Loom Model

Description:


There are long rolls of paper hooked up to "nodes" on a grid, which act like "mouths".  There are rollers that the paper is fed into and out of, like in a printer.  The paper goes in the back side and comes out the front.  The strand can infinitely grow, assuming it is fed an infinite input.  Hopefully we will be able to control the speed of the rollers. 


The nodes are on a grid where they can move to different coordinates via Arduino programming.  Movement of the nodes will result in weaving or braiding of the strands as they exit the nodes.  The strands can be woven together in different ways responding to sensory inputs such as amount of light, noise, movement, etc.  They use one set of movements for a while to make a certain type of pattern.  Once something stimulates the system (a lot of noise, for example), the nodes change position, consequently changing the pattern of braiding. The system creates a physical representation of time.  You can analyze the end product and actually see where a lot of people came into the room because at that point in the braid, the strands were woven tighter (or looser, or in a certain pattern, etc.).


This project also incorporates the creation of a physical pattern language and scale.  Each pattern will signify a specific change in environment.  How can we make this language legible? The translation of condition into pattern must be intuitive.  Also, if we are able to control the speed of the rollers, each section of the strand will have a different scale.  For some sections, one inch of the strand will illustrate one hour of happenings.  In sections manufactured with a different script, 1 inch could equal one year, or five minutes, or 3 seconds, or?  We must formulate a coding system that will translate scale to the user, just like in an architectural drawing.


This system models tree bark, striation in rock formations, snake skin, or human hair - you can see where a snake was bitten by a bird because it will have a scar (or different scaling pattern) in the skin that it sheds.  You can chemically analyze a piece of hair and see at what point in someone's life they took certain types of drugs.  These examples formed the biomimetic intentions of the project.  This project begs the questions:  "How does nature store data?"  "How does nature keep a record of history?"  Considering the digitalization of society, is it still important to have physical versions of data?  There are no hard drives in nature.  How do you communicate the notion of "sunlight" in one's and zero's?

The next step is to analyze different braiding techniques and how they can result in different patterns.  Then we just program those movements into Arduino.  To start, we could run the system with a minimum of 3 nodes (3 strands of material going into the system).  However, you could technically build a huge grid with (x) nodes if you wanted to.  That would yield a super thick braided strand or blanket with more patterning possibilities.