Teleportation Box

Public kiosk where any passer-by can place an object in a vintage steamer trunk, take a picture of it, transport it through the network, and have it appear in other boxes set up at other locations, as well as on a blog.

Personal Statement

This project was conceived as a fun way for people to broadcast objects that have significance to them, and to interact with each other in public spaces. There is also hopefully some magic aspect to the project, in which a person can feel as though they are "sending" their object to others, and to the internet.

Audience

People idle or waiting in a public space.

Background

If someone wants to share a thought with the world, blogs or twitter are currently the quickest and easiest solutions. For permanent local installations of the same thought, there's graffiti, although it has to be condensed. If you'd like to share an image, or an object, rather than just text, your options become more complicated, and it's certainly harder to do it in a public space. This project was conceived so that you can share objects, messages, or pictures, with the people in your space, as well as with people in other spaces. The only limit is the temporal one, until someone else updates the system.

Diagrams

User Scenario/Implementation

The way this project is meant to be viewed and displayed is a simple kiosk with two main elements: the steamer trunk on the floor, a mat in front, and a map on the wall behind it. The map will have LEDs showing where other, similar, steamer trunks have been placed around the world. So, as one takes a picture of their object and sends it, his/her location will lite up indicating where the image displayed on the screen came from. This is a key part of the project as it is quite essential to note the socio-cultural implementations of what each person carries on them at any given moment, as well as what they deem as important to transmit. The mat on the other hand is also crucial as it invites the user to kneel in front of this box as they place their object, giving the feel of a box of wonders. Ideally the box should be opened with two hands further accenting this experience. The box will be constructed in way of a steamer trunk to give the feel of something old. The box will have two main visible features, a screen on top and a button for the users to press when they have placed thier object inside. As the button is pressed a flash of light will be triggered simulating a flash. This flash will be visible only on the box currently in use to confirm that the image has been captured. after that the picture of the objects get turned into a sepia coloration allowing for the experience of not only sending the object to other locations but through time as well.

References

http://steampunkworkshop.com/electroetch.shtml (Etching for the Button)

http://developer.apple.com/sdk/ (Image Capture Architecture)