Heere Mousey Mousey! Part 2

Testing has occurred. I tried model one and two.

First, Model Two is below.

I made model 2 longer so the ramps were less steep and made it easier for the mouse to climb up.

I also added a side door, held by magnets so you can easily get the mouse out after you've caught him.

There are heavy steel bars along the floor so he can't knock the whole thing over and get out!

Thanks for reading!

Heeere Mousey Mousey!

In designer bootcamp we are making humane mouse traps. Pretty much having fun with simple mechanics and physics to catch mice!

We are limited on our materials and systems we could use to: bass wood, acrylic/polystyrene, gravity, magnets, elasticity, and wire forming. Also, the simpler the better.


I designed mine using the simple principle of a trap door. All the mouse has to do is walk to the cheese and he is caught! The doors flip over and the doors latch against each other so the mouse can't push his way out. Some people had these rather complicated designs where it was dubious to think the mouse would actually even set off the trap.





This is my first model, after presenting it to the class last week I'm changing the trap doors to lay closer to flat to the top surface and be easier to trip when the mouse walks on them, adding a small door on the side ramps to let the mouse out once you've caught him and improving the graphics.

The new exit door.

I'm showing it on Tuesday with the improvements. Hopefully Shaun will bring some real mice and we can test these suckers out!

Thanks for reading!

Thumb Replacements For Tired Hitchhikers!

A week or two ago in Designer Bootcamp we learned how to make these super simple molds. Simply mix two playdoughy compounds together (I forget what they were made of) and mold it around what ever you want, we did our fingers. Me specifically, I did my thumb. You let the chemicals do the their thing and it sets up with a duromoter much the same as a bouncy ball.


Then, you fill the molds you just made of your thumb with epoxy! We did both clear and white epoxy. It was amazing the detail that the mold making got. Even the ridges on my knuckles and the lines on my skin!




Really this was all just to learn a new process, not for a certian project, but it was pretty fun. It's also nice to have a day where your not 'on' all day. Our class made that's what she said jokes the whole 3 hours. It was good.

Thanks for reading!

Ribbon of Dirt - Inpiration

I presented my latest CFC project today for the nature inspiration project.

Here is the run down.

Ribbon Of Dirt

I derive much of my joy and fun in life from small ribbons of dirt winding its way through the woods. Hours upon hours spent exploring these ribbons have thoroughly accustomed me to their specific bobs, drops and twists. But although I know them like a lover, they surprise me and challenge me and leave my body and soul thriving for more. In the same way a person can be spontaneous, so can these sporadic ribbons of dirt. New obstacles fall and are thrown in my path, but they simply are highlights on each new ride through my own personal amusement park.

Like a roller coaster I ride the natural dips, the natural hills. These ribbons are my muses where I work out the complexities and concerns of creative life. Every new ride clears my entirety, like a brand new day, and gives me the inspiration to carry on creating.

Pete Hall




My class mostly liked it and appreciated the way I had arranged it on the wall. I was quite happy with myself, I had this one pretty well thought out and had answers for most of the their questions (example, why did you not have it come in from white to color like you have it fade out? Well, because I know where I've been, what's ahead is always changing and new. Pwned that question.).

Thanks for reading!

Welcome!

Thanks for moving over with me to theprocessoftheproduct.

I'll be keeping you updated here from now on.

Thanks for reading!

Blog Changes Coming

Think of this as a P.S.A.

In a weeks time, I will be changing the web address that this blog is posted to. Currently you read me at aplusdequalsm.blogspot.com but in a push to give myself a unified web presence under the PeterMartinHall. banner I will be changing this site to more reflect how I use this blog as a sounding board and an update medium on my projects and less as my base on the web. I hope to have my digital portfolio site umich.edu/~petemh be my professional web home base. I will continute to use my flickr and my Facebook as my social and less professional web base. If you'd like to be Facebook friends with me, search me (Pete Hall, see I'm less professional there, I drop the r and the Martin!) and send me a message your a follower of this blog. Make sure you send me the message, other wise I might now know who you are!

So, since this site is about how I work through design issues and projects, the site will be changing to theprocessoftheproduct.blogspot.com in one weeks time. So next week Thursday, March 12, the site will be switching over. Make a note and preemptively bookmark the site, it won't be live yet, but you'll be prepared!

Thanks for reading, I hope you all make the jump with me! And no, I will not be jumping on the Twitter bandwagon anytime soon. I don't have that much to say!

Ant Farm

I presented the ant farm today in CFC, it went over quite well, I'm pretty happy with it.

The ants are doing great so far, and for only being in the sand for 3 days, they've started to tunnel a bit even. I only seem to have lost one or two ants so far (that's lost as in they've died, not gotten out), I assume they died when Kara and I put them in.

The piece was presented on a pedestal with my placard on the front explaining the piece. Shiva seemed to like it, and people kept coming back over to see it throughout the course of the class. Which I'm taking as a huge compliment. I think this may be my first cfc project that everyone likes, professor, class and me! Normally, I like it and the prof likes it but the class doesn't, or (more common) I like it kinda, but am unhappy overall, and no one else likes it either, so everyone liking a cfc piece of mine is a nice change.

The placard read,

Ant Farm

I aim to explore the harnessing of the environment by humans for our own benefit, be it frivolous, harmless uses like an ant farm or more serious uses, both in implementation and effects, such as disposal of pollutants. We dramatically change our environment and are thus limited by it, as we use our resources inefficiently we change the physical properties of what makes our environment, our environment. I aim to show this through ants constricted in an ant farm. Much the same as humans, the ants are constrained by their environment and they change their environment as they move the dirt but they are ultimately constrained by it and they changes they make. There is only so much space to move dirt in the ant farm, just as we only have so many resources.

Similarly, if we pollute a freshwater lake and abuse its ecosystem, we lose the lake as a source of drinking water and food. The ants only have a limited food supply; they must efficiently use what food is supplied to them to keep their colony alive. When their food supply runs out, they die. When we ruin our environment, we face the same pressures and consequences.

Pete Hall







The actual ant farm itself is made out of laser cut 1/4" clear cast arylic and an acid that melts arcylic and then lets it harden again to create a seemless bond where two pieces of acrylic meet whose name I can't remember.
The ants are harvester ants (who can apparently bite!) and have a limited food supply of seeds and other foliage and are living in simple sand substrate. I got them from antsalive.com.

Thanks for reading!

Ants!

I bought ants a while back. Their still in the mail, I hope they make it here by Wednesday for my CFC Ecology project (I'm making an ant colony!). I bought it from one of those sites you never knew existed, but when you need them, hey! there is a site that sells ants and ant food! AntsAlive.com!

Thanks for reading!

Conceptually Unfinished

Ah, CFC, how I dislike you.

So, the unnatural project for CFC III. I find it so hard to spend time on CFC classes in general, I'm more interested in my other courses, that my CFC projects really end up suffering. Case in point, the unnatural project.

My idea was to do something with a little Hindu girl named Laskshmi in India born with 8 limbs (4 legs, 4 arms) because of being born with a parasitic twin attached to her at the hips (no extra head). She was revered in India as a goddess, specifically the goddess Lakshmi, who she is named after. The rest of the world did not. So I was going to picture the little girl coming out of a lotus flower (which the goddess is normally pictured coming out of), thing is, I waited till last Monday to start. It was of course due Wednesday! So my lotus came out nicely, but I didn't give myself enough time to make the girl work, so I left it out. Big mistake.

Alone the lotus flower was nice, but had not one bit of concept. Opps.

The frame was made out of some nice stiff jewelry wire and lots of masking tape.

Then I wrapped it in pink tissue paper.

Added some green leaves and viola! a lotus with no concept!

Oh well, it's over now. I'll do better from now on and actually give myself time to work on CFC, no matter how uninteresting it is.

Thanks for reading, and Shiva (my cfc prof) if your reading this, sorry for coming to class with such a poor project.

826 Michigan Window Robot

I can not believe I never posted the finished 826 Michigan robot! I just realized that my header image here at A plus D equals Me and my welcome image at my website, umich.edu/~petemh, both use the robot and I've never really shown him here! So, here goes!

Well it's pretty simple all together actually, the robot was made as an incandescent window dressing model to attract attention night and day to the 826 Michigan robot storefront. 826 Michigan is a "non-profit organization dedicated to supporting students ages 6 to 18 with their creative and expository writing skills, and to helping teachers inspire their students to write." After tutoring there a few times for CFC II, I did the robot as way to give back.

Why a robot? Well the original 826 tutoring location in San Fransisco had a clause in it's building lease that they needed to have a store front, so they put up a pirate supply store, kinda as a joke. Except now the store is very profitable and helps to drive the free tutoring programs for the kids. It is now a tradition for all 826 locations around the nation to have a store front, Michigan chose a robot supply store and called it Liberty Street Robot Supply & Repair. How awesome is that for kids, get tutoring at the robot store! If you want to visit, it's here in Ann Arbor at 115 East Liberty Street a few blocks away from campus towards Main St.

826 Michigan Storefront

The robot himself (if it was a real robot, it would be programed to be a guy I've decided, a guy robot who waves hi!), was designed in Adobe Illustrator, and made out of 1/4" amber acrylic which was laser cut and then stacked and fastened together. His eyes light up when he is plugged in and his whole head glows! Which, of course, is awesome!





Hope you like him, it's one of my favorite things I've done at Michigan. I mean a light up robot? Please.

Thanks for reading!

myPod Docking Station

For Designer Bootcamp we're designing the standard, the everybody makes one at design school, the ubiquitous iPod dock. This is actually the second iPod thing I've designed, the other was a speaker dock back in mech. engineering (link is to some old concept sketches, the actual manufactured one sucked, my group knew nothing about design, they decided on some super boring design that didn't work). This one is much more interesting. I didn't have to rely on engineers!

I had a few criteria for myself on the dock

-easy access
-display iPod
-charge/sync iPod
-easily store ear buds
-keep the aesthetic of Apple and the iPod
-good design semantics (simple to understand how to use it)

My basic original idea. (out of many, we all had to have several concepts worked out).

The initial foam model, ear buds stored in lower compartment.

The iPod lays down over it all covering up the unsightly ear bud cords, just displaying the sleek lines of the iPod.

Prototype #1 was built with Rhino (the Mac beta! it works well) and Adobe Illustrator, then made with laser cut 1/4"MDF board stacked, spray painted, and then vacuum formed with clear polystyrene over it. The clear material really gives a beautiful shine on top of the red coat on the base.

I learned with the foam model that the ear buds need a deeper cavity to store them with out pushing up the iPod, so, I made it deeper and wider by cutting the back supports for the iPod body into pillars, acquired almost 1.5 square inches!

Of course, it's got syncing/charging ability!

The red color doesn't really hold the Apple aesthetic (unless you look back at those old colorful iMacs!). The next iteration will be white. Also, I want to round out those hard edges on the inside of the dock, give them a small radius as hard corners are rare on Apple products.
I'm also concerned with the bulk of dock, I'm going to look into slimming it down.

Up next, refinement of the current prototype #1.

Thanks for reading!

Laser Cutting 101

Yes, I've had lots of experience with the laser cutter before, but for Designer Bootcamp we're getting some more! Shaun wanted to see where we stood on our thinking in 3-d, so we made 4"x4" cubes and 4" diameter spheres on the laser cutter out of foam core. They had to fit together with friction. It was pretty fun actually, easy assignments are always appreciated!

I tried to make my cube feel like a building with a friction held pillar system.




My sphere, nothing to amazing really. It's a sphere!




We're working on iPod charging stations currently. I'll post my ideas on that soon.

Thanks for reading!