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February 19 2012
Edible Implants
Why turn to implants when the female body can do it by itself? Dutch designer Femke Mosch came up with the idea of making edible implants that stimulate breast growth from within.
February 06 2012
#10: Enhance Human Experience, Don’t Replace it
Part 10 in the 11 part series Anthropomorphism and Design.
The hidden danger with interactive products is that they will become so good at fulfilling our needs that they start to replace actual humans. This is not a futuristic scenario: In an increasing number of locations, from supermarket self-scan checkouts to online bookstores, automatization has replaced human contact. Eventually this may lead to us becoming alienated from other people, which seems to contradict today’s rapidly increasing communication possibilities. Anthropomorphic products have the potential to support, stimulate and enhance human contact, but they may also eliminate it.
January 31 2012
#9: Be Aware of the Ecosystem You’re Invading
Part 9 in the 11 part series Anthropomorphism and Design.
With most products, one wouldn’t normally worry about the environment that it enters. However, anthropomorphic products inevitably elicit responses from others, even from non-human entities. This can have obvious advantages, for instance, when a human-shaped scarecrow frightens off the birds. But when daddy’s new toy frightens the children or the pets, there is a significant chance that it will end up on the attic. Bringing home an anthropomorphic product can be like introducing a new person into the household, which doesn’t always go as smoothly as the family might hope.
Image via I’m Not Obsessed.
January 26 2012
Rule #8: Use Human Ethics
Part 8 of the 11 part series Anthropomorphism and Design.
Anthropomorphic products blur the boundaries between products and people. Ethical norms for people don’t usually apply to products and vice versa. For example, there’s no need to apologize if you accidentally run into an object. But with an anthropomorphic product, you might instinctively say sorry, because it seems like the right thing to do. People can apply their attitude towards humans to products, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But transferring attitudes from a product to a human might lead to problems, especially when the product induces abnormal social behavior. Don’t make your product do what you wouldn’t want a person to do.
Image via Lazy Bone.
January 21 2012
Rule #7: Respect Social Standards
Part 7 of the 11 part series Golden Rules of Anthropomorphism and Design.
Anthropomorphic products enter the human social space. Humans have the most complex social behavior of any organism on Earth. Anyone or anything trying to join in should be careful to do it right. Although an anthropomorphic product may function perfectly, if it crosses social boundaries it will still tick people off. This can cause the product to become a social reject, which won’t do sales much good. Luckily, it’s not hard to figure out why things go wrong. Imagine a scenario where a person and a product interact, then replace the product with a second person. If the actions of the second person and the product don’t match up, then there’s something off about the product’s design.
Image via Anvari. For other parts in the series, see part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5 and part 6.
January 18 2012
Playing With Pigs
Click here to view the embedded video.
Besides children and pets, it turns out that pigs are also attracted to interactive interfaces. Pig Chase is a computer game in which pigs and people can play together. The aim of the project is to entertain pigs in the bio-industry and to research the relationship between the cognitive capacities of pigs and people.
So, how does the game work? A screen with light effects in the pigs’ pen is connected to an iPad. Pigs are fascinated by the movement of light and attracted to new light spots on the surface. The iPad user controls a ring of light, which the pig follows with its snout. The human participant leads the pig’s snout to a target. When the target is reached, the pig is rewarded with a display of fireworks.
Pig Chase is developed by The Utrecht School of the Arts (HKU) and Wageningen University. Video and more information on Playing with Pigs. Via Mashable.
January 17 2012
Rule #6: Meet People’s Expectations
For past entries and an introduction to the 11 Golden Rules of Anthropomorphism and Design, click here.
People expect many things from each other: Expect them to say hi in the morning; expect them to buy a ticket for the bus; expect them to watch out when driving a car; expect them to do their jobs well. People also expect certain behaviors from anthropomorphic products. When a product works differently than promised, this can cause confusion or anger. When a person gives commands to a product and the product ignores him, he becomes frustrated, because the product feels like a person who rudely turns his back. You wouldn’t accept that behavior from a person, so why would you accept it from a product?
The robot Saya has been developed to teach elementary-grade school children. She can speak different languages and make facial expressions, and hopefully confirm to what the kids expect of an instructor.
Image via The Daily Mail.
January 12 2012
Baby Loading
Remember those long gone times when babies were delivered by white storks? Today they are simply downloaded into mom’s belly. How superhandy! Apparently every era creates its own myths. Filed under Boomeranged Metaphors. Peculiar image of the week.
Geek Mom and Baby are doing fine. Via Thinkgeek. Thanks Ad.
January 11 2012
Fotoshop Your Way to Beauty
Click here to view the embedded video.
Filmmaker Jesse Rosten shows his critical views on body standards by presenting the exclusive beauty breakthrough Fotoshop by Adobé. This revolutionary product features pro-pixel intensifying fauxtanical hydro-jargon microbead extract (now with nutritive volumizing technology). Maybe she’s born with it? No, we’re pretty sure it’s just Fotoshop.
This project is related to the Nanolift product presented in Next Nature’s Nano Supermarket.
Via The Cool Hunter and Jesse Rosten.
January 10 2012
Rule #5: Consider Zoomorphism as an Alternative
Part 5 of the 11 part series Golden Rules of Anthropomorphism and Design.
When a product imitates animal behavior, the strict social rules governing anthropomorphic products don’t apply. People may be much more forgiving when a zoomorphic product makes an error, and fascinated rather than disturbed when it behaves other than expected. Similar to how we think a person walking in circles on the street is weird, but a dog chasing its tail is funny, Sony’s robot dog Aibo is considered adorable, while Honda’s humanoid robot Asimo seems clumsy and slow.
Image via Flicker user pt. For the rest of the series, see part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4.
January 06 2012
Rule #4: Complex Products Tend to Be Anthropomorphized
Part 4 of the 11 part series Golden Rules of Anthropomorphism and Design. See part 1, part 2, and part 3.
Think about a spoon. Now think about a spoon with a face. What do you think it is? Most likely, you think it’s a spoon with a face. Now think about a computer, which doesn’t have a face. Are you more likely to swear at the spoon or the computer? Humans have a natural tendency to anthropomorphize things they can’t explain. In the past, mysterious phenomena such as the weather, the sun or the moon were anthropomorphized in the form of gods.
Nowadays, technological products have advanced to such a degree that most people don’t understand them. They try to explain a device by ascribing human emotions and motives to its behavior. The more complex, capable and autonomous a product is, the more likely it’s going to be anthropomorphized. Designers of technologically advanced products should anticipate how users will anthropomorphize their product, and design it accordingly.
Photo via Top Design Mag.
January 05 2012
Dolphin Wannabe
Same article, different example: Water Powered JetPack by Jetlev.
Click here to view the embedded video.
(Thanks: Marlies Peeters)
January 01 2012
Fly like a Bird? Get Human Birdwings
Click here to view the embedded video.
From the dawn of humankind we have been creating technologies to extend our given bodies: a coat to survive in colder climates, a gun to kill at a distance, a car to travel faster. Typically, however, our technological extensions not only amplify but also numb certain aspects of our bodies. Examples? Just think of when you find yourself in a fitness center as you grew too fat from driving a car and not walking.
Arguably, the most desirable technologies are the ones that that take the human condition as a cornerstone. They resonate with our human senses (rather than numb them), feel natural (rather than estranging), empower people (rather than outsource them), and that realize the dreams people have of themselves. For lack of a better word we call them ‘humane technologies’.
Now here is an example what might be the most humane technology since the invention of the bicycle. Dutch mechanical-engineer Jarnos Smeets dreams of flying like bird. Nothing new really, many people have had this dream for ages. Yet being an engineer and all, the guy is seriously propelling his dream towards a reality.
Using the accelerometers of the WiiMote and a smartphone, Jarnos is building a pair of human birdwings. Although there are still some serious technological hurdles to be taken – the birdwings will have to be semi-human powered as human muscle power isn’t sufficient to carry a person up into the air – the results so far are already impressive. Lift us Jarnos!
The Haptic Wing mechanism
A sketch of the mechanism
Click here to view the embedded video.
Website: humanbirdwings.net.
December 27 2011
Feel-o-Meter Feels for a Whole City
Click here to view the embedded video.
In cities across Germany, Big Brother looks like a smiley face. The Fühlometer, a piece by Julius von Bismarck, Benjamin Maus, and Richard Wilhelmer, uses security cameras and sophisticated software to ‘read’ the faces of pedestrians, and then categorize them according to their emotions. The giant robot mirrors the mood of the city’s inhabitants, and perhaps encourages them to put on a happy face… or else.
Via Io9
December 23 2011
City Rats Love Ethnic Food
City rats, it seems, prefer the same foods that humans do: Greasy, fatty, sweet, and salty. Although rats are usually seen as the billy goats of city life, ready to chow down on anything remotely edible, they show a marked distain for healthy vegetables. According to author Robert Sullivan, “A rat might starve in an alley full of raw carrots”. Like a human that missed the low-carb fad, Rattus norvegicus instead loads up on white bread, fried chicken, and mac and cheese.
Rats don’t only exhibit a human-like tendency to indulge in junk food. Although they naturally opt for sweet over spicy, their cultural background plays in a role in what they eat. In Manhattan’s East Harlem, home to one of the city’s biggest Latino populations, rats have reportedly developed a preference for the same spicy food that other rodents would reject.
Rats mirror our urban lives, eating what we don’t, absorbing our culture, and taking up residence in even the more undesirable real estate. Maybe they make us uneasy because they’re too good at acting human.
Via Edible Geography and Robert Sullivan’s Rats. Image via Caruba.
December 22 2011
One Chicken Feeds 100 People
Our peculiar image of the week is not what it seems. Rather than a man with a gigantic chicken on a leash, you are looking at a normal chicken with an incredibly shrunken man standing next to it.
Really? No, its all fantasy. Part of the incredible shrinking man project by Arne Hendriks, who investigates the possibilities of downsizing the human species to better fit the earth. Today, Arne will be cooking an 45 kilogram Ostrich at Stroom in the Hague, which should give the 100 diner guest an experience on what it would be to be only 50cm tall and share one chicken.
December 21 2011
Rule #2: Different People Anthropomorphize Differently
Part 2 in the 11 part series Golden Rules of Anthropomorphism and Product Design. All text is excerpted from the Next Nature book.
What people experience as anthropomorphic is highly personal. Tests have shown that when given a selection of products with anthropomorphic characteristics, people differ greatly in how human-like they perceive the objects to be. Even if an anthropomorphic product fits the cultural, social and ethical norms of a society, it’s still possible some people just won’t like it because they experience it differently.
A computer with a glowing round button is a fairly generic design. But to those who’ve seen Stanley Kubricks’ 2001: A Space Odyssey there’s an unavoidable association with murderous hardware. Would you trust the unblinking blue eye of a Lacie hard drive?
December 18 2011
Rule #1: Any Association that Can be Made, Will be Made
Welcome to the 11 part series The Golden Rules of Anthropomorphism and Product Design. In this series, we will be examining how designers can better integrate human-like forms or behavior into their work. Does an anthropomorphic design inspire positive reactions, or does it leave the audience confused, irritated or even offended? Read on to find out. All posts are excerpted from the Next Nature Book.
–By Joran Damsteeg, Koert van Mensvoort and Hendrik-Jan Grievink–
People have evolutionarily built-in mechanisms that help us to recognize the human face and body, and what gender, race and mood those faces and bodies are projecting. We’re so good at recognizing each other, we do it even when it’s not applicable. When we look at animals, machines, and random objects we infer characteristics that aren’t there. Especially when a product was intended to have certain human qualities, it’s easy to imagine even more. Since designers can create anthropomorphic products without even realizing it, it’s better to design these characteristics intentionally.
London’s Swiss Re, aka The Gherkin, is a famous example of a building that looks like something more than an innocent suite of offices. Click through for more examples of unintentional anthropomorphizing.
Photos (in order) via Jovike, Happy Chair is Happy, Vierkante Driehoek, and Things that Look Like Faces.
December 16 2011
Human Furniture
This unpractical yet not less pretty anthropomorphic furniture piece was created by photographer David Blazques. We are clueless on whether it is in permanent use, yet it serves fine as our peculiar image(*) of the week.
(*) I stumbled on this image while preparing a lecture on Anthropomorphobia for the I Don’t Know Where I Am Going But I Want To Be There symposium, this Saturday in Paradiso, Amsterdam.
December 08 2011
When Siri met Siri…
Click here to view the embedded video.
Like with pets and babies, we seem to like it when devices mimic our behaviour and social patterns. In the process of domesticating technology, we teach products to behave like ourselves. But we all know that almost every learning process starts with copying…
Earlier this year we have written about Siri, a relatively new feature in Apples iOS that allows users to control their iPhones with their voices in a quite convincing way. Especially the ‘intelligent’ answers Siri gave to questions stole many users hearts.
But what happens if speaking devices start having conversations with each other? In the nineties, there was the Furby a furry toy animal that could talk. Some lucky owners of these fantastic creatures reported having sleepless night after their toy friends got stuck in a feedback loop of nocturnal conversations. Of course, this only happened between products of the same technological species (batteries included).
The short movie featured in this post is also an example of this ‘Furby-effect’. The movie is funny, but why exactly? Which one of the phones dp you feel most sympathy for? Do we even see some character development over here?
We have become radically dependent on the technology we have created ourselves. But the opposite is also true. We have a symbiotic relationship with the things we create. So, at the same thing, the whole thing is a little bit sad: it shows how helpless the products are, without us interacting with them.
Yet, it points out to a future when the devices around us lead whole social lives, without us being involved. One day, you might find your mobile phone and your refrigerator gossiping about you…
Click here to view the embedded video.
Thanks Coralie Vogelaar
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