CanHaptics Lab 1: No-tech puppeteering
Task: Create three hardware sketches that move 1mm, 10mm and 100mm. No-tech materials only.
Goals
The main goals for this lab are to understand the different levels of sketching as described by Camille Moussette, and to get acquainted with DIY sketching resources. We mainly focus on transforming crude ideas into “quick and dirty” low-fidelity prototypes, which fall into the “minutes to hours” level.
Materials
The materials used in this lab consisted of random objects found around my house: soda cans, candle and candle wax, cardboard corners from furniture packaging, used silicon earplugs and rubber bands. Craft sticks and yarn were the only two items bought at a dollar store.
Tools
Scissors, box cutter and a lighter.
Brainstorming
Unma Desai and I had a 2-hour long brainstorming and building video call. Although we decided to create separate sketches, it was a great opportunity to have a work-social session with a classmate. We interchanged suggestions for each other’s sketches and shared ideas of how to create movement using only no-tech materials.
Original idea
Inspired by Rube Goldberg machines, the original idea for this lab was to create a chain of events that trigger movements at different scales.
After several attempts of sketching the release mechanism that is capable of triggering the popsicle structure, this idea was split into two parts, described below.
Part 1: Soda can steamer
The first part consists of a steamer that causes a pendulum to oscillate slightly (1mm). At the same time, the steam melts a wax bond between two strings, which is stretched until ruptured (10mm), releasing a small weight into a cup of water, which in turn, causes a splash (100mm).
To start the chain of motion, I first used a sealed soda can, filled up to 1/3 of water, as show the figures below. The biggest challenges here were to guarantee that I had a small enough hole to create a strong flow of steam, and to make sure I would not start a fire in my carpeted basement apartment. The first challenge was conquered after the third try, with a diameter of about 1mm. For the worrying challenge was mitigated by keeping a large water bottle close by and by keeping the candles in a non-flammable encasing.
The process of iterating and building this prototype took a total of 2 hours. Since the steamer took between 30 to 40 minutes to melt the wax bond on a winter day (6ºC inside the apartment), the video below focuses only on the last 10 min of the process.
Part 2: Exploding stick structure
The second part of the original sketch was inspired by craft videos using popsicle sticks. The main idea was to create an “exploding” effect caused by suddenly releasing the potential energy stored in a series of intertwined craft sticks. A small object placed at the tail was propelled into the air (100mm) by the exploding motion.
This prototype was fairly simple to build, and only took about 5 min to be fully assembled. To showcase this sketch, I also attempted in creating my first ever animation, which can be seen in the video below.
Reflections
One of the most interesting insights that this activity brought to me was to become more aware of the variety of ways in which movement can be expressed. At first, I was very attached to creating things that roll, fall, or slide. However, as I worked through brainstorming sketches, I realized multiple other possibilities of movement effects: splash, explode, stretch, rupture, boil, fickle, shake, click.
And after spending almost a week trying to come up with ideas in isolation, I realize the value of a 20 min face-to-face conversation with a lab partner. Being able to explain my concepts out loud and getting immediate feedback — verbal and nonverbal — goes a long way when working with creative projects.
