Wearable Sensing for Responsive Media Spaces

Steven Dow, Tazama St.Julien, Giovanni Iachello

Project milestones:
Background Research and Related Work
Responsive Media Midterm Presentation
Responsive Media Final Presentation

Comunication Forum

Proposal

Introduction:

Non traditional interfaces are becoming increasingly important as interaction tools with computing systems, both for verbal and non-verbal communication. One way of exploiting non-traditional user interfaces is to apply various kinds of sensors to the human body in order to perceive and use gestures and movements of a person to control computing processes.

In the past few years, wearable sensing techniques have been subject to growing interest in the multimedia art and communication communities. For example, the symbolic representation of body movements captured from a variety of sensors (accelerometers, force sensors, magnetometers, stress strain, light sensors, etc) can be used as input for numerous applications which can create audio/visual output back to the user. This work is illuminated in TGarden a responsive media environment created by Prof. Sha Xin Wei and collaborators.

For this kind of application, it is necessary to collect data in a continuous form and with tight restrictions on latency and sampling frequency. These restrictions derive from human perceptual characteristics. In order for visual feedback to be perceived as linked with one’s gestures and movements, the latency between the two events should be in the order of 1/10 sec. For audio feedback, if the sound is melodic, e.g. if the system simulates an “instrument”, the latency needs to be even lower (1/30 sec).

Project goals:

The primary aim of this project is to develop optimized sensory data delivery mechanisms with Berkeley “motes”. The current transmission method is not optimized for the specific transmission medium and type of information transmitted. Furthermore, only accelerometers and light sensors have been actively used in the multimedia project mentioned above. We will also investigate the use of devices like magnetometers and force sensors on the motes.

The realistic goal for our semester long project will be to support the creation of a smart media space designed by artists in Sha Xin Wei’s Architecture of Responsive Spaces class (LCC6321). The primary milestones for this project will be:

1. Getting the hardware working.
    a. Build the sensor motes (attach accelerometers, force sensors, etc.).
    b. Test sensors and radio transmission.
2. Optimizing the delivery of sensor data
    a. Learn TinyOS.
    b. Develop compression techniques.
    c. Investigate alternative methods for reducing latency.

Architecture:

In yellow is the relevant part of the architecture for this project.

Uploaded Image: arch-UbiComp.jpg

Deliverables:

1. Demonstration of initial hardware setup and data aggregation(March 20).
2. Final presentation and demonstration of finished product, applied to a specific real-time multimedia synthesis application (last week of classes).

Extra Information
Hardware:

2 Rene sensor motes with ADXL202 Accelerometers attached
2 Rene2 sensor motes
2 ADXL202E Accelerometers
1 Programming board?
5 supplementary antennae

Resources:

Berkeley Wireless Embedded Systems web site:
http://webs.cs.berkeley.edu

TinyOS:
http://webs.cs.berkeley.edu/tos/tinyos-1.x/doc/tutorial/index.html
http://webs.cs.berkeley.edu/tos/support.html (includes email list)
http://today.cs.berkeley.edu/tos/media.html

Time Sync issues:
http://www.ai.mit.edu/people/sombrero/nestwiki/index/ComponentTimeSync

Sensors
Analog Devices http://www.AnalogDevices.com/
Assemtech http://www.assemtech.co.uk/
Connectix Corp. http://www.connectix.com/
Crossbow Technology accelerometer http://www.xbow.com/
Jameco Flex sensor No. 150551 (Flexion sensor) http://www.jameco.com
Philips KTY series http://www.Philips.com/
Measurement Specialities Pressure, force, vibration, flow, and
ultrasonic sensors and sensor-based products http://www.msiusa.com
MindTel Sensors and devices http://s013.infomall.org/mindtel/mindtel.html
Murata http://www.murata.com/
National Instruments http://www.natinst.com/links.htm
New Sensor Corp. http://www.sovtek.com/home.html
Radiometrix http://www.radiometrix.co.uk/
RF Solutions http://www.rfsolutions.co.uk/
MEGATRON Bauelemente Explanations to force transducers, sensors,
transmitters http://www.megatron.de/meba/kraft/e_kraft.htm
Tekscan FlexiForce sensors http://www.Tekscan.com/flexiforce.html

Links to this Page

Project Groups last edited on 22 April 2003 at 1:50 pm by w204d47.lawn.gatech.edu
project presentation sign-up sheet last edited on 22 April 2003 at 2:50 pm by w204d47.lawn.gatech.edu