Archive

Posts Tagged ‘physical computing’

My most important Twitter Messages #18

January 22nd, 2015 No comments

Twitter von der hess

Long time ago I started posting my last summary of my Twitter messages. It is always a nice way to reexperience the developments of a certain time period. For this reason my most important Twitter messages from Ocotber 2014 until January 2015. Read more...

Plants as a barometer: “Charisma Garden”

October 20th, 2014 10 comments

charisma_garden_banner

The last introduced projects were characterized by its approach of attaching data to a plant. In this project “Charisma Garden” (2013 - 2014), the data will be directly integrated in the health and growth process of a plant. In comparison to the “Travelling Plants” and “Dead Tree Project”, the data is not added to the plant then rather the representation of the data is the plant by itself in this project. In relation to the chapter “3.1. Visualizing techniques with plants” on page 44, the “Charisma Garden” project can be assigned to the category plant displays and takes over the role as a data sculpture. This dynamic (visually changing) data sculpture presents the social activity of a Facebook user.

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My most important Twitter Messages #17

October 5th, 2014 No comments

Twitter von der hess

Long time ago I posted my last summary of my Twitter messages, however for me it is always a nice way to reexperience the developments of a time period. For this reason my most important Twitter messages from July 2013 until October 2014. Read more...

Practical component: Methodology

August 8th, 2014 9 comments

After exploring and describing the theoretical botany knowledge for Human Plant Interfaces in chapter 2, the chapter 3 has investigated contemporary Human Plant Interfaces in interactive art, media art and human computer interaction. This section explores new applications for interacting with or through plants in urban or interior environments. The methodology of the practical works is based on the research outcomes of chapter 2 and 3.
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Locomotion applied to plants for Public Spaces

June 15th, 2014 20 comments

plant locomotion

The previous chapter explored the possibilities of biosensing with plants. Partially, it reveals some methods for translating plant perceptions into electronic signals (e.g. “Pulsu(m) Plantae”). Movement and locomotion are always connected with perception [Ingensiep2001, page 303; Chamovitz2013, pp. 15]. The perception signal and the movement abilities of a living organism define how the movement will be performed. This interaction has an explosive power in philosophy.  These two abilities (perception and movement) determine the differences between plants and animals. More or less, the latest scientific findings reveal that plants are able to perceive their environment and react on these circumstances [Chamovitz2013]. These results cast doubts on our philosophical classification of plants and animals. This topic has an enormous impact for our ethical consciousness. If we put plants and animals to an almost equal level, than we cannot destroy and treat plants like we used to do. It is important to have this background for understanding the ideas behind the listed artworks. Furthermore, I will focus on the locomotion capabilities of plants and less on their movement capabilities. The artistic expression related to movement and kinetic gestures were discussed in “3.1. Visualizing techniques with plants”.

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Biosensing for Human Computer Interactions

June 14th, 2014 29 comments

After the analysis of “Visualizing techniques with plants”, we will explore interactions for human computer interaction (HCI) through plants. The objectives of this research are revealing technical approaches and which kind of interaction can be performed.

Interactions between humans and computer is usually implemented by sensors. In 2009 Dan Saffer defined a sensor for human computer interaction like this:

 

A sensor is typically an electrical or electronic component whose job is to detect changes in the environment [Saffer2009, page 13].

 

We are surrounded by plants and plants are able to sense changes in our environment. The increasing problem with our environment forces us to reconsider our usage of technology. Hybrid solutions between natural resources and our current technology is able to decrease our current environmental issues [ICC2007, pages 15-21]. For this reason, it is obvious to explore the plant abilities of sensing for HCI. The sensor belongs to the basic components of any gestural system, which is used in HCI applications [Saffer2009, page 13]. In our context we replace the common electronic sensor with a plant. An additional electronic circuit translates these bio signals into electronic computer-readable signals. Accordingly to this approach, the gestural system is completed again. Read more...

Visualizing techniques with plants for Interaction Design

June 2nd, 2014 24 comments

Nowadays information becomes more pervasive and crucial in a knowledge-based society [ZhaoMoere2008]. Therefore it is important for a society to develop an easy access to communicate meaning and functionality of information [MoereOffenhuber2009]. The easiest information access exists in our natural everyday physical environment. Public screens attempt to address this task. Unfortunately, current public screens hold several disadvantages for our public environment. They need a dedicated flat surface, illuminating their surrounded environments, and address only the visual sense. Furthermore, people often associate public screens with advertisement and pay less attention to them [MoereOffenhuber2009]. Therefore, it is rational to investigate information displays beyond the traditional screen-based visualizations. Plants are one of these objects, which are omnipresent in our daily physical environment. For this reason, data sculptures with plants might be an alternative approach to solve the problems of public screens and reach wide audiences. The following artworks are interpreted as the next development steps of the contemporary plant-based artworks from chapter 2.3 “Ethnobotany”. In this stage electronic and digital technology is applied to plants.

Within the scope of my research I will present a qualitative evaluation of visualizing techniques with plants. The evaluation model is based on the comparison methods developed by Andrew Vande Moere, Dietmar Offenhuber [MoereOffenhuber2009], and as well as Matthew Brehmer, and Tamara Munzner (2013) [BrehmerMunzer]. The evaluation result reveals their visual encoding techniques, and which characteristic of data they visualize. Furthermore, the outcome assigns approaches of creating more intriguing, and easy memorable visualizations. Read more...

Can Plants be a Music Instrument?

October 8th, 2013 6 comments

Make music with plants

During my research on Human Plant Interfaces I figured out music and sound is a very often used expression for this kind of interaction. As far as I know John Lifton and Richard Lowenberg are one of the first artists that used plants for creating a soundscape. Their installation "Green Music", created for the much discussed movie "The Secret Life of Plants" (movie), uses the approach of bio sensing and converts the signals to synthesized sounds. The visitors can interact with the plants via touch for changing the pitch level of a sound. Read more...

My most important Twitter Messages #16

July 1st, 2013 No comments

Twitter von der hess

A small summary of my Twitter messages from February 2013- June 2013:

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Links for plant-based Bio Art and Gardening

April 3rd, 2013 1 comment

Plant Colour Patterns

One week ago I published a blog post about links and places for Physical Computing in Germany. Today I decided to do the same for plant-based stuff. Hopefully, I get more organized in the future and maybe helpful for some others, too. Please feel free to add some others resources as comment. ThX!

DIY BIO (ART) Community

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