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8. Wearables

This week we delved deeper into e-textiles learning about different types of actuators, meaning what are different types of outputs for an electric circuit and how do we control them. She listed visual, sound and motion ones, but I guess we can imagine some that would be related to smell and taste as well.


Here are the links to the tutorials: - Arduino and Power Loads.
- Arduino, NeoPixels and sound. - Drive folder with the sketches

Research

This again is a topic I know nothing about. I was really happy to be able to rejoin my group in Lyon, at the amazing maison Jacquart. The group dynamics are crucial to be able to learn new things. Today on the drive over from Grenoble I listened to a podcast with Robert Greene, this quote felt very à propos concerning my Fabricademy journey.

Here is a picture of our group.

With Julie and Lucie after listening to Liza Stark's and Emma Pareschi's tutorials, we looked at Becky Stern's wearable tutorials. I was inspired by her Zodiac embroidery and How to sew Neopixels with conductive thread tutorials.

Download free zodiac patterns made by Becky Stern



With Diane's help these two examples felt like something I could handle.

Neopixels

We looked at Maite Sosa Methol's Fabricademy page, and her careful documentation and tried to reproduce this circuit. This means that we also had to anually install the Adafruit_NeoPixel Library page from this site: - Adafruit_NeoPixel Library.
This allows us to have access to different NeoPixel sketches. Next, we needed to upload the Adafruit NeoPixel libary to input the code to Arduino. These are a set of functions that need to be installed on Arduino. This is the code that Diane Wakim shared with us: neopixel switch
me


Since this worked I followed Becky Stern's tutorial for Zodiac Embroidery, and sewed my NeoPixel on.

I had fun experimenting with different Arduino NeoPixel Library sketches, such as the strandtest wheel

Sound

Following Emma's tutorial I set out to make speakers making speakers Then I used this circuit board, suggested by Emma. arduino and sound
Unfortunately, I must have done something wrong, because no sound came out when I used the magnets close to it. I figured it may be because the fabric I used was felt, therefore too heavy. So I tried making it again with cotton butter cloth, made sure that my conductive thread didn't touch (I wrapped tape around the thread in the middle of the spiral), and then I loaded Emma's sound sketches. arduino and sound arduino and sound

Monsters

Coming up next! Here is the monster I'll make once I get the circuit sketches! monster

Article on sustainability and etextiles


Last update: 2021-11-23