Tag Archives: testing

Reclaimed wood and glow testing

Some photos from prototyping today. I figured out how I can allow the light to travel through composite various materials to create a glowing grain effect. Tomorrow I will take the rhino 3d model and cut out the same effect using the cnc machine…

chipboard table for prototype
cut grain lines to allow the glow to shine through
daylight glow
chipboard before lighting
the glowing effect
anticipated result
wihout composite material the led’s cannot saturate…instead they appear as three individual spot lights
light travel through acrylic tubing
lighting effect using 2 led’s

Video

A brief LED test.

Despite almost going blind and having blind spots in my eyes after this process, my friend (an electrical engineer student) and myself were testing LED’s from a circuit board to work out the battery voltage we would need to allow the LED’s to shine as bright as I wanted. We fiddled around with the board and decided 4V was too much as the LED turned blue. The maximum brightness and best brightness from these will be 3.5 V therefore I will use 3V LED’s with 12V batteries meaning I can have 4 LED’s connecting to one battery.

The brightness of the LED is important for this design as I need the glow to almost penetrate the wood that I am using. The glow must be visible to the users of the table. I will follow up this post with further material selection for the end product.

Conceptual thinking in a prototype.

I am working on a prototype at the moment. It is so simple. It is a basic pole.

I want to use it to test people in captive environments where it will stand. The first test I am going to do is simply use it as a table. Somewhere people will gather around the pole to drink hot/cold drinks. The pole will also act as a sketch pad to gather thoughts and answers to questions written on it. The reason for this is to firstly attract people to the pole and allow them to engage with it, because it is not a normal table…it is new and unexpected in this captive space. Secondly I will be observing how people interact with each other around this pole and compare the results to a normal captive environment with real tables and see how this pole has created a change in interaction.

After the first experiment (drawing on the pole and answering questions), I will test the users more and use different forms and materials and ask the users to do things ie. connect with a stranger through simple forms using the props provided but still using the pole as a base(for comfort?) I will use straws, cups etc to test the users to see how they interact with the opposing user at the pole. This will allow me to see first hand how people choose to interact with each other and from the experiment. I will look at the fun factor and the how comfort can be introduced to 2 strangers through such simple tasks and forms.

The result will be added to my initial design concepts which I will take further in my project. Watch! This space! For videos, photos and results of the experiment which will take place on Monday in the small University cafe.