Tag Archives: concept

Concept: Curious Displays

Design, Technology, Video, , ,

Curious Displays, designed by Julia Yu Tsao, is a way-off-into-the-future conceptual idea.  Like way into the future.  Basically, hundreds of tiny blocks scatter your surroundings and bunch together to form various things.  For example, the blocks can come together to form a screen of sorts to watch a movie, or they can collectively shape into an arrow and point to the location of your missing keys.  Tsao describes the project as such:

The project explores our relationship with devices and technology by examining the multi-dimensionality of communication and the complexity of social behavior and interaction. In its essence, the project functions as a piece of design fiction, considering the fluctuating nature of our present engagement with media technology and providing futurist imaginings of other ways of being.  ..

Curious Displays is a product proposal for a new platform for display technology. Instead of a fixed form factor screen, the display surface is instead broken up into hundreds of ½ inch display blocks. Each block operates independently as a self-contained unit, and has full mobility, allowing movement across any physical surface. The blocks operate independently of one another, but are aware of the position and role relative to the rest of the system. With this awareness, the blocks are able to coordinate with the other blocks to reconfigure their positioning to form larger display surfaces and forms depending on purpose and function. In this way, the blocks become a physical embodiment of digital media, and act as a vehicle for the physical manifestation of what typically exists only in the virtual space of the screen.

It’s all a little too far out there for my tastes, but an interesting topic to undertake nonetheless.

[Via CuriousDisplays; Vimeo; BoingBoing; Gizmodo]

Concept: Decorate & color your walls without paint

Architecture, Design, Images, , ,

Change It! by Amirko aka Amirkhan Abdurakhmanov

Change It!  Designed by Amirko.

Wouldn’t it be awesome to have the ability to change the look and feel of the rooms in your home without the hastle of dealing with messy paint?  Concept designer Amirko has thought up a way to do just that.  The wall of colorful squares you see in the image above is actually made up of many small triangles.  Each triangle features a different color; some are black, white, and rainbow-colored.  With slight manipulation you can spin the triangles to create various designs to decorate an entire wall.  Neat, huh?  Check out the gallery below for some more designs.

[Via YankoDesign; Gizmodo]

‘Experience the void’ at the Guggenheim: come happy, leave injured

Architecture, Design, Images, , ,

JDS Architects have come up with a wild n’ wacky idea to fill up the void at the Guggenheim Museum, that is, the wide open space inside the building.  JDS invites you to “experience the void” by bouncing your way from the top to the bottom of the museum via a trampoline net.  Design Boom points out that “this idea plays on Frank Lloyd Wright’s original scenography for the Guggenheim in which he envisioned patrons visiting the exhibition from the top, downwards.”  Problem is, this method of transportation in the building would likely result in one too many tragic body traumas.  Take a deep breath, it’s only a concept; and due to such safety concerns, it will likely remain just that.  But it’s a fun idea, is it not?

[Via DesignBoom; Gizmodo]

Locus OS is slick, intuitive, sadly just a concept

Design, Technology, Video, , ,

Barton Smith, a talented industrial designer, has come up with an operating system of his own called Locus OS.  Besides the OS being visually stunning and welcoming, its menu system and user interface are highly intuitive and are ahead of its time.  Smith describes his concept OS with the following points: “Location-based operating system; multiple widget desktops designed around a location or activity (ie. kitchen, office, car);automatically switches between desktops with GPS and wi-fi mapping; and simplified collections menu allows browsing via function rather than application.”  Simply put, it’s an OS that prominentlyfeatures Mac OS X-like “spaces” or panels that distinguish and organize work and play on a PC.  The menu system is very reminiscent of Zune HD and Windows Media Center.  Smith conceptualized Locus OS back in 2008, well before the design of iPhone 3.0, WebOS, and Android fully surfaced, he notes.  Why the Microsoft branding? “It was originally going to be for the Microsoft next Gen computer comp from 2008.”  In other words, it remains a concept to this day.  Can we get a wealthy venture capitalist on this, STAT?!

[Via Engadget; Vimeo]

Our future, augmented reality’d

Design, Technology, Video, , ,

Designer Keiichi Matsudafor, who is about to receive his Masters in Architecture, shares his vision of a future that includes virtual overlays that may one day help us with everyday tasks.

The latter half of the 20th century saw the built environment merged with media space, and architecture taking on new roles related to branding, image and consumerism. Augmented reality may recontextualise the functions of consumerism and architecture, and change in the way in which we operate within it.

Scary, is it not?

[Via Likecool; Vimeo]

Turbine Light illuminates roadways with wind-power

Design, Images, Technology, , , , , , , ,

From TAK Studio comes the latest innovation in green roadways–the attractive Turbine Light.  Here’s how it works: These wind-powered lights line up highways and streets and illuminate when cars pass by them.  If enough energy is generated by the passing cars, the lights will shine the path to your destination.  Problem is, the keyword here is IF.  Would such implementation promote faster driving?  It would make sense for something like this to be installed in windy cities that already generate enough energy for illumination. For all the rest, what about solar powered lights, hm?

[Via Inhabitat; Gizmodo]

Bridging the gap between digital and the physical by making content “graspable”

Technology, Video, , , , ,

PhD student Fabian Hemmert asks, “How can we make digital content graspable for us, for humans?”  How do we get from the physical to the digital?  He introduces three conceptual cell phone models (“mobile-shaped phone boxes,” really) that could theoretically help bridge this gap that has yet to be conquered.  The “weight-shifting mobile” uses a iron weight that moves around, giving the user a sense of physical mass.  For example, when you’re exploring your way through a city using Google Maps, the weight can direct you in the right direction as it shifts the center of gravity inside the phone, making you feelwhich way to turn.  Next up is the “shape-changing mobile.”  Say you have a wide collection of eBooks on your device.  If you’re reading a short twenty page story, the device will make itself thin; if you’re reading a lengthy Harry Potter novel, the device will expand, making the experience more realistic, as if you were holding a thick book.  It can also change it’s shape to customize the grasp, have the device lean towards you when in use, etc.  The “living mobile phone” is downright strange: this model has a “breath” and “heartbeat.”  It’s meant to make the device seem organic in your pocket.  In standby mode, the phone “breaths” up and down; when you receive an alert, it’s “heart rate” increases and the up and down motions speed up.  To calm it down?  “Pat it behind the ears.”

Hemmert’s ideas are innovative andinteresting, though I feel the implementation of such technologies will remain far-out research assignments for the forseeable future.  He ends the demonstration with this postulation: “Not humans should get more technical in the future; rather than that, technology a bit more human.”  Intriguing, intellectual, and plain ‘ol creepy if you ask me.

[Via InformationAesthetics; Engadget]

Concept vid reveals what Google Chrome tablet may look like

Technology, Video, , , , , , ,

Watch out, iPad.  Google Chrome OS-inspired tablets are on the way and they are (conceptually) looking real good.  On Monday Glenn Murphy, Google Chrome’s designer, posted this UI concept video and a handful of stills on Google’s Chromium site.  Though it’s only a mockup of sorts, it proves the Google is working hard to make Google Chrome OS (and devices they will eventually run on) a fully functional, multi-tasking beast of an experience.  Since Chrome OS is at least one year away from deployment, this is essentially Google showing us how they are experimenting with several different UI manipulation techniques and appearences.

[Via TheChromeSource; Gizmodo]

HP’s ‘wall of touch’ prototype does not require touch

Technology, Video, , , , , , , ,

HP recently showed off its “wall of touch” concept to The Wall Street Journal.  HP labels it a “large digital sign” that allows users to interact with it.  Interestingly HP gives the user two options for said interaction: you can touch it as you normally would with, say, a Microsoft Surface table, or you can simply point to specific locations on the wall.  With the aid of integrated cameras and a magnetic strip the wall can detect when a user approaches and intentially interacts with it with hand gestures.  For now HP is selling this technology to companies who plan on using it in large public spaces.  In fact, Continental Airlines has one of the first walls installed in their Houston airport.  HP does leave the door open and hints that it may turn into a “mainstream product” if there’s enough interest and demand for it.  It would cost anywhere from “a couple thousand dollars” to $100,000, depending upon the built-in technologies (HD video cameras, etc.).  Be sure to check out a demo of HP’s “wall of touch” in the video above.

[Via Wall Street Journal; Engadget]

MIT discovers a way to “print” your meals

Design, Images, Technology, , , , ,

MIT students Marcelo Coelho and Amit Zoran have devised a way to prepare meals with an advanced 3D printer machine.  The “Cornucopia” printer and its included canisters promise “control over the origin, quality, and nutritional value of every meal, with no packaging or excess food waste.”  Read on to learn about how the process works:

Cornucopias’ printing process begins with an array of food canisters filled with the “cook’s” foods of choice. After a meal selection has been made using the device’s multi-touch translucent screen, users are able to see their meal being assembled while simultaneously manipulating real-time parameters, such as calories or carbohydrate content. Each ingredient is then piped into a mixer and then very precisely extruded, allowing for very exact and elaborate combinations of food.

Once each ingredient has been dropped, the food is then heated or cooled by Cornucopia’s chamber or via the heating and cooling tubes located on the printing head. In fact, the ability to hyper-localize heating and create rapid temperature changes also allows for the creation of meals with flavors and textures that would be impossible to replicate with present-day cooking methods.

So, is this the future of food preparation?  It’s highly customizable, simpe to use, and it reduces waste.  As long as the end result is in fact “edible” and tasty it passes my standards.  Though I have a feeling the Cornucopia will remain a concept for some time.

[Via Inhabitat; Engadget]

The all-in-one toilet

Design, Images, , , ,

homecore5

So I’m sure you’ve heard of the all-in-one PC, but I bet you’ve never seen an all-in-one toilet!  The “Home Core Integrated Toilet” designed by Dang Jingwei combines a toilet bowl, sink, mirror, and vanity table into one.  The “main theme” of this one of a kind toilet is its eco-friendliness.  When you use the sink to wash your hands you have the option of choosing to use this “gray water” to flush the toilet.  In other words, the water you wash your hands with becomes the water that resides in the toilet bowl that eventually flushes away your bodily fluids and excrement.  Nothing like an all-in-one, highly efficient and design-savvy toilet, eh?  Oh, it also features four different water pressure levels.

[Via YankoDesign; Gizmodo]