I’ve worked with low fidelity soft robotics and inflatables in the past but not so much as an interactive piece. For my final project, I would like to explore how to use pneumatic actuation as a way to communicate between objects and in relation to human presence. The concept is a duet between two flowers that explores blooming as a shared condition. Each flower has their own personality, one proactive and one reactive. Through programmed delay and air flow sequencing, they can form a “conversation” in motion, revealing how the objects can express relational intelligence rather than simple automation.
Some ideas for performances that could work, let’s call the flowers Marco and Polo:
• Only Marco responds to user’s proximity immediately when nearby
• Marco (quick responses) tends to lead and Polo (gradual) tends to follow. Polo is more cautious and will bloom only once Marco has bloomed.
• When a user touches the petals of Marco, it would bend towards the person happily. However, when a user touches the petals of Polo, it would bend away as it hates physical contact before deflating
I want to further personal study models and test out the different bloom designs I could get. Inspired by fibonocci pattern present in sunflowers, the cast molds were created to represent a simplified version of that. Of course, the casts isn't the priority currently as I need to figure out the electronics for actuation.
Electronic Progress
For the system, I hope to run both flowers with the same microcontroller using either one pump (plus solenoid valve) or two pumps that independently run.
Week 9 (Output Devices) Time-of-flight distance sensor with screen display
