OVERVIEW

The BIOdress: A Body-worn Interface for Environmental Embodiment

Sara Adhitya (University College London)
Beck Davis (Queensland College of Art, Griffith University)
Raune Frankjaer (Trier University of Applied Sciences)
Patricia Flanagan (Hong Kong Baptist University)
Zoe Mahony (University of New South Wales)



This work explores how wearables can facilitate human understanding of their natural environment through an extended state of embodiment. It questions our current anthropocentric attitude to design and explores how we can encourage more allocentric thinking towards more sustainable design. It asks how computational technology and the Internet of Things can contribute to the development of wearable interfaces which expand our notion of the human body to include our natural environment.

POEME: A Poetry Engine Powered by Your Movement

Shannon Cuykendall (Simon Fraser University)
Ethan Soutar-Rau (Simon Fraser University)
Thecla Schiphorst (Simon Fraser University)



POEME: A Poetry Engine invites participants to create poetry through movement. We explore the relationship between bodily, mechanical and digital interpretations of movement while referencing the choreographed routines of mass transit. We hope you have a safe and enjoyable experience!

Functionality in Wearable Tech: Device, as Jewelry, as Body Mediator

Alexandra Ju (Rhode Island School of Design)



This project explores jewelry's relevance to the themes of technology as amplifier, frame, and ritual object, and of the body as an interface. Considering the rise of “wearable technology,” the series of jewelry objects plays with how the integration of electronics and movement can impact emotional attachments to jewelry and subsequently Wearables, and can define and mediate interactions in between people.

Dividual Plays Experimental Lab - An installation derived from Dividual Plays

Keina Konno (YCAM)
Richi Owaki (YCAM)
Yoshito Onishi
Ryo Kanda
Sheep
Akiko Takeshita (YCAM)
Tsubasa Nishi (YCAM)
Naoko Shiomi (Toyohashi Arts Theatre)
Kyle McDonald
Satoru Higa
Motoi Shimizu
Yosuke Sakai (YCAM)
Yasuaki Kakehi (Keio University)
Kazuhiro Jo (IAMAS/YCAM)
Yoko Ando
Kazunao Abe (YCAM)
Takayuki Ito (YCAM)
*YCAM (Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media)



Dividual Plays Experimental Lab consists of essential elements of Dividual Plays, virtual environments for dance “scenes”, a programming toolkit "RAM Dance Toolkit", and a motion capture system “MOTIONER”. With these systems, the lab allows the visitors to explore and create their own body movements corresponding with the experience of the dancers in Dividual Plays. We are interested in how dancers’ movements are shaped when an interaction is established between the virtual environment and the dancers in the real world.

A Flying Pantograph: Interleaving Expressivity of Human and Machine

Sang-won Leigh (MIT Media Lab)
Harshit Agrawal (MIT Media Lab)
Pattie Maes (MIT Media Lab)



A tight motion coupling between a human hand and a robot realizes a perceived extension of the hand. However, the unique machine motions and aesthetics go beyond human intuition and familiarity, thereby creating an eerie yet captivating experience of a hybrid body. A tension is triggered between this uncanny embodiment of extended body and a mundane act of pen drawing. Through this, we explore a new definition of the relationship between human physiology and technology.

What We Have Lost / What We Have Gained: Tangible Interactions between
Physical and Digital Bodies

Matthew Mosher (University of Central Florida)
David Tinapple (Arizona State University)



This piece investigates how to embody electronic music performance through large upper body movements. It also explores how to transform viewers into performers, participants, and players through tangible interactions with a sculpture. In doing so it questions the experience of using the user’s physical body to manipulate the digital representation of another’s body.

Exploring Bodies, Mediation and Points of View using a Robotic Avatar

Paul Strohmeier (University of Copenhagen)



The installation explores the minimum conditions for mediation by means of a touch sensitive telerobot with an actuated head. People can experience alternative modes of embodiment via the telerobot by wearing a head-mounted display and vibration motors. Using our system we were interested to explore which experiences were mediated in an embodied fashion and which experiences were perceived in a more hermeneutic, interpretive manner.

Tangible Scores

Enrique Tomás (University of Art and Design of Linz)



Tangible Scores are a new paradigm for musical instrument design with a physical configuration inspired by graphic scores. We literally incorporated a musical score onto the surface of the instrument as a way of continuously controlling several parameters of the sound synthesis. Complex and expressive sound textures can be easily played enabling precise control in a natural manner.

Heart Calligraphy: an Abstract Portrait Inside the Body

Bin Yu (Eindhoven University of Technology)
Rogier Arents
Jun Hu (Eindhoven University of Technology)
Mathias Funk (Eindhoven University of Technology)
Loe Feijs (Eindhoven University of Technology)



Heart Calligraphy is a biofeedback installation that creates abstract portraits of participants based on their heartbeat data using a pen plotter. The real-time heart rate is mapped to the basic parameters of the pen’s behaviors, namely speed, position, pressure and pen-down time. Due to the natural variability in heart rate, every portrait becomes a personal and unique graphic that reflects the natural biorhythm inside the human body.

Thank you to our review panel:

Sarah Fdili Alaoui (Simon Fraser University)
Kristina Andersen (STEIM)
Stephen Barrass (University of Canberra)
Jared Donovan (University of Queensland)
Jonathan Duckworth (Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology)
Ylva Fernaeus (KTH Royal Institute of Technology)
Lise Amy Hansen (The Oslo School of Architecture and Design)
Anja Johansen (Norwegian University of Science and Technology)
Mari Velonaki (University of New South Wales)
Danielle Wild (University of Southern Denmark)