Methodical Madness Shades People

So, we've finalized that we are going to build a modular Solar Umbrella, as explained here, but with a few different properties.

Instead of being used for personal shading, the umbrellas will lattice to form a shaded walkway by day, and lit walkways at night without shading. Multiple umbrellas would be linked to each other by some sort of radio/bluetooth. The links would be utilized to light up specific paths at night with different lights in large parks, where someone can be at a stand, interact with a screen to define where she wants to go, and then follow the lit path to get there. This would not only create a safe environment, but be useful to people who do not have maps at night. It could also be migrated to a more suburban environment and sidewalk routes. This interaction creates the 'surface', as multiple umbrellas would interact to form a map.

Construction of the umbrellas would be modular, so that there could be in-between umbrellas without the more expensive touch-screen interface, that would still be of the same construction. There are other interesting ramifications to the modular assembly we are developing, but that will not be discussed until later on.

We will try to produce concept art with our white paper tonight.

In other news, Neil is back, no longer quarantined with the sickness.

Methodical Madness is Fueled by Happiness

We were assigned our final project groups on Friday. My final team is myself and:

• Westley Burger, Architecture
• Pete Hall, Art and Design
• Brieana MacDonald, Architecture
• Taylor McKenzie-Veal, Art and Design
• Neil Poulin, Engineering

I have never worked with Brieana, but I have worked with everyone else in the group. Pete in Week 2; Neil in Week 3; Westley and Taylor in Week 4. All have contributed well to the projects, and I'm sure that Brieana is an equally strong contributor.

During the class period on Friday, our objective was to formulate initial ideas. Nothing concrete, but we came up with a list.

First, the core to the project is that it must be a Heliotropic Smart Surface. We started with traits that we would like it to have. The first two recommendations were Interactivity and Personality - something that is memorable, with a human interaction. I proposed a Smart Surface designed to harness the heat in Asphalt. We kind of moved away from that idea, saying that we should create something that is possibly modified or developed by Observation. Neil stated that he wanted to work with Novel Materials, something edgy and new that hasn't really been worked with before. I then stated that we want to talk about how Recyclability is important, and the idea that things should be designed for recycling, not designed for manufacturing. We discussed that whatever we design should be Modular, both in Scale and Function. The Local Scale is important, and we need to focus on a local site in order for it to be a meaningful project, something that we can actually work with, IF we are going to be site based. We touched on the idea of using Human Energy alongside Solar Energy, and then talked about the incident in Sweden where they are using Rabbit Energy, though not in quite so humane of a way. The concept should be Noble, and we discussed the possibility of it being Mobile. Bunnies and Sunshine, the new world, Fueled by Happiness. Somehow, we made a segue from there to discussing local locations, and came up with the idea of developing The Big House as a Smart Surface.

The principal idea using The Big House is developing a new bleacher system that is photovoltaic and piezoelectric, and automatically oriented with the sun. The bleachers could be utilized in any outdoor venue anywhere in the world, and developed with recyclable materials such as steel. The project idea comes at a good time, as the bleachers are going to be replaced in the next few years when they re-do the aisles. I am unsure if we will use this as our final idea, but it is definitely my favorite at this point. We are meeting this week to hand in a proposal Friday.