SIDeR 12 conference

So, I went to the Sider conference with Jette last week to present our ‘Introducing Magical experiences in UX’ paper. That was quite the fun experience, with presentations, a workshop and lots of nice people – and A LOT of people from ITU! We got a lot of good feedback on the paper and people found our research useful for employing at places like museums. I am really glad people liked it – I only wish I had more time to work on it, but for now all of my time is consumed by our bachelor project.

The other papers were very interesting, and I just loved the city of Gothenburg, it was so nice and calm (I really needed a break) – and public transportation was cheap! Here are some pictures:

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I decided to upload the paper on the website, and our presentation of it as well – it can be found in this post.

For the workshop we had to come up with a concept for the Austrian skiing destination Schladming, a place which differentiates themselves by offering lots of electronic benefits for the visitor. My group decided to focus on their problem of getting more summer tourism and improve the quality of the experience of being in and around Schladming. This is our poorly made, quick and dirty-(shit we are running out of time before the deadline)-video.

Fun idea, though I think it might fit better for here-and-now stuff, like maybe on Roskilde festival.

Anyway, that’s it for now, I a bubbling with creativity at the moment, so hopefully I’ll have time to upload some more fun DIY projects soon.

The beaded collar

Okay so according to the great big internet the next big fashion accessory is, and has been for a little while, the collar.

And while it comes in many shapes and sizes – there are some great ones on etsy.com just search “collar” – you can’t get that many beaded ones.

 

So here’s the how to:

1. Make a collar which nicely follows you neckline – otherwise it will stick out pointing in all kind of directions when you are done beading. You can try making it in paper before you start cutting the fabric. Choose a fabric which isn’t too delicate. Make sure to leave about 0.5 cm extra space to fold for a nice hem.
2. Fold in the hem – it may be necessary to cut it up into sections.

3. Sew the hem all the way around, like in the pictures.

4. When done, you fold the collar in half and find the middle. Then use a protractor to draw lines all the way down the collar to make sure your beading will look nicely.

5. Start beading – I chose a diamond pattern, but you can choose whatever you like.
6. When done you repeat step 1 and 2 to make a back for your work, you don’t have too, but it hides all the stitching.

Here’s some other nice DIYs:

http://honestlywtf.com/diy/diy-peter-pan-collar/

http://www.refinery29.com/4-diy-collars-anyone-can-whip-up

http://scraphacker.com/diy-collars/

And finally there’s the easy/lazy one : http://rookiemag.com/2011/10/diy-collars-marlena/

Live at the apartment

So, my happy thing for the day was helping my boyfriend’s band out by making this little video here at our apartment.

Visit their facebook: facebook.com/pages/Still-They-Dont-Believe-Us/

One happy thing a day keeps the doctor away

Thats my advice for myself today. To do one thing a day that makes me happy.

Today was going to the Creative Space store to get the ceramics that me and my friend Jette painted on my birthday last week.

They turned out great!

The bowl is my present for her and the wonderful pitcher was her present for me. Can’t wait to make hot cocoa and serve it in that thing, it is just too cute!

 I love the butterfly detail on the back…

The soundtrack of today must be ‘Good Friday’ by Cocorosie

And I suppose my outfit is kind of inspired by that song as well… boyfriend did say I looked like a christmas-elf (listen to the lyrics and you will catch my drift)… Oh and the mess in the background is all his

ITU classes and hand-ins

6th. term

Innovation and Entrepreneurship

Philosophy of Science

Bachelorproject: Eye-tracking and the E-book

5th. term

Research Project and Academic Dissemination

Event Management (CBS class)

Management of Creative Processes (CBS class)

4th. term

E-business and Understanding Business

Concept Development with Industry

Digital Mediation of Live Performances (RUC class)

3rd. term

Digital Aesthetics

Co-design: Understanding Users and User involvement

Mobile Media and Social IT

2nd. term

Sketching & Prototyping

Crossmedia

Digital Media Culture

1st. term

Introduction to Interaction Design

Dissemination, Project Work & Webdesign

Media & Communication

Owl – Oil painting sketch

I watched Amélie (again) recently, and on the wall above her bed she has these amazing paintings by Michael Sowa, a german painter from 1945.
They are pictures of animals wearing clothing items, like the fowl with pearls. I would love to own one of his paintings, especially this one with the bunny! – but even as replicas they don’t come cheap.

So I thought I would just paint my own and play with the form a bit.

So here is the sketch for the painting I am planning to do these next couple of months:

I am playing with this idea of personifying the animals with accessories and using it as a comment on modern society, for instance a white swan who thought it necessary to doll up with peacock feathers, because she did not feel beautiful enough as it was. But the first one is going to be an owl…

Creativity in organizations (Pixar)

How is creativity managed in Pixar?

Class: Management of Creative Processes.

For the class Management of Creative Processes, we had to investigate what creativity is and how is it managed in different companies. The exam case was Pixar and we had to write a short synopsis using the terms from Chris Bilton’s book “Management and Creativity” (I very much recommend this book if you work with creative people or would like to understand how to inspire others).

The synopsis can be read HERE.

Group Members:

Pernille Østensen Fjeld & Dominique Rosenbohm

The Self-Imagenarium

How can an event that helps people unwind their potential be created?

Class: Event Management.

For the class Event Management, which was my elective for the fall 2011, we had to come up with a large scale event and do the full planning, budgeting and so on… anything but run the event really.

As the title “Self-Imagenarium”/”Self-Imaginarium” implies, the event we came up with was all about exploring yourself and expanding the possible opportunities you thought you had, without getting all hippie-like, which is often the case with “evolve yourself” type events. The event is definitely catering to a more business-like, albeit broad, audience. In short we wanted everyone to be able to participate, major corporations, individual employees in small companies, as well as students and the unemployed who just want to get to know themselves better.
The event was designed to put the participants through a string of tests, group-based or individually oriented, designed by us, a handful of coaches and some experience designers (from the Exploratorium in Copenhagen), through which they would develop a better knowledge of their individual competencies.

It was never decided whether “Self-Imagenarium”, which is a pun on self-image or “Self-Imaginarium”, which is more about imagining something would be the best title.

The plan can be read HERE.

Group Members:

Jens Stürup & Kirsten Kristensen

Introducing Magical Experiences in UX

How can user experiences be perceived as magical?

Class: Research Project and Academic Dissemination.

For the class “Research Project and Academic Dissemination” we had to pick a research topic to our own liking and do an actual academic study of the area. My group and I chose to work with magic in User Experience design. This proved to be a quite difficult research topic as we soon found out that not much research had previously been conducted. In a way you might say we were pioneers. The project had to first attempt to understand and define magic as something of a workable size, before attempting to put it to use.
The project ended with a test of how the experience of magic might be created in designs and concluded on some initial constituents of why an interaction can be perceived as having magical qualities.

The paper has been accepted for publishing at the Sider-conference 2012, the abstract can be read here, and it is available for download here.

The PDF presentation of the paper – what little sense it might make to you:) – can be found here.

Group Members:

Nina Kirstine Busk, Søren Gerluf Sørensen & Jette Stampe Forstholm.

2nd draft

Can be found HERE.