In March, I’ll be on speaking in the True Mobile & Beyond track at QCon London 2014. It’s an exciting opportunity to take part, and I’m hugely looking forward to hearing and learning from the other speakers on the track: Halle Winkler; Mo Ramezanpoor; Jaimee Newberry; and Hannah Dee.
In the past couple of sessions for our CATH project, we’ve refined ideas further, talked lots and sketched and drawn. We’ve now come up with a core idea we’re working on for the remainder of the time on the project.
Here’s what I’m working on at the moment.
Last Tuesday I ran sessions at TeenTech in Bristol on designing an app. The sessions were run for 300 12- and-13-year-olds (and their teachers), with Justyn Spooner from Bright Yak. TeenTech helps young teenagers see the career possibilities in science, technology, engineering, maths – and the arts.
Last month, I spent a day at Birmingham University’s newly opened Prototyping Hall to begin a new piece of work exploring digital experiences in theatre.
This is the abc programmable controller. Designed and built nearly 30 years ago, it might be seen as an early Arduino.
I’ve had a couple more talks / demos confirmed this year for the gesture-responsive book. I’ll be at iOSDevUK 3 in Aberystwyth, Wales in September, presenting the project with Mo Ramezanpoor. Mo will be talking in more detail about his work on the project to interpret 3D gesture data.
Then in November, I’ll be talking about combining Arduino and books at the Handheld Mini / Port80 event in Cardiff on the 27th. Tickets for this event are free.
Do come and say hi if you’re attending either event.
A few quick updates on show & tell events for the gesture-responsive storytelling book project:
In March I was invited to talk at The Electric Bookshop in Edinburgh, where I did the first public demo of Treasure Island, our little prototype of the book we’re making for The Library of Lost Books.
One weekend in the middle of February, we ran a hack session to make a first useable prototype of our book for the Library of Lost Books – a talking, gesture-responsive book.
Our aim was to put together the elements we’ve each been working on: story and audio; Lilypad Arduino; gesture detection; getting iPhone and Arduino talking to each other to share data – and to combine them in a physical book.
Over the past couple of weeks, the first drafts of the PleaseReadMe story have been written, re-written and recorded. It’s a linear narrative, although some choices (that a reader takes or discovers by moving the physical book) take the reader away from the main path temporarily, before bringing them back to the main story line. Continue reading
During the past few months, I’ve come across a number of different stories that have hung around in my brain for longer than expected. Each one explores different ways of storytelling: an unexpected context; an engagement with a physical object or space; a forced slowdown, or pause; a blurring of play and story. Here are five stories that have made an impression. Continue reading
