The final form has been decided upon and ultimately finished. We opted for a leather jacket, both for it’s versitility in physcially creating the piece, and the versitility of the image it portrays. We wanted to create wearable technology that didn’t advertise its
External Sensors - Can you find them?
technological abilities. As such, the technical components, both the sensors and the physcial wires have been place in inconspicuous places, that upon first glance would be hardly noticable. It is an effort to pursue “ubiquitous computing” desires to seemlessly integrate technology and activity (Bell & Dourish, 2006; Weiser, 1991). Rather than continue to envision ubicomp as in a proximate future, it is possible to acknowledge that comptuing technology has begun to reach a level in which it permeates, or has the possibility to, almost every aspect of our lives, and our project is a direct reflection of that belief.
Given the limits of our technology and skills, this goal of seemless and invisible technology is not possible, as our final form still relies on wired power and internet connectivity. Our ideal form would, of course, have its own powersource and utilize a wireless internet connection.
iKu575
Also worth noting is our choice of ‘transparency’ as a design value. Perhaps we can articulate this further via comparative analysis of iKu575 and our favourite “Ted Talks” example! (i.e. SixthSense)