02 October – 03 October. The Metabolic Network Sensory Workshop provided a hands-on approach to the concept of interactivity, modeling of dynamic systems, software craft, sensors and actuators, fabrication and textile arts. That last bit is ripped off from the ACADIA website but it's all true. We spent a very intense few days—unwinding, stretching, inserting, imagining, laser cutting and manipulating a tangle of ropes and fiberglass cable dangling from a rigging 20ft in the air at the Dalhousie School of Architecture.
After listening to the general vision proposed by the workshop leaders, I found myself gravitating towards the group led by architect and computer scientist Mette Ramsgard Thomsen. Her approach was biological in nature—suggesting that motors and actuators might be implanted or grafted within the overall rope matrix. She challenged us to visualize the overall installation moving, flexing and pulsing like an organism.
In this test version the servo motor and its corresponding lever is fastened to the rope with a makeshift cardboard buckle. Eventually, this approach led to an alternative acrylic harness for the servos which kept the motor suspended within the rope coils. Working with the servo motors led to a few key realizations, namely, that the motor's rotational abilities had to be amplified in order to maximize the overall effect to the rest of the matrix. Also, the servos themselves were limited to 180 degrees of rotation and weren't able to move the solid grey ropes. Because of this, the servos were situated within the ropes but actuated the light weight fiberglass cables and thinner membranes.
The eventual installation had four different apparatus which were responsible for actuating different areas of the overall matrix. The clam apparatus, the infinity apparatus, the swerving apparatus and the sway apparatus. The clam apparatus was designed to flex a bamboo rod which was connected to several circles of fibreglass cables. This mechanism created an instantaneous localized movement within the mesh of fibres. The infinity apparatus and the swerving apparatus were connected to one another to help form a servo bank which created slight sporadic horizontal movement through the installation. Together these mechanisms caused a less determinate, pull and push of the fibreglass cables. Finally, the sway apparatus was designed by Allan Macy and installed on the mezzanine level above the installation floor. A DC motor pulled ropes connected to the rigging which caused the suspended polls to sway back and forth.
Matt's clever demonstration of the clam apparatus (with me bossing him in the background).
Mathias Gmachl (from the design research studio Loop.ph, based in London) and Carole Collet (course director MA Textile Futures, Central Saint Martins College of Art, London) discuss the direction of the installation.
Each servo motor was attached to a micro-controller. We used Arduino boards attached to daughter boards for added flexibility. Each servo had to be programmed independently from the others. Although I'm not sure why this was the case. For a quicker alternative the servos were tested using a MAKE micro controller (hardware) and MAX MSP (software).
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