PITCH Presentation

Post 26

A little update, today is the first day of my Sem break!
I gave a talk for EMM about Wearable tech inspired from PPM's final year project:



I will be starting my final semester in November and soon, graduation!

So I presented my PITCH on Friday, 29 August.

I presented my slides Ms. Sweii, Din Tan, Klek, Yee Siang and Yi Weii.

Feedback and questions I got were and I did a little research to finally answer those questions and feedback:

Sweii: You didn't mention about how the number of participants effects the whole experience and the display?

I forgot to mention this in the presentation as well.
Two players, more visuals. 1 player active only, less visuals. No players active, totally weak visuals. Des it.

Klek: What not just do crowd motion tracking instead of making them wear something so brittle?

Honestly, I didn't know why I froze and went blank on the main reasons why I actually chose wearable tech.

The thing is that I didn't even present about how I wanted to replicate lighters, rave rings and phone lights people use during concerts. You see those little white dots in the crowd? Those are cellphones. I want to replace those pretty dots of lights with my LED from my WOO Band, which would be prettier.

I didn't mention about how the gloves would give an LED feedback once they interacted by fist-pumping.
You can't really achieve that with motion tracking the crowd pixels.

As for it being brittle, I'm trying to find a way to make it sturdy and comfortable at the same time.

1. It will have to be water resistant (as raves are often conducted outdoors and are prone to rain and/or if they were foam parties)
2. It has to be flexible and PVC will be totally out of the question because sweating through it is really uncomfortable. Cotton as well, it takes a long time to dry.


Happiness Level : 7

Starting with the Arduino

Post 25


Alright looks like I'm facing the same problem like I've had since Livetags.

I CAN'T ARDUINO ON MY WINDOWS 8.1 LAPTOP.

Apparently the my OS could not recognize the drivers. I'd probably end up using my old desktop to code the Arduinos like last time.

But, the thing is, I need my laptop because it's portable.

Below is the video of what I'm experiencing exactly. Except that I update the drivers from the windows folder. But it keeps saying is already updated with the best drivers. My COMPORT is still not lilypad.

The sketch and tutorial for the RGB LED is Here.

I get this error after uploading my sketch: avrdude stk500_getsync() not in sync resp=0x00

Researched online and it's probably a driver problem.


So this is what I did today.

I hooked up my arduino and it could upload the Basic Blink Sketch. I doesn't loop forever though.

So fix the drivers, I tried installing the FTDI drivers from here but it still wouldn't work.

And this is only the first day.

Happiness Level : 4

References

Buechley, L. (2014). programming the LilyPad Arduino: color (RGB LEDs). [online] Web Media MIT edu. Available at: http://web.media.mit.edu/~leah/LilyPad/06_rgb.html [Accessed 27 Aug. 2014].

Ftdichip, (2014). Virtual COM Port Drivers. [online] Available at: http://www.ftdichip.com/Drivers/VCP.htm [Accessed 27 Aug. 2014].

LilyPad Arduino, (2014). Lesson 2: Light (LEDs). [online] Available at: http://lilypadarduino.org/?page_id=212 [Accessed 27 Aug. 2014].

Van Vlymen, B. (2013). problem with serial port Arduino uno on Window 8.1. [online] YouTube. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZpyPgk5NmU [Accessed 27 Aug. 2014].

Some Updates

Post 24

Honestly, I haven't been doing much for this subject since there were so many other demands and submissions from other subjects.

Anyway, this will be the benchmark for my motion graphics. It's EDM too so you will get a very clear idea on the direction of Graphics I'm going to.




PLAYLIST Here's the whole playlist of all the edm lyric videos.

I'm also downloading XCTU and should start the coding soon. Here's the link to the PREZI of my PITCH.

It's updated LIVE, so you could creepily observe my every move and every edit.

http://prezi.com/eg76l5ilkon2/woo-band/ I have embed it here. You can play it here as well.

I did not design the polygon graphics, it's one of the latest templates Prezi uploaded. I figured I could use it because it is sooo beautiful and it kind of symbolizes my need for progress to success. I'm really just crapping here, I just really like the colors and the graphics.

I also bought the wireless router today at RM80 at Pyramid and had no problem shopping around for it with the Lawyat buying guide that Yee Siang gave to me. It is also similar to Yaw's.

Happiness Level : 5 (Neutral)

References

prezi.com, (2014). Prezi - Presentation Software. [online] Available at: http://prezi.com [Accessed 25 Aug. 2014].

Youtube.com, (2014). EDM Lyric Videos - YouTube. [online] Available at: http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8aXabcnTljy22HK0mrtHpxBjZbdBqhZz [Accessed 25 Aug. 2014].

VEVO, Z. (2014). Zedd - Find You - [Lyric Video] ft. Matthew Koma & Miriam Bryant. [online] YouTube. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vFLW-idOxk [Accessed 25 Aug. 2014].

Brainstorming period

Post. 23

I have just made it a point to scan all my brainstorming sketches. As you can see, my mind can get pretty wild.

Happiness Level : 5 (Neutral)

Gantt Chart & Flow Chart & Use Case Scenario

Post no. 22

Really executing my Prospectus really forced me to realise that I have so many things missing.

Click to enlarge my gantt chart.

I segregated the weeks into pre-production, production and post-production.

I left alot of open weeks for the execution of my coding.


Flow Chart

Use Case Scenario

Happiness Level : 4

Prospectus Content

Post no. 21

1. Introduction
2. The brief - Methadology
3. Case Studies
4. The Big Idea
5. Objective
6. Genre
7. Inspirations
8. Target Audience
9. Format/Platform
10. Rationale
11. Elaboration of whole user experience - Experience Duration
12. Flow Chart
13. Use Case Scenario
14. Gantt Chart
15. User tests (Alpha and Beta - how will it be conducted- 450 words)
16. Graphic Resources
17. Programming Resources and Info - Tutorials
18. Sound Resources
19. List of hardware and software and Music
20. Sketches for Graphics
21. Sketches for Logistics - Floor plans , Construction plans - Sketches for Glove Design
22. Learning Statement
23. Expenditures
24. Risk Assessments
25. References & Annotations

I have listed out the important titles from the brief and what I think is important. This is going to be one very thick prospectus.

Happiness Level : 4

Meeting with our Specialists 9

Post no.20

Tutors Present: Yee Siang & Jam

So today I brought my TM router and boards for my 10.30 Am tutorial. Yee Siang was testing out my router but we couldn't get it to work because the default password (blank space) for the D-Link wouldn't get through although we reset it a thousand times.

Finally he opted that I get a cheap TP Link router from lowyat at RM79. Their product lists is HERE.
He suggested that I didn't need to get the 3G/Unifi router. I could just get AP/ROUTER/Repeater.

Then Yaw walked in and he brought in the exact same router we were talking about! His project needed wireless connections too for his web sockets.

He tested Yaw's router and it worked perfectly!

One thing he said to us is that we should reserve the IP address for our wireless device if not they're just going to keep refreshing whenever we restarted our machines.

Finally after

3 weeks, my parts from China arrived!
My two FTDI boards, Arduino Lilypad and two RGB leds arrived safely.

HOWEVER, I realised I bought the wrong FTDI cable because I bought the one with teeth on it. My arduino had teeth on it as well. So how are teeth and teeth going to connect to each other?

I was supposed to get THIS ONE!

But instead I ordered THIS ONE!

See? The Arduino has teeth too.

Jam came to my rescue and loaned me some cables so I didn't need to re-buy the parts. Thank you Jam.

So, I used the female-female cables to connect them. I was so relieved. Jam also borrowed me 4 makey makey alligator clips for my testings.

CURRENT UPDATED EXPENDITURES:

I found some videos that could get me started with the connections:

This one sends data from the computer to the the Xbee:

This one receives data from the xbee to the computer:

Happiness Level : 6

References

Arduino, (n.d.). Arduino - ArduinoBoardLilyPad. [online] Available at: http://arduino.cc/en/Main/arduinoBoardLilyPad [Accessed 15 Aug. 2014].

Gravitech, (n.d.). Arduino LilyPad/Pro/ProMini Programmer. [online] Available at: http://www.gravitech.us/arliandpropr.html [Accessed 15 Aug. 2014].

Jung, C. (2014). Lilypad Arduino Xbee Communication (Receiving Data). [online] YouTube. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LesKsP5-olM [Accessed 15 Aug. 2014].

Jung, C. (2014). Lilypad Arduino Xbee Communication (Sending Data). [online] YouTube. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xjg4oRwSDE0 [Accessed 15 Aug. 2014].

Pricelists. (2014). 1st ed. [ebook] Malaysia, p.1. Available at: http://images-cdn.lowyat.net/pricelists/PCHardware/C-Zone/pchardware-czone.pdf [Accessed 15 Aug. 2014].

TaoBao, (n.d.). 【Realplay】USB转TTL 支持3.3V 5V双电源FT232RL FTDI MWC调试器. [online] Available at: http://detail.tmall.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.14.1.hUAnPU&id=26917352895&ad_id=&am_id=&cm_id=140105335569ed55e27b&pm_id= [Accessed 15 Aug. 2014].

Meeting with our Specialists 8

Post no.19

Tutors present: Jazmi & Sweii

I missed the two previous sessions and feel horrible. The first one was Jazmi's (where I was overwhelmed with the 40 Hour CFE challenge) and the second one which was with Yee Siang (where I resulted in lugging around my paperbag filled with arduino boards and went home after some miscommunications)

MUSIC
Alright so today I gave Jazmi and Sweii a listen to the music I chose and told them that I specifically chose the ones on SoundCloud which had the labels 'Free Music Download' on them. I'm glad that they had really good remixed of mainstream Dubstep and EDM tracks like Summertime Sadness or Animals.

I decided to extract the drop and parts leading to the drop about 30 seconds to keep the experience short and sweet.

He commented that the transitions should be smooth too.

STAGE DESIGN
Now that I have changed my output to a holographic box instead of a projector, I could no longer project my audiences onto the front panel of the box as all the animations are going to be happening behind the slanted glass.
I opted to place two monitors on each side of the box.

But Jazmi gave a useful reminder that monitors in concerts are usually embedded in the stages. I just had to make sure it blends with my holo box.

As for the machine, I was thinking of using a Mac Desktop Monitor because of its clarity and large screen. I obviously had to think of a way to conceal that bulbous silver machine lying faced down on my holo box.

As for the distance between users and holo box, I have yet to test them as I need to have a live testing on the viewing distance and space. I need to conduct this in the iis.

HOLO BOX
I consulted him about the double images I get from my previous holo box and he suggested I take a look at some holographic films.

WOO GLOVE
He said it sounds catchy but it should have some meaning to them. Make it like an acronym.
W - Wearable
O  - Overhyped
O  - Omitters

Maybe.

WOO GLOVE TECHNICALITIES
For the LED, they are RGB. So, I should program different colours for both the microphone input and the accelerometer input.


Happiness Level : 6

MUSIC

Post. 18

Music for main experience:
My SOUNDCLOUD

Sound effects for experience:



Looks like I'm going to be doing some DJ'ing myself.
Happiness Level : 6
References

Jiménez, B. (2013). Are you ready?. [online] YouTube. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdluUXgQbw0 [Accessed 14 Aug. 2014].

Nadigel, R. (2012). Download DJ Samples for the mobile DJ sampler.. [online] YouTube. Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=741OQGNxUlo [Accessed 13 Aug. 2014].

Gantt Chart Planning

Post no.17

For today's PPM session, we had some planning exercises for our Gantt Chart, and did some risk assessments. I really liked this exercise! 

So we started out with Risk Assessments, we were required only to complete three but I figured since I already have a couple of risks in my mind, why not just fill them all in?

GANTT EXERCISE

So first, we were told to plan out our FYP tasks AS DETAILED AS POSSIBLE (my weakness which I am trying to fix) and separate them into different sections. I took the initiative of collecting all the colors I need for different departments because I knew I was going to move them around later and that I was going to be confused if I didn't.

I left gaps in between some sections because I thought I needed to execute some tasks first before the others according to hierarchy. So I mentally arranged them to from the highest to the lowest - for time where I would begin and end the project. I scribbled and arrow with the words 'Music First' because I only could execute the sketching after I have found my sounds from the 3rd Pink Content section.

However, it didn't really matter that I did that because we were instructed to arrange out tasks in completion order next. So I ripped it all off and rearranged them, 3 types of tasks at a time.

After that we had to decide how long we would want to carry out our work.

We had 2 months holiday + 14 weeks of the Final semester + 2 Weeks of Holiday = 24 weeks.

Obviously I'm going to be resting for at least a month so I decided on 20 weeks.

I separated them and gave each task a maximum of 2 weeks each. It had taken up 19 weeks. As you can see I have an extra week (The little green circle out of nowhere) to leave for the buffer time or emergencies.

I boxed up the tasks in red to signify the important milestones as well.

I'm glad, because I have always found it such a drag to execute gantt charts.

PS. I visited June's Diploma Class mini Digital Interactive exhibition, and discovered that I really needed to research on the animation plug-ins for my display. Their work had interesting ideas and their graphics were polished. But all of them (like 90%) executed it in Flat Design/Vector graphics. Not a lot of personal style or coding there, but their animations skills are really strong!

Happiness Level : 7