Newcastle University

Culture Lab taking part in Maker Faire

Location: Centre for Life
Time/Date: 13th March 2010 - 14th March 2010, 10:00 - 17:00

Culture Lab staff and students, along with some of our residents and DM students, are taking part in Maker Faire. The world’s premier event for DIY technology and craft will again be returning to the UK. This interactive event features cool robots, clever gadgets, garden shed inventions, knitted wonders, the occasional fireball, and much more! With loads of great shows and demonstrations at Centre for Life and Discovery Museum.

We'll be manning a stall exhibiting current work as well as running 2 workshops:

Sat 13 March: 1pm-5pm

e-Craft Workshop by Ewelina Aleksandrowicz and Lalya Gaye :

Want to make interactive plush toys? Make your knitting or sewing electronic with conductive thread? Weave sensors into fabric? Iron-fuse beads into game controllers? Change your favourite teddy bear into a noise machine?
At this DIY workshop, you will learn how to hand-make interactive 3D things, using a combination of traditional craft and simple electronics.
Requirements: No prior technical or craft experience required. We will provide plush, textile, sewing machines, fusebeads, irons, needles, thread, soldering irons and other tools and materials; but if you practice a craft (knitting, crocheting, wood-chiseling, origami, soldering, etc) or have fabric/yarn etc you would like to use to build your object, feel free to bring it with you along with your tools. All the electronic parts needed for this workshop will be provided by us. We will also have available different templates and kits for ready-made models: if you have little or no crafting experience, these will get you started by letting you assemble or modify simple objects.
 

'I-Robot' Mobile Video Workshop by Andrzej Wojtas

Full weekend workshop Sat 13 10AM - 3PM Sun 14 March 10AM - 3PM A mobile video workshop focused on collective video making using mobile phones. This 2-day workshop will raise the participant's awareness of the hidden creative potentials of mobile phones, as well as introduce them to basic video editing suites. We will create short movies based on the topics of the Science Festival, from the perspective of a robot. Participants will first review examples of movies made using these techniques, learn how they were made, then get to shoot their own short movies and edit them. The workshop will end with a public screening of a final piece. Please bring a laptop and a mobile phone with video-recording capabilities, if you have one. If not, we will have some equipment (phones and computers) available. We provide all the necessary software. No prior experience required! Come to this workshop to uncover the mysteries of how to make great looking video productions with mobile phones and discover the joy of participatory film making!

Abraham Thomas is presenting his performance, Shadow. Shadow challenges expectations of the relationship between light, movement and sound. This piece utilizes a variety of technologies but ultimately relies on the human body to dictate the visual and sound output. Sometimes beautiful music is made and sometimes horrible noise.

humanaquarium - Robyn Taylor // Guy Schofield // John Shearer. humanaquarium is a large cube, big enough to contain two musicians.  The front face is a perspex window, through which the performers can be seen, illuminated by the light of a video projector. FTIR (Frustrated Total Internal Reflection) technology is used to detect the position of audience members' hands on the window, allowing touches to manipulate the output of the performers' instruments and affect timbre, instrumentation and vocal effects.                              youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_XtrnSaS7c

Maker Faire is part of Newcastle ScienceFest, a 10 day celebration of science at venues across NewcastleGateshead, with the principal aim of increasing the North East’s enthusiasm for science and encouraging young people to consider a career in this area. Full details are available here:http://www.newcastlesciencefest.co.uk/Events/Details.aspx?Id=120
 

Sat 13 March: 10am - 5pm.

Sun 14 March: 11am - 5pm

Published: 12th March 2010