#Arduino 1

This is my first attempt to install arduino into my laptop,and the result is as shown below..


Never give up,keep on trying! T_____T

Sincerely,
ALIA

From zero to one..

I've borrowed the arduino board from Mr.KY,the sensors,the cable,LED,all the colorful wires and so on,just to try it out by myself.But,i'm noob with all these things.I just can keep on staring at all those things without doing anything for few hours,i'm totally have zero knowledge about arduino and all the technical things that have to do with arduino.

I have no idea what to do with all these things.

This is the most scariest thing on Earth.

Colorful wires are just like rainbow after the rain.And there's no sensor that can detect pressure.. :(

I'm talking crap here,i better look for more tutorial on how to use these things.Thanks to www.arduino.cc

Sincerely,
ALIA

Class Exercise

Done the in-class exercise that has been conducted by Mr.KY during DM class,an exercise about our FYP's content..What's the content of our FYP..Let see mine..


Sincerely,
ALIA

Another survey and interview

During the mid-trimester breaks,i went back to my hometown.So i managed to meet some people to do the interviews.My interview scope is to interview people who're working in medical or health industry.My project is more to sound,so i went to a few spa to interview the people there,who've been working and dealing with spa treatment (water + sound therapy) for a few years.



Then i interviewed another people besides people who're working at the spa, which are people who's selling/dealing with health products,something like that (they have some knowledge about therapy and that kind of stuff).I did ask them a few questions and also distribute the survey questions for them to answer.



Sincerely,
ALIA

Sound recording and editing

I guess for the recording part,i'll try to borrow a recorder from the technician at FCM.That was the same recorder that me and my groupmates have used during our Sound Design class.If i can't get the recorder,maybe i'll use the dslr camera that can capture video to record the sound.Natural sound from my surrounding will be recorded later (eg: waterfall sound,beach,river and etc).

And for the sound editing part,i might use WavePad to edit the sound because i'm quite familiar with the tools in that software.I've tried it before,and it's not that hard to edit sound using that software.

Sincerely,
ALIA

Survey results

After a few hours "spamming" this survey on YM,Twitter,Facebook and Tumblr,the results show that 35 people have answered my survey.Thanks! :D

Let me summarize the survey,but for a few questions only,not for all the survey questions.


No.5 Most people don't know what is Water Therapy.So by doing my FYP project,i need to make it meaningful so that people will know what is Water Therapy is all about.


No.6 Some people never tried Water Therapy,so they don't know how does it works.


No.7 Everyone wants to experience Water Therapy.This is a good starts for me to make it real.


No.8 Based on the result,most of them want to have the experience doing Water Therapy treatment with sound and visual to help them stay focus during the treatment.I think i've changed my mind now,i guess i'll just stick to Water Therapy with sound only! :D


No.9 The don't know that everyday in their life,they have experienced Water Therapy in some simple ways.

No.10 Most of them believe that Water Therapy is a good way to cure a few diseases.So this treatment should be commercialized.

Sincerely,
ALIA

Water and sound.

For the past few days,i did some research about water and sound,sound therapy,water therapy with sound and so on.And i did found some videos that make connection between water and sound.

This project has been created by Boris Van Luger.For this project,he listens to all the parts of each sequence prior to translate them to the instruments.What makes me interested with his project is because he's translating natural sound to the instruments.For my project,i want to use natural sound also.

You can view all the videos created by him HERE.

This person creates a project by using light sensors to detect the change in light and produce sound from the water ripples.

"When water makes a ripple it acts as a magnifying glass and makes some areas brighter than others. Phototransistors which are light sensors detect this change in light. An arduino or microcontroller receives the inputs from the sensors and sends them as midi events to a computer. A midi sequencer or a program that reads midi notes like from a midi keyboard then plays these notes accordingly."

This is the link that this person give to create a similar project by our own.CLICK HERE.

Sincerely,
ALIA

Survey about water therapy.

I did a survey about Water Therapy so that i can collect some responses from the public,and continue with my research.This is the link to my survey.
CLICK HERE.

Sincerely,
ALIA

Children water therapy program

When i was "Googling" some information about water therapy on Google,i've came across this article by FLORIDATODAY.COM.

Teen raises money for children's water therapy program at Ocean Breeze Elementary

Kaitlyn Hoskovec's goal for her senior project at West Shore Jr./Sr. High was to raise $500 for water therapy in the special needs programs at Ocean Breeze Elementary.

Kaitlyn decided to hold a swim-a-thon at the Indian Harbour Beach pool, where she has been a lifeguard and swim instructor for the past two years and where she started swimming competitively at age 5.

Her swim-a-thon raised $1,500, triple her goal. She presented a check on Oct. 15 to school Principal Laurie Hering.

The school plans to use the money to buy a Hoyer Lift, which will assist staff in transferring disabled children from a wheelchair into the pool where the student will receive specialized water therapy.

"I just wanted to give back to the community by benefiting those special needs children with something that I have enjoyed all my life," referring to swimming, Kaitlyn said.

Her proud dad, Bill Haskovec, said that Kaitlyn, who has a 4.0 grade point average, "researched the programs in which water therapy has assisted children with special needs into developing their muscles, coordination and social skills. Children with autism, spinal injuries and cerebral palsy have beneficial results from non-stressful low-impact water exercise. "

Kaitlyn attended Gemini Elementary in Melbourne Beach and lived beachside with her family until a year ago when they moved to Melbourne.

Read the original article HERE.

I asked myself,"do our country,Malaysia,have this kind of program???"

Sincerely,
ALIA

Multitouch surface

I know the title itself doesn't have anything to do with my FYP project.But hey,i just wanna share something here.Guys,if anyone of you are doing your FYP that are using multitouch table or surface,you might want to try this software.It's not that hard,you can try it,explore it.I just downloaded this software,wanna try after this! :D

TOUCHLIB
Touchlib is a library for creating multi-touch interaction surfaces. It handles tracking blobs of infrared light, and sends your programs these multi-touch events, such as 'finger down', 'finger moved', and 'finger released'. It includes a configuration app and a few demos to get you started, and will interace with most types of webcams and video capture devices. It currently works only under Windows but efforts are being made to port it to other platforms.

CLICK HERE to explore this software.
and this software also..CLICK HERE.

Tutorial that i found on YouTube on how to create a low cost multitouch pad.. :D

I'm not sure what software is this guy uses,but you can use Touchlib also.Have fun trying! :D

SIncerely,
ALIA

Spa

I asked my friend,Syira,about spa treament.She has accompanied her mum to a spa at Tmn.Tun Dr.Ismail (TTDI) for a spa treatment last week.I asked her,does the spa has something like water fountain,fish pond or something similar to that,and she said YES..I google some information about that,i found out that some spa do have the water fountain,fish pond so on to give the peacefullness and harmony feeling to their customers.And it's actually some kind of water therapy,together with the water therapy,they also play some sounds that give the calm feeling to their customers while doing the treatment.

Syira & me

Sincerely,
ALIA

Sensitive pad..

I just had a random conversation with my senior this afternoon in class..He's from DM too..He did ask me about my FYP,what am i doing for my FYP..So i said that i'm doing something about water therapy..And he asked me how it's going to work,and how am i going to make it happens..I said that i'm not really sure about that..I told him that i wanna use sensitive pad to detect the sound..And he said,that thing will be a little bit expensive and it's quite hard to find..I'll try my best to make it happen! :)


Maybe i'm going to use something similar to this,but smaller version of it..

Sincerely,
ALIA

Hot water therapy

Me,myself have experienced hot water therapy few years back when me and my family lived in Besut,Terengganu.The famous La Hot Spring which situated 140km north of Kuala Terengganu.During the time we lived in Besut,this place is just about 1 hour drive from our house.It is a famous place among the people who live in Terengganu.This place is stated in Tourism Terengganu website.

There's actually 2 types of water,one is the hot water and the other one is the normal natural water from the stream.Mostly,the older people love to take a dip in hot water to feel the warm of the water and experience it by themselves.I did try that and it was quite amazing seeing my legs in that hot water,but once you move your legs,you might want to pull out your legs from the water because you can feel the hotness of the water.But at the same time,it was so relaxing.I would love to go there again someday.

Water from the stream

The hot water comes from here

*images from Google*

You can read the article from Tourism Terengganu HERE.

Sincerely,
ALIA

Melting (YouTube) (2009-2010)

Melting (YouTube) (2009-2010) by Emily Keegin See the original post here..CLICK HERE..

She recorded the sound of melting glaciers from start until the glaciers totally melt.Then the recorded glaciers turn into three digital films (polaroids photo).Her project is quite the same with my FYP project,which is using sound as the medium to be experimental.The different is just type of water sources that we're using for our project.

CLICK HERE for some pictures showing the melting glaciers in Iceland.

I also found some similar video that are quite similar with my project.But these videos are called Iceberg meditation.The objectives for these meditations are:-

- Dissolving fears and limitation from our past.
- Giving back the self-confidence.
- Taught us to be more relax in panic situation.

Sincerely,

ALIA

Mind map 1

Sincerely,
ALIA

Class discussion

Today me and my classmates did a discussion in class.Mdm.Forest divided us a few groups and she asked us to discuss among each other about our FYP project and same goes to our Design Research topic.Everyone needs to tell others what they are doing for their FYP and SRI,so others can give some opinion and sharing their knowledge about that topic.

People in my group are JJ,Hafizadt,Sweet ying,Navena and Aini.

So i did told them about my project and asked for opinion either i should include the visual or not together with the sound.Some said that the sound itself can give a big impact to anyone who'll experience my FYP and so said,i can include the visual to attract people and provoke people's emotions.

Sincerely,
ALIA

Research

Guys,i need your help..I'm doing a research (thesis) for my Design Research class and i need your feedback/comment about my research topic.I know this blog is for my Digital Media class,but what's the point of having a blog if we're not using it for our education purposes..Am i right?? :D

Topic: Review of therapeutic sound (sound therapy) that are suitable for artistic impression.

Don't be shy to drop your feedback/comment here..I won't bite u! :)

Sincerely,
ALIA

Proposal 3

Research Topic: Interactive images + sound

Theme: Identity and sensors

Background: Usually people just make some drawings, take some pictures of their drawings, transfer those pictures to their personal computer, create a video by putting those entire pictures in one video and finally add some music.

Problem Identification: It’s just too much steps to combine drawings + music (sound) using common way to create a video (picture + music).

Aim and Objectives: Easy steps to produce image + sound at the same time. Users need to draw some patterns (most probably geometry shape) on a piece of paper and then show that patterns in front of the webcam. Later the webcam that has been setup together with the system will detect that patterns and plays a sound that synchronize with the patterns.

Motivation: I want users to be creative by trying this interactive application and explore something new and they can be experimental.

Ideation and Concept: Some technical stuff needed for this interactive application such as webcam and notebook to create the program for this application. Use some programming script to create the system.

Review, Analysis and Precedence Studies:

inkLamp from Sebastian Thielke on Vimeo.

http://vimeo.com/8013511

Design Approach: Simple geometry patterns and 8-bit music.

Proposal 2

Research Topic: Audio + Interactive Graphical Displays

Theme: Old story new media

Background: Users might have their own experience using mouse to interact with the interactive content and graphic in certain website. But now, they can use multi touch table as the medium to interact with the interactive application.

Problem Identification: Using mouse is kind of old style and users might be bored with it,users need to explore more about the current technology.

Aim and Objectives: Users need to be more experimental in their daily lifes. Some of them haven't got the chance to use/try multi touch table,so they might have different feelings after trying/using this interactive application.

Motivation: I want users to try out something new. Give them the courage to try something different instead of just using mouse to interact with when opening an interactive website, watch some motion graphic videos on You Tube, and so on which are just too common for now.

Ideation and Concept: Choose a song category from the list, when the song is playing, just placed your fingers on the DIY multi touch table. The graphical display will synchronize with the song and with your finger’s movements.

Review, Analysis and Precedence Studies:

Midimals from Georg Reil on Vimeo.

http://soytuaire.labuat.com/
www.hotel6to6.com
http://www.theirlastever.com/

Design Approach: Typography, and Vector images.

Proposal 1

Research Topic: Dripping water sequencer

Theme: Identity and sensors

Background: It is an interactive sound installation. Sound is produced when the water is dripping out of the bottles. The volume of sound, the tone of sound, the speed of the dripping water and etc can be controlled by changing the bottles’ position upside down in some holes that have been created.

Problem Identification: I wonder what did people do to control their anger, reduce their stress and so on in their everyday life, so that they'll feel some kind of sensation.

Aim and Objectives: This interactive sound installation is like some kind of water meditation (water therapy). People can feel so relaxing, calm, peace and harmony when hearing the sound of the dripping water (sound of waterfall, stream, waves, rain drops, garden fountain and so on). Water meditation can reduce mental chatter and promote relaxation.

Facts about water:
- Water cleanses our wounds; washes away our sins, tears bring us release and etc.
- Water washes away our negative thoughts and emotions and restores our state of peacefulness.
- Spiritual belief (baptism and holy waters).
- Central component of some religious.
- Buddhist value:- water symbolizes purity, clarity, and calmness, and reminds us to cleanse our minds and attain the state of purity.

Motivation: In my everyday life, sometimes I don’t know how to let go my stress, my anger and so on. I found out that meditation is the best way. Even some of the motivators have recommended meditation to their patient to reduce their stress.

Ideation and Concept: Sounds will be recorded earlier, and when the water drops on certain sensitive pad, sound will be played according to which sensitive pad that the water drops on.

Review, Analysis and Precedence Studies:

FINE COLLECTION OF CURIOUS SOUND OBJECTS from Georg Reil on Vimeo.

Water Cycle - Experimental Short - HV20 / GH1 from Matt Pringle on Vimeo.

http://matrixsynth.blogspot.com/2009/12/water-drop-sequencer.html
http://www.flickr.com/photos/spyzter/sets/129857/
http://ezinearticles.com/?Water-Meditation&id=4544392
http://vimeo.com/14117758
http://vimeo.com/10173262
http://healing.about.com/od/water/a/water_abbond.htm
http://www.chakrashower.com/
http://www.suite101.com/content/water-meditation-a177304

Design Approach: Bottles and holes will be placed on a bit higher position from the floor so that we can see the dripping water drops on the sensitive pad. Some electronic stuffs, technical parts and programming involve to play the recorded sound.

Heyya!

Hello! I'm Alia..This is my FYP 1 blog..Anything about my FYP wil be update here..So feel free to visit this blog and drop your comment! :)

Why so serious? :)))

Sincerely,
ALIA