Last Friday we had a first hands-on workshop for our radio kit, the Fab FM. This project is collaboration with Dave Mellis, at the MIT Media Lab High-Low Tech group.
Fab FM allows people to fabricate their own radios, or even manufacture small series. People can follow our basic kit design or modify it - its function or look. All is open: the electronics hardware, software as well as the casing design.
The kit includes the electronic components, our new board and the design files: electronic circuit and case design. For this workshop these files were sent in advance to the participants, this way they could personally explore different possibilities of change and suggest their own modification.
Through Fab FM we would like to explore the possibilities, problems and qualities of open source hardware.

A visit at IDHO’s Interaction Lab, to give a little talk about play experience and to check out the students presentations of their own play experience designs. So far they focused on game-play and some screen based stuff - but their semester has just started… We will keep an eye open to check their website and to see what Hands-On Play they will create.
On the picture above is one fun project that the students made: Breaking glasses (all different shapes and sizes) using our human voice :]

I had the pleasure to guide the workshop at the great Parisian school of design, ENSAD. The mixed background students, worked in six groups of two and created awesome hybrid projects blending old tradition and new technology. You can read more about each one of the projects and process or watch the videos, on our English (!) workshop blog. This school has the most beautiful hands-on workshop space i have ever seen, old-school traditional machines to make their own fabrics, prints, and whatever…
On the picture above is one of the students project: the magnificent “Flampoule”. It is a light-virtuosity instrument, a hybrid of a flute and ampule (meaning a bulb).
More pictures on flickr.

The Fab Radio just made a fabulous appearance on Makezine. Fab Radio is a lovely project allowing everyone out there to build their own personal radios.
This was part of Dave Mellis‘ project for the Neil Gershenfeld’s famous class: “How To Make (almost) Anything”. We were looking to design a simple radio, easy to assemble, and that could use the personal materials we each already have. You know… these kind of weird stuff we somehow end up keeping from an exotic trip or a special adventure - then, we really have noting to do with all that stuff… We also sometimes call these things “souvenirs” - and because we have sentimental relation with them, we keep just collecting them. This radio is one example of how we can maybe make something useful using these very personal and special materials.
Also, dear Mellis posted for you all the schematics and process documentation.

Lately I was helping out a bit for the audio of the War Veteran Vehicle. This second version of the Veteran Vehicle installation, done by the Interrogative Design Group (IDG), was created for the Abandon Normal Devices (AND) festival in Liverpool.
This Vehicle is a converted British Military Land Rover, its back gun mounting has been replaced with a powerful video projector and a speaker system. This projection platform “shoots” fragments of the testimony of British soldiers and their families into the public space.

And this is a little behind-the-scenes peek, looking at the syncing process of the content which will be projected from the Vehicle. With this interface, developed by Robert Ochshorn, the words can be easily dragged and placed onto the precise timing of the audio file. This helps in syncing the audio files with the appearing text, and therefore can be done on the spot, having almost real time response.

Some of the WildUrban objects will be presented at the HEMBI (Human-Environment Mobile-Based Interactions) workshop. If you’re around Cambridge, on September 15-16, please be sure to visit the Media Lab. Myriel Milicevic will talk about Neighbourhood Satellites projects, and Natalie Jeremijenko about the Texting Fish, Wrestling Beetles, Translating Birds, and Other Cross-Species Adventures.

Now starting an exciting collaboration with Elisabeth de Senneville, designing a charming futuristic vision (or so it seems at the moment). Elisabeth is a fascinating artist, a fashion designer and a pioneer of innovations in the area of textile. I do hope to reveal more details and images about that project as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, here is an image of the amazing jacket, which Elisabeth made especially for me. It is made out of her famous neoprene textile, and has a great simple cut (she has a whole neoprene collection). The fabric is micro perforated which makes it extremely light and increases breathability.

Merci Elisabeth!

Yeah!

“Look here, look here”:

That’s Zazaziza and the Undercover at Droog

Presenting at Harvard the WildUrban Radio, a unique device that allows pleasurable eavesdropping on our wildlife neighbours. The navigation knob allows you, the urban dweller, to explore various directions of near-by wild audio streaming. As we tune into the life of an animal, we can sync our daily routines with it, creating a new type of bond. This new connection may encourage further encounters in the urban spaces.

With the Ecology Media group, we present WildUrban - a fresh approach to life in the city as a space shared by humans as well as wild animals. You are welcome to check it out (March 30–May 17, 2009), at the exhibition taking place at Harvard GSD as part of the Ecological Urbanism Conference.

I have presented “Suspense”, a wireless energy lamp, at the Palais de Tokyo. The lamp celebrated the TeslaManiacs, an art-science event regarding wireless energy, as a part of the Gakona exhibition. Since JB and I are in the US at the moment, we have enjoyed a transatlantic live video-audio conversation with the TeslaManiacs and Dorkbot in Paris. We have presented the history of wireless energy, and started the debate about the vision of wireless energy and its possible consequences.

The Suspense is a playful lamp which lights up when hovering above the beaming table. The base of the lamp, designed from a simple coil, provides the wireless energy using induction. The closer it gets to the centre the higher the intensity of the light. So, here’s a first quick look of “Suspense”, the floating chandelier, in photos and video.