type of film made:

Film Week: Paper Fictions from christopher waggott on Vimeo.

Democracy: Deptford from ben barker on Vimeo.

material from Jane Ellen Taylor on Vimeo.

Recorder Made Easy from Matt West on Vimeo.

I’m Not Superstitious But… from Ellie Edwards on Vimeo.

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SIX SPEAKING CHAIRS, OBJECTS FOR GRANDPEOPLE AND THE MUSEUM OF LOST INTERACTIONS

7th December 2009

4 – 6 pm

Room137a, Richard Hoggart Building, Goldsmiths

Graham Pullin is an interaction designer who spent 10 years at IDEO which included leading Social Mobiles with Crispin Jones and running a studio.
He moved to Dundee to pursue research into communication aids for people who cannot speak, has published the book ‘Design Meets Disability’ and
leads the Interactive Media Design course there.

All ‘Design Means…’ lectures are open to the public.

Coches y otros animales from zaunka on Vimeo.

This week the third year BA Design students are making films. We’re lucky to have Quique Corrales, a photographer and film maker from Madrid, running a week-long workshop on film making. Quique is a long standing friend and collaborator of El Ultimo Grito… here is an example of the work they produced for La Casa Encendida in 2007:

Objetos y obstáculos from zaunka on Vimeo.

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TRAJECTORIES THROUGH MIXED REALITY PERFORMANCE

23rd November 2009

4 – 6 pm

Room137a, Richard Hoggart Building, Goldsmiths

Matt Adams co-founded Blast Theory in 1991, an artists’ group renowned for its multidisciplinary approach pioneering the use of new technologies within performance contexts.

Since 1997, the group has collaborated with the Mixed Reality Laboratory at the University of Nottingham. Works such as Desert Rain, Can You See Me Now? and Uncle Roy All Around You have been nominated for four Interactive Arts BAFTAs and won the Golden Nica at Prix Ars Electronica. Recent projects include Rider Spoke and You Get Me. Ulrike and Eamon Compliant was commissioned for the Venice Biennale in 2009.

Blast Theory has shown work at Tate Online, Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, ICC in Tokyo and National Fine Art Museum in Taiwan. Blast Theory has been awarded residencies in Adelaide, Berlin, Canada, London and Bristol. The group has made works for TV and radio such as Soft Message (2006). Blast Theory’s building in Brighton acts a hub for interdisciplinary practice and includes studios, project space and residencies.

Matt has curated at Tate Modern and at the ICA in London and has taught at the Royal College of Art and Mediamatic. He has co-authored over a dozen papers with the University of Nottingham, is an Honorary Fellow at the University of Exeter and a Visiting Professor at the Central School of Speech and Drama.

Steve Benford is Professor of Collaborative Computing in the Mixed Reality Laboratory at Nottingham where he explores novel interaction and communication technologies for rich and dynamic social interaction, focusing on the potential of ubiquitous computing to enhance the creative industries. For more than ten years now this has involved working with artists, ethnographers and scholars from the arts and humanities to create, tour and study a series of mixed reality performances. He is Directing EPSRC’s Doctoral Training Centre in Ubiquitous Computing for the Digital Economy, leading the MRL’s Platform grant in the Widespread Adoption of Ubiquitous Computing, Directing the Creator Digital Economy Cluster, and is also Head of the School of the Computer Science. He received best paper awards at CHI 2005 and CHI 2009, won the 2003 Prix Ars Elctronica for Interactive Art, the 2007 Nokia Mindtrek award for innovative applications of ubiquitous computing, and has received four BAFTA nominations.

All ‘Design Means…’ lectures are open to the public.

Last Friday saw the conclusion of ‘Design is Dead, Long Live Design‘ – the joint project based around creating discussion and debate. It was a lively day in the wonderful surroundings of the Great Hall, the topics were broad and the debates passionate and well considered.

Through a process of proposition, opposition and vote casting this house found:

That design should not be made for an art gallery market, it is not context driven and it should not serve Industry. We also found that design should be playful and a problem solving activity whilst not being a survival instinct. We decided that design should be for the future and should aid social mobility whilst not being activism. Finally we worked out that design is blue collar and is ultimately pollution.

We went to the Eco Home exhibition at the Geffrye Museum today and I was disappointed. The exhibition aims to ‘examine current ideas around ‘eco-living’ in informative and timely ways’. A lot of the pieces are reminiscent of early ReDesign exhibitions packed full of lampshades made from ‘used’ cardboard, cushions woven from seatbelts and stools formed by rolled up ‘old’ newspapers (about 50 or so of the same issue). I can overlook the dubiousness of the material reuse (perfectly clean, un-creased cardboard, non-frayed seatbelts and un-dog-eared newspapers) but more generally the objects of this ilk have questionable eco credentials. How long can a paper vase or a cardboard lampshade really last? How much energy does it take to melt down aluminum and re-mould it into a chair? How many glass bottles do we get through in comparision to how many cut bottle vases (cut in Guatemala I might add) we would need in our homes?

Creating ‘desirable new products for the home’ is only going to perpetuate our need to consume and dispose. I don’t think the fact that these objects had a previous life is enough to give these objects the ‘emotional durability’ that the curator talks of.

Film of the curator talking about the exhibition.

Some other examples of the exhibits: the Wattson (a domestic energy use surveillance system), wind-up radios, draft excluders, showers timers…

Last gripe – printing the exhibition text on cardboard does not an ‘eco-friendly’ exhibition make!

Visit if you’re in the area but don’t make a special trip.

Auger-Loizeau

Seminar 3 – Speculative and Critical Objects

James Auger (b 1970, Derby, England) has a BA in Product design from Glasgow School of Art and an MA in Design Products from the Royal College of Art in London. Post RCA He worked as a Research Associate for Media Lab Europe, where the main focus of his research was a design-based investigation into technology mediated human experience.

James is currently based at the Royal College of Art in London where he teaches and is a PhD candidate in the Design Interactions department. He is also a partner in the speculative design practice Auger-Loizeau whose projects have been published and exhibited internationally, including MoMA, New York, 21_21, Tokyo, The Science Museum, London and the Ars Electronica festival, Linz and is in the permanent collection at MoMA.

Prior to being a designer, James completed an engineering apprenticeship at Rolls-Royce (aero engines) and worked as a special effects technician for T.V and film. [Words by James Auger]

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The seminar will run from 4:00pm – 6:00pm,
Interaction Research Studio,
6th Floor, Ben Pimlott Building,
Goldsmiths, New Cross, London, SE14 6NW

Download poster

It will be webcast from 4pm GMT at:

http://www.materialbeliefs.com/stream/dss3.php

Every year, final year BA Design students run a cafe to raise funds for their degree show. The quality of the food is variable, year on year. This year however, it’s been AMAZING! The effort that they have put in is incredible; the bunting, the table and the George Forman mean lean grilling machine all add to the fantastic food. As a bit of a foodie, I’ve become a little fussy, but this year the quality of the food is very high. If you haven’t been yet, come… it’s the best grub in New Cross.

Jo Godwin, BAEd Design & Technology graduate 2009, was awarded the Technical Textiles first prize in the Drapers’ Company/Industrial Trust competition. Jo entered the Higher Education category during the summer when she submitted her detailed study of Quantum Tunnelling  Compound (QTC) and it’s application within textiles.  The ceremony took place at the Drapers’ Hall on Tuesday 10 November an institutional award was made to Goldsmiths and received on behalf of the department by Prof. Kay Stables. Well done Jo, brilliant stuff!

Info on the event: http://www.industrialtrust.org.uk/

Info on QTC: http://www.peratech.com/