Audiovisual Performance by Noa, Jack and Zane

Noa, Zane and Jack decided to join forces and create an Audiovisual Performance piece as their Final Project. They wanted to connect color and sound while using a glove and keyboard to control the output. With the help of the softwares Arduino, Processing, and Max MSP,  the team has designed some interesting items to make this performance possible. 

 

Skull Projector by Daniel and Crystal

This project is meant to be a literal interpretation of the Synesthesia concept: The students are planning to install a projector in a cow's skull. The projector will display a video that the students have created. The skull itself will also be equipped with LED lights that will change color throughout the video show.

 

The "Futree" by Clara and Zoe

The Futree is a Palm tree with sensors that are disguised as monkeys. The sensors function as pressure sensors; whenever a sensor is activated a cascade of blue LED lights and audio samples will be triggered. In summary, every time you press the belly of the monkey on the palm tree you trigger a a cascade of blue LED lights and the palm tree emits jungle sounds.

 

Flower Power Art by Katie and Klara

Katie and Klara are the Flower-Power team in NuVu's Synesthesia Studio. They envision their final product as a flower that will be operated by hand movements. The flower will change color and play sounds in response to the hand movements of the operator.

Today was the start of NuVu Studio's

The morning began with a quick intro to NuVu, our studio life, and our fun-loving team (Saeed, Saba, David, Sean, and Zoz). We then got to the task at hand: designing a character robot! With David's swift intro into electricity and electronics, followed by an even quicker brief on the











At the end of the day, all the teams presented their character-bots and talked about the major design challenges they encountered along the way.

Students were actively engaged in orientation for the NuVu Summer Session today.  The three studios: Fantasy Tech, Fantasy Art & Animation, and Fantasy Fashion convened for the first time to discuss the next two weeks.  The level of excitement grew throughout the day as the NuVu-ers gained understanding and perspective within their respective studios.

Film by Nandini Srinivasan, Valerian Planche, and Taylor Pierce "Central Square: Is It Safe?" talks about the way Central Square in Cambridge, MA has changed over the past 50 years from an unsafe neighborhood to a safer one. Interviews with many store owners as well as locals in the square provide some insight into how Central Square has improved over time to became a safer place to live and visit. One such perspective comes from the manager of Cambridge Bicycle, a bike shop on Massachusetts Avenue that has been serving the area for over 40 years, who explains how the neighborhood has become a lot safer to ride bikes or drive down the street due to side walk enlargements and proper bike paths. Nabil Sater, owner of the landmark restaurant and performance venue The Middle East, a main Central Square destination for around 40 years, talks about how the area has changed socio-economically to bring in new clients over the years.

We had a great finale for the interactive music studio. A few people from MIT media Lab and Beaver school joined us for the review. Here are some images that show how much fun everybody was having!

Noa, Zane and Jack decided to join forces and create an Audiovisual Performance piece as their Final Project. They wanted to connect color and sound while using a glove and keyboard to control the output. With the help of the softwares Arduino, Processing, and Max MSP,  the team has designed some interesting items to make this performance possible. 

Jack took on the design of a DIY (Do It Yourself) Glove Controller with flex sensors and accelerometers for affective control and program changes.  Noa used Max MSP to create a synthesizer with custom effects (with models for plug-n-play). The custom synthesizer will be controlled via the DIY Glove Controller.  Zane has built a circle piano with LEDs attached to it. The LEDs will be affected by the sound of the synthesizer. Zane will use the Arduino software to control the change of colours.

In summary, the DIY Glove Controller will be what is affecting the synthesizer, while the synthesizer be what is affecting the LEDs.  Thus, movement & touch will affect sound, while sound affects colours.

Since we have a limited supply of Hydrogen, Jeff has been experimenting with Hydrogen. Here are some early calculations to figure out how many aluminum cans are needed to produce enough gas to fill the balloon. (33.8 aluminum cans fills a 5-foot balloon)

Ready to generate hydrogen

Aluminum beginning to bubble

And some Hydrogen

Hey, kids and parents: Instead of another summer uttering the dreaded phrase "I'm bored," how about visiting the MIT Media Lab or building a Destruct Bot? Our students are doing this and much more at NuVu’s summer camp in Cambridge, MA.

NuVu, is a different kind of summer camp for kids and teens. Instead of dodgeball and canoes, it has laser cutters and 3-D Printers. The camp is a six-week program inspired by the architectural studio model and geared around hands-on, collaborative projects.

Each two-week summer camp session has different studios dedicated to the theme of Interactive Music and Art. Kids are encouraged to share their creations and ask their coaches, mentors, and alumni any type of question.

Final projects will be presented at the end of each two-week session. The next presentation is scheduled for this Friday, July 19th. Details are available at http://nuvujul19.eventbrite.com. May we hope to see you there?

 

We are very happy to announce our new partnership with

Maira presents her team's research findings and final design for a safe and energy efficient cooking stove for a fishing village in Malawi, Africa.

Jose works with his teammate on the electrical components of the Energy Computer bound for a village in El Salvador.