Workshop 1

We came together on Thursday 27th February to have our first prototype workshop. We have been designing and making things separately for a while and today we brought our individual ideas together and developed them into something more solid.

1. Audio Visual Installation We wanted to do something a little bit different with the video projection installation. The video will be depicting snapshots of Nano Nagle's life. The timeline below shows the timeline of the major events in Nano's life. We want to show little glimpses of Nano's life and so perhaps not all of this information is particularly important.

Through content experiments we have established that there are a few key points that we want to get across in the video installation.

1. Nano teaching
2. Secrecy and illegal
3. Nano tending the sick
4. Walking with a lantern (lady of the lantern)
5. Founding the presentation sisters
6. Nano getting sick

(storyboard is currently being finalised!)

We decided that just having a normal projection might be a bit boring so we are currently looking into projection mapping. We are considering using multiple projection surfaces in different shapes and sizes.

This is an example of what it might be.

Each of the blocks will be projected onto with a different scene in order to create a more interesting projection approach. By workshop no 2 we will have our video content recorded and we can do some prototype testing with these types of projection surfaces.

2. Text Installation We have been brainstorming for a while how we would make the text installation. In the workshop we tried many different techniques. The concept behind this installation is that the words would be hidden or somehow encrypted in the overall piece and using light certain words or phrases would be illuminated to reveal hidden information.

Originally we were playing with the idea of blocking out certain letters so that when the light shone through only certain letters would be illuminated. We want this piece to be quite large (the scale of each letter can be seen in the second picture.

The second idea was to use the same technique used in this word clock.

(http://www.instructables.com/id/Sleek-word-clock/?                                                                                    ALLSTEPS)

This was created by printing an inverse version of the letters onto acetate and illuminating certain ones from behind with LEDs. (see pictures for our first attempt prototype)

We printed a series of letters with hidden words onto acetate. The only problem with this was that the black ink was not quite black enough and so next time we will print out a couple of sheets and stick them together.

Using black card we cut out pockets for behind the words that needed to be illuminated. This way light would not spill out and illuminate other letters.

We then placed LEDs in to the pockets. Unfortunately we were limited to using red LEDs which did not work very well for illuminating the words. Also because the black ink on the acetate was not dark enough the LEDs shone through thus distorting the letter and losing the effect.

We plan on remaking this prototype as we think this is the best method to create the text effect. However instead of using one sheet with multiple letters printed on it we are going to create a line of individual letters, each within their own container. They will be positioned in a line rather then a block along the wall. The additional information will still be found underneath the larger letters.

3. Map Installation

We didn't do much for the map installation in this workshop. We have a prototype with working LEDs and that will be connected to a potentiometer (which will be hidden in the lantern) which will trigger them. This video shows a animated version of what the map will look like.

                       

 We want to create a network of lines which start in Ireland and stretches out across the world like a spider web. We have ordered some neon tubing and LEDs so the next workshop will be all about the map!

Survey Results Analysis - Lanterns

Using surveymonkey.com we conducted a survey in order to ask people what they thought about lanterns both aesthetically and functionally. The survey consisted of five questions and a total of 22 participants took part in the survey. In order to address what people considered a lantern to be and what people considered pleasing to the eye we gathered a series of pictures of different types of lanterns from the web. We narrowed this selection down to five distinct lantern types (shown in fig.1) and asked the participants to choose which lantern they considered to be a traditional lantern and which they found most pleasing.

Fig.1

Fig.2

The results are shown in fig.2

Fig.2

Over 60% of people consider the first image to be a traditional style lantern.

The next few questions concentrated on the design and functional features of the lantern, asking them why they considered image one to be a traditional lantern. A range of responses were collected and analysed in order to determine what features should be included in the lantern so that people will recognise it. The most dominant answers included:

• Handle (64%)
• Light Source (55%)
• Glass Chamber (36%)
• Candle (27%)
• Shape (22%)

Other answers which we will take into consideration when designing the lantern are the fact that lanterns are portable (18%). Our concept consist of stationary lanterns which are switched on and off by the user but not moved. The survey clearly shows that people consider a handle to be a key feature in the design of a lantern and doesn't this imply that you can pick up the object and move it? Will the fact that one cannot move the lantern have an effect on how the user interacts with it or responds to it. Further experiments into this should be made using physical lanterns as testing subjects. It should also be considered that although the lantern is the starting point of the installation it is only used to trigger content and so other elements play a part in the users interaction with the piece. This should be reflected in further experiments.

Other answers included varying brightness (14%) with some kind of dial or twist function (14%).

The final question considered the aesthetic value of the lanterns and how people responded to it. The participants were asked to choose the lantern most pleasing to the eye (based on Fig.1). The results are shown in Fig.3.

Fig. 3

Here the majority considered the third lantern to be the most pleasing. This raises more questions towards the design of the lanterns. Should they be pretty and inviting, should they look like a common lantern, how historically accurate should they be? Research into similarly designed projects should be conducted in order to determine the importance of aesthetics vs. accuracy in heritage projects.