Final project photos

Light Wings

By Jisook Moon and Lessa Morfee

The idea of flying and the aesthetic beauty in swarms of fireflies inspired this dress that has electronic components incorporated into it. There are bright blue lights on the wings below the arm on each side, which gently fade in and out according to the flapping movement of the arm. The black dress contrasts well with the blue lights and immerses you into the magical environment the lights create. This dress is ideal for people who want a special elegant dress or for a performer who would enjoy choreographing with these light enabled wings. Get your best shoes out, put on this dress and take flight!

Light Wings works by sticking the LED’s into the material underneath the arms and connecting those to the Arduino Lilypad through a resistor. The LilyPad is powered by a battery pack that holds three AA batteries that also sends power to all other components. There are also two bend sensors sewn in the pit of the arms that determine when the LED’s dim or become brighter. After programming the LilyPad to adjust the lights to dim in and out according to the data from the bend sensors, all components are soldered together and neatly hidden within the dress.

Progress

After making sure we had all the components we needed we began to program the Lilypad and then soldered everything together. When that was completed we tested it a few times and we sewed up the wings on the dress, then covered them with a see-through fabric.

Fitting all the components inside the dress

Here are some photos of where we placed the various components to make this dress work how we wanted it to. This includes LED's, battery, Liliypad and bend sensor.

Creating the dress

Making and sewing the dress took quite a lot of time but I got there in the end and the end result looks exactly like we wanted so I'm glad that worked out. We chose the fabric together and then I took it home to start our project.

New proposal

Inspired by the act of flying we have changed our proposal to using flex sensors under the arms and LEDs on the wings to express this motion. So as you lift your arm the LEDs gradually light up until the arm is lifted at a 90 degree angle, then all the LEDs will be on and begin to look like they are slowly pulsating. This gives the impression of quite a calm and relaxing feel which is what you would feel if you could really fly.

I have been delegated to making the dress with the wings on it and we both chose back as the main colour for easy viewing of the LEDs.

The M-Dress by CuteCircuit

Is that your dress ringing? The M-dress by CuteCircuit is a mobile phone dress that can answer calls with a lift of the arm.

CuteCircuit is a fashion company in London that focuses on the development of wearable technology. They use intelligent textiles and microelectronics to help create a new function for clothing that can provide personal communication. Their aim is to create ‘emotionally rich experiences’ for its users. The founders Francesca Rosella and Ryan Genz have been featured widely in the media, being on National Geographic Television and BBC World Technology. They also both hold a Master in Interaction Design from Interaction Design Institute in Ivrea. CuteCirucuit has had its products exhibited at Wired NextFest for two years in a row in NYC and LA. (Wired NextFest is an annual festival of innovative products and technologies organised by Wired, an American magazine).

The M-dress is a silk jersey dress that has a normal sim card inserted in the side tag on the inside of the dress. When you hear the dress ringing you simply answer by lifting your hand to your ear and the sensor opens the call for you. For easy functionality CuteCircuit introduced special gesture recognition software to make the user experience intuitive.

I think this is a good concept and can become something worn in the future, especially because women tend to wear clothes with tight or small pockets, or even no pockets at all to put a phone in. This often leads to missed calls and I know I’ve had this problem in the past where my phone gets buried in my bag and I can’t here incoming calls. So I think this idea will help in those kinds of situations. Also I think a range for men would be a good idea too as many business men use their mobile phones primarily to communicate so this would be an efficient way to do that, by just lifting their arm. Though not sure what happens when you get a text and where that is received or how you view that, maybe this dress is purely a phone only? . . .

CuteCircuit website: http://www.cutecircuit.com

Proposal

This was inspired by the book I'm reading called The Iron King by Julie Kagawa, which is about fey creatures - faeries.

This dress will have LEDs in the 'petals' and pressure sensors on only the side petals so that when you swing your arms while walking you will trigger different petals to turn on the LEDs and make them sort of shimmer. Also there will be a speaker as the center of the bow on the back and depending on whether you move or not it will play melodic music. Gossamer fabric may be used over each petal to let the light through but hide LEDs.

This is LASH - Light Activated Shiny Hat

Wiring it up

Wiring everthing up was pretty hard when you need to connect everything inside a hat but it worked out in the end and although it may not be the prettiest sight, it works!

Extending the lilypad

This is where I have attached the basic components I need to program the lilypad so that I can play around with the programming and see what works.

Building the hat

This is in the process of making my Mad Hat with its different components.

Galaxy Dress

Galaxy dress by CuteCircuit - a small video

Wearable Ideas

384 Wearable Technology

I have decided to present the project M-Dress by the Design company CuteCircuit because I think it solves a problem many women have. This project which is in the form of a stylish, sleek dress allows the wearer to receive and make calls without having to pick up a mobile phone by raising your arm to your ear.