Print 2

My second print was more successful. I first printed the inside dodecahedron that contains the LED. The LED strip fits inside it well, however I don’t like the harsh LED light spots that can be seen in the photos.

I then printed the outer dodecahedron frame that will have plastic on the faces. It doesn’t fit on the base very well – I’ll need to come up with a better solution for attaching the base and the frame. I think also that the frame needs to be thicker so it will print more nicely and be stronger. I can feel it bend when I put slight pressure on it.

Originally my LED strip required 12V to power the LEDs, but the LEDs only actually needed 9V (3V each) to power them. Each LED had a resistor that made sure it was only getting the needed voltage. Because I thought you couldn’t get small 12V batteries I removed the resistors so I could use a 9V battery instead. After I’d done this, Craig told me that you can get small form factor 12V batteries. I said “oh well” and decided to use the 9V battery anyway.

I’ve decided to make the whole MP3 player larger to accomodate for a 9V battery. The battery will be in the bottom of the base piece and will be easily accessible to ensure it can be changed easily. A larger inside piece will also mean the LEDs will be further away from the edges, so hopefully there won’t be harsh spots of LED light on the plastic like in the top photos.

Print 1

My first print of my design didn’t work too well. I had retraction disabled which meant as the 3D printer head moved between the legs PLA dripped down making the print all messy. This also caused three of the legs to print incorrectly, resulting in a jumbled mess of plastic.

I was able to identify from this failed print that the outside dodecahedron needs to be larger and that its sides/legs need to be thicker, i.e. stronger.

Base Electronics

I’ve decided to incorporate all of the electronics into the base piece of my MP3 player. The centre dodecahedron will be printed as part of the base piece. It will house the LED, with the wires coming down through the central tube into the base where they will go to the battery and switch.

I will develop the base to include a housing for the battery and switch but this is the basic gist of my design.

Making a Dodecahedron

3D Modeling

The way I currently make the dodecahedron frame on Inventor involves first creating a solid dodecahedron and then cutting through it to remove the middle and leave only the frame. This is a convoluted process and doesn’t allow me to easily generate multiple dodecahedron frames to test different measurements/features of the frame’s sides. What I really want is a way to start off with one side and then combine 12 of them to create a solid object.

I used maths to work out the dimensions and angles needed for an individual side and then made it on Inventor. I discovered the ‘sweep’ tool which allowed me to quickly make five sides of the pentagon at once instead of making each one individually. I then combined 12 of these pieces in an assembly to form a dodecahedron.

One side of the frame using 58.3 degree angles for the sides

Assembly of the 12 sides

However, I found that the pieces didn’t all line up and that there were gaps between some sides. This is because my maths wasn’t accurate enough.

I guess I’ll just have to go back to the old way.

Printing

Variation 1

When I print the full size dodecahedron frame the top face will need supports to print on because otherwise it will be trying to print on thin air. However, the supports will make the inside of the frame all messy. Therefore, I will need to print the frame in two bits. When I printed the dodecahedron frame before it only worked without supports because it was at a small scale so it was only printing a small amount on thin air.

I split my dodecahedron frame at the top face. That means that when the model prints it won’t need to use supports. I will print it in the orientation shown in the picture below, but this piece will actually be the top piece.

The missing face shown in the photo above will become the base piece. I will need to add some sort of connectors to hold the top piece to the bottom piece. Maybe I could develop the bottom piece into a base which can also house the battery and switch…

Variation 2

Here I split the dodecahedron frame at the very top, cutting away the 5 sides of the top face as opposed to the whole top face like in variation 1. This meant that the frame can slot over the base piece and makes joining the base and the frame much easier.

I will develop the base piece to make it more visually appealing and to incorporate the electronics. I think the inside dodecahedron should be printed as part of the base piece, with the frame being a whole separate piece.

Electronics

I found the easiest way to iterate the components of my LED circuit inside my MP3 player was to print off a picture of a 3D model I had made and to draw over it. I could quickly generate a few ideas of how the components could be stored inside the device.

Material/Light Testing

I 3D printed one side of the dodecahedron frame. This allowed me to do quick material tests to determine the best material to use for the laser cut sides. I wanted to see what material allowed light through it best.

I also saw that the side looked best when the indents were hidden. This is pictured on the right, whereas the bottom picture shows the indents. Therefore, in my dodecahedron frame I will make sure the indents are all on the inside.

I began playing around with different materials for the sides. I first used thick art paper. This paper diffused the light at a distance of about 5cm, but up close the individual LEDs could easily be made out.

I then tried with some thin plastic from the cover of an A4 clear file. When the plastic was directly on top of the LEDs the details along the strip were visible, but at a greater distance the light diffused. I prefer the effect of the thin plastic over the paper because the plastic lets in more light.

I then tried with the plastic over the dodecahedron. The dodecahedron was solid, and thus the LEDs had to be placed under it, not inside it like they will be in the final MP3 player. Despite this, the dodecahedron had a nice glow to it and through the plastic it was a really cool look.

I then tested the LEDs through a tube which allowed the light to travel up into the dodecahedron. The light can be seen at the top of the dodecahedron in the right photo, but it does not glow out of all the sides like I want it to. The main thing blocking the light is the fill, so next I will try an empty dodecahedron with no fill and put the LEDs directly inside it. I will need to increase the shell thickness for an empty part and possibly print the dodecahedron as two parts – the bottom 11 sides and the top – because without support inside the dodecahedron the top has nothing to print on to.

 

 

Economic Inequality

One example of a representation of poverty in New Zealand that Dr. Greg Gilbert used in his lecture was Ans Westra’s series Washday at the pa. This series of photographs and text detailing the everyday life of a rural Maori family was commissioned by the New Zealand Education Department’s School Publications section for a School Bulletin in 1964, a time when there was mass migration from the country to cities. Some viewers assumed that sub-standard conditions depicted in Washday were typical of Māori communities (McDonald 84), and thus Washday became a topic of controversy. One particular group that took offence at the series was the Māori Women’s Welfare League. The League “focused attention on ‘the mother, the child and the home’ as the main routes to address the problems of poor health and educational status facing Māori” (Brookes 243). Washday went against what the League stood for. The photographs could be taken to depict Māori as not having done well in life, or as not being able to provide for their families, and could imply that rural communities are poor.

Westra, Ans. Untitled. From the series: Washday at the pa. Black and white photograph, gelatine silver print. Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington

Timelines of significant events in New Zealand from 1945-90 (click to enlarge):

 

Works cited:
Anderson, Atholl, Judith Binney, and Aroha Harris. Tangata Whenua: An Illustrated History. Wellington: Bridget Williams Books, 2014. Print.

Brookes, B. ‘Nostalgia for “Innocent Homely Pleasures”: The 1964 New Zealand Controversy over Washday at the Pa’. Gender and History 9.2 (1997): 242–261. Print.

McDonald, Lawrence. ‘Camera Antipode : Ans Westra : Photography as a Form of Ethnographic & Historical Writing : A Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfilment of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy, Social Anthropology Programme, School of People, Environment & Planning, Massey University, Manawatu’. Thesis. Massey University, 2012. mro.massey.ac.nz. Web. 26 Sept. 2016.

Refined Concept

My first chosen design that I’m developing further is this concept with the glowing centre. After playing around with more shapes I had a better feel for what I wanted to make and realised that this concept didn’t have to be a boring old cube.

I made a digital model of a dodecahedron, a more interesting shape than a cube. I’ll have one dodecahedron inside another, with the inside one containing the LED. Hover over the images for the process of making the dodecahedron:

Each side is a polygon

The polygons are joined individually into the shape, resulting in this 3D assembly

The assembly was then derived into an individual part

And the part was stitched together to become a solid object

After discussing this concept with Geoff, I came up with a few ideas about how I could integrate laser cutting into my design. This is a page of rough sketches of variations that I came up with.

The basic idea is that there is a 3D printed dodecahedron with a laser cut frame, or vice versa, in which is another smaller dodecahedron that contains the LED. My favourite idea, the circled one, is a 3D printed frame that is printed at the same time inside dodecahedron. The frame and the inside dodecahedron are thus connected by some sort of central pole that could also house some wires. The frame would have laser cut panels of polypropylene slotting into the sides, creating a complete object. The polypropylene would hopefully allow the light through, so when the LED is switched on the smaller dodecahedron inside the object will shine through.

I played around with making my existing solid dodecahedron into a frame.

Variation 1

I then made one of the sketched variations into a 3D assembly. This assembly would be printed as one object and laser cut panels would fit over/into the open sections of the outer dodecahedron.

The blue highlighted section in the right image is the outer dodecahedron.

Variation 2

The inner dodecahedron would be 3D printed and the outer frame laser cut. The frame would be made of 12 polygons that fit together/around the inner object.

Variation 3

I tried making a frame that would allow laser cut sides to slot in. Because I’m using digital fabrication methods, I can have be very accurate with my slot joints which means I don’t need to come up with a complicated joint for holding the sides on. Hover over the images for the process of making the dodecahedron frame:

I first made a single piece with an indent to allow a side to fit on

I then combined 12 pieces into an assembly of a dodecahedron frame

I then derived the assembly into a single part

My idea was to follow the same process as when I made the first dodecahedron in 3D, but obviously that didn’t work. The assembly became all janky and the indents I had put into the individual pieces to hold the laser cut sides had been removed by the addition of other sides.

I then took my original frame and simply pushed indents in on all 12 sides. This worked much better. The depth of the indents will be the same as the thickness of whatever material the sides will be made out of (probably polypropylene sheet).

Variation 4

I combined my previous variations to form this object. The sides are indented to allow the laser cut pieces to slot in (as shown in the bottom picture), the central dodecahedron is connected to the frame by a pole that will contain the wires. The battery will be housed in the bottom face. The bottom face is 3D printed as part of the frame, and is not a laser cut slotting piece. This means it is slightly thicker to allow for the thickness for the battery.

 

Design Iterations

Iteration 1

I liked this concept of a multi-fingered shape. I thought that maybe it could connect to the user by clipping onto their belt or a piece of their clothing.

I put one different coloured LED in each finger. Each LED would flash at different times to the others and would represent a different player in Kamasi Washington’s band in Cherokee.

Iteration 2

I player around with some variation of shapes in this concept. This MP3 player would again clip onto the user’s clothing.

Iteration 3

I took this idea of having an object within an object and lighting the inside object. I explored different shapes and made a model.

Iteration 4

I was interested in this idea I came up with during my LED testing. By having an LED inside one square of the inside fill of a 3D printed object, you can light up just that square and create patterns on the top of the object. I implemented this into my hourglass-shaped concept, and had a few LEDs on the bottom inside of the MP3 player that flash on and off in time to the music, lighting up different parts of the MP3 player.

 

Dawn Raids

One key theme from the week 7 lecture was that designers need to consider their design methodologies when designing with/for/into other cultures. There is a “Western assumption that a centred position or narrative can speak for all aesthetic and human experience” (Taouma, 41). It is important to take other cultures’ ideas, norms, procedures, protocols etc. into account, and understand the culture before and throughout the design process.

This T-shirt is designed by artist Siliga David Setoga. The font and colours of the logo ‘Fob Power’ reference those of ‘Cold Power’, a brand of laundry detergent. Fob (‘free on board’) is a term used by traders to refer to fruit that has come from the Pacific, and has come to be a derogatory term for Pacific Islanders themselves (Mallon, Māhina-Tuai, and Salesa, 237). Beneath the Logo the words read “Outstanding On The Football Field, The Factory Floor And The Footpath Brawl”. The T-shirt makes a statement regarding the stereotypes about Pacific Islanders in New Zealand.

Setoga, Siliga. T-shirt (Fob Power). Printed cotton. Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington

The documentary ‘Dawn Raids’ details the mid-70s police raids on the homes and workplaces of Pacific Islanders who had allegedly overstayed their time in New Zealand. Pacific Islanders came to New Zealand for job opportunities and education, but many ended up staying on longer than they were legally allowed so they could provide for their families back home. Initially a blind eye was turned to these overstayers, but as job opportunities in New Zealand became more and more scarce, police and government began to crack down on Pacific overstayers. They began supposedly random ‘spot checks’ in the street which escalated to early-morning house raids. The racist attitudes that police and government had towards Pacific people sparked the formation of activist groups like the Polynesian Panther movement.

Works cited:
Mallon, Sean, Kolokesa Uafā Māhina-Tuai, and Damon Ieremia Salesa, eds. ‘All Power to the People: Overstayers, Dawn Raids and the Polynesian Panthers’. Tangata O Le Moana: New Zealand and the People of the Pacific. Wellington, N.Z: Te Papa Press, 2012. 221–240. Print.

Setoga, Siliga. T-shirt (Fob Power). Printed cotton. Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington. ‘All Power to the People: Overstayers, Dawn Raids and the Polynesian Panthers’. By Mallon, Sean, Kolokesa Uafā Māhina-Tuai, and Damon Ieremia Salesa, eds. Wellington, N.Z: Te Papa Press, 2012. 221–240. Print.

Taouma, Lisa. ‘“Gauguin Is Dead… There Is No Paradise”’. Journal of Intercultural Studies 25.1 (2004): 35–46. Print.