Maintaining authenticity: transferring patina from the real world to the digital to retain narrative value

This research is concerned with utilizing new technologies to harvest existing narrative, symbolic and emotive value for use in a digital environment enabling "emotional durability" (Chapman, 2005) in future design. The projects discussed in this paper have been conducted as part of PhD research by Rosemary Wallin into 'Technology for Sustainable Luxury' at University of the Arts London, and visual effects technology research undertaken by Florian Stephens at University of West London. Jonathan Chapman describes vast consumer waste being "symptomatic of failed relationships" between consumers and the goods they buy, and suggests approaches for designing love, dependency, and even cherishability into products to give them a longer lifespan. 'Failed relationships' might also be observed in the transference of physical objects to their virtual cousins. Consider the throwaway nature of digital photography when compared to the carefully preserved prints in a family album. Apple often use a skeuomorphic (Hobbs, 2012) approach to user interface design, to digitally replicate the patina and 'value' of real objects. However, true transference of physical form and texture presumably occurs when an object is scanned and a virtual 3D model is created. This paper presents three practice-based approaches to storing and transferring patina from an original object, utilizing high resolution scanning, photogrammetry, mobile applications and 3D print technologies. The objective is not merely accuracy, but evocation of the emotive data connecting the digital and physical realm. As the human face holds experience in the lines and wrinkles of the skin, so the surface of an object holds its narrative. From the signs of the craftsman to the bumps and scratches that accumulate over the life of an item over time and generations, marks gather like evidence to be read by a familiar or a trained eye. According to the time and the culture these marks are read within, they will either add to or detract from its value. These marks can be captured via complex 3D modelling and scanning technologies, which allow detailed forms to be recreated as dense 3D wireframe, but the result is often unsatisfying. 3D greyscale surfaces can never fully capture the richness of patina. Authentic surfaces require other qualities such as colour, texture and depth, but there is something else - more difficult to define. Donald A. Norman expands on the idea of emotion and objects by describing three 'levels’ of design "visceral, behavioural and reflective". Visceral is based on "look, feel and sound", behavioural is focused on an object’s use, and reflective is concerned with its message. New technology is commonly seen in terms of its ability to increase efficiency, but this research has longer-term objectives: to repair or even rebuild Chapman's 'broken relationships' and enable ‘emotionally durable' design. The PhD that has formed the context for this paper examines the concept of luxury value, and how and why the value of patina has been replaced by fashion. Luxury goods are aspirational items often emulated in the bulk of mass production. If we are to alter behaviour around consumption, one approach might be to use technology to harvest patina as a way to retain emotional, symbolic and poetic value with a view to maintaining a relationship with the things we buy

Innovation 2.0: Grantmaking to Transform America's Education Systems

As social and technological forces reshape the environment, the educational landscape is being similarly transfigured as parents, employers, policymakers and students grow impatient with incremental efforts to reform a broken system. Too often such efforts have proven both slow and inadequate to the evolving needs of learners: Innovations have been inequitably distributed, promising solutions have been difficult to implement at scale. Yet the signs of widespread change are real, and there is little doubt that transformation has begun

Augmented and Virtual Reality techniques for footwear

The use of 3D imaging techniques has been early adopted in the footwear industry. In particular, 3D imaging could be used to aid commerce and improve the quality and sales of shoes. Footwear customization is an added value aimed not only to improve product quality, but also consumer comfort. Moreover, customisation implies a new business model that avoids the competition of mass production coming from new manufacturers settled mainly in Asian countries. However, footwear customisation implies a significant effort at different levels. In manufacturing, rapid and virtual prototyping is required; indeed the prototype is intended to become the final product. The whole design procedure must be validated using exclusively virtual techniques to ensure the feasibility of this process, since physical prototypes should be avoided. With regard to commerce, it would be desirable for the consumer to choose any model of shoes from a large 3D database and be able to try them on looking at a magic mirror. This would probably reduce costs and increase sales, since shops would not require storing every shoe model and the process of trying several models on would be easier and faster for the consumer. In this paper, new advances in 3D techniques coming from experience in cinema, TV and games are successfully applied to footwear. Firstly, the characteristics of a high-quality stereoscopic vision system for footwear are presented. Secondly, a system for the interaction with virtual footwear models based on 3D gloves is detailed. Finally, an augmented reality system (magic mirror) is presented, which is implemented with low-cost computational elements that allow a hypothetical customer to check in real time the goodness of a given virtual footwear model from an aesthetical point of view

Unpacking capabilities underlying design (thinking) process

Engineering graduates must know how to frame and solve non-routine problems. While design classes explicitly teach problem framing and solving, it is lacking throughout much of the rest of the engineering curriculum and is often relegated to capstone classes at the end of the students’ educational experience. This paper explores problem framing and solving through the lens of experiential learning theory. It captures core problem framing and solving approaches from critical, design and systems thinking and concludes with a table of learning outcomes that might be drawn upon in designing an engineering curriculum that more fully develops the problem framing and solving capabilities of its students

Wearable Communications in 5G: Challenges and Enabling Technologies

As wearable devices become more ingrained in our daily lives, traditional communication networks primarily designed for human being-oriented applications are facing tremendous challenges. The upcoming 5G wireless system aims to support unprecedented high capacity, low latency, and massive connectivity. In this article, we evaluate key challenges in wearable communications. A cloud/edge communication architecture that integrates the cloud radio access network, software defined network, device to device communications, and cloud/edge technologies is presented. Computation offloading enabled by this multi-layer communications architecture can offload computation-excessive and latency-stringent applications to nearby devices through device to device communications or to nearby edge nodes through cellular or other wireless technologies. Critical issues faced by wearable communications such as short battery life, limited computing capability, and stringent latency can be greatly alleviated by this cloud/edge architecture. Together with the presented architecture, current transmission and networking technologies, including non-orthogonal multiple access, mobile edge computing, and energy harvesting, can greatly enhance the performance of wearable communication in terms of spectral efficiency, energy efficiency, latency, and connectivity.Comment: This work has been accepted by IEEE Vehicular Technology Magazin

LionBarat App: Augmented Reality-Based Fashion Shopping Application

The purpose of this study is to design a mobile-based application that serves to help potential buyers to easily find fashion according to the wishes of potential buyers accurately. The research method used in this study is a descriptive method of analysis with a qualitative approach. Meanwhile, the application development process uses an object-oriented approach with the System Development Life Cycle Prototyping. The results of the research method on the LionBarat application are expected to provide convenience in shopping for fashion without fear that the clothes that will be purchased are not suitable because of the greatness or are different from those in the application user interface. The main concept of this application is a way to make it easier for potential buyers to find the right and accurate fashion according to what the LionBarat application displays. This idea was created from the unrest of online shopping application users who buy clothes such as clothes, pants or shoes due to the lack of accurate images and descriptions of existing products. In addition, this application has features that are integrated with Google Lens and Lidar so that application users can search and buy the desired fashion by inputting/scanning images into the search field. The conclusion of designing this application can be concluded that fashion sales on the application can be even better if it can take advantage of the implementation of Google Lens and Augmented Reality (AR)technology as an online fashion shopping feature. This research is expected to help fashion sellers in getting more potential consumers who can indirectly increase new innovations in online shopping

Trendswatch 2013: Back to the Future

TrendsWatch 2013 highlights six trends that CFM's staff and advisors believe are highly significant to museums and their communities, based on our scanning and analysis over the past year. For each trend, we provide a brief summary, list examples of how the trend is playing out in the world, comment on the trend's significance to society and to museums specifically, and suggest ways that museums might respond. We also provide links to additional readings. TrendsWatch provides valuable background and context for your museum's planning and implementation