Home made digital camera

After a few setbacks I am back on track with the practical part of my thesis. Yesterday I finally received the screen component I was waiting for a month and a half. Today I took apart a webcam and combined it with the screen.

[Crap, I accidentally deleted this video on Vimeo, facepalm]

I would like to thank the guys at Cirque for their support and specifications for the touchpad module. Now I will be able to work with it. The interaction part will be painful to create, but doable. [Update: That touchpad went belly up the first day, so...]

Short link to this post: http://skrci.me/dss05

Museum Lights and a trip to Denmark

And now to the "wannabe music artist" part of my description. Yes, I recorded a new track and it's ready for you to listen, download and love.

Museum Lights by Echotype

 I will be away for a few days, because I am visiting my friend in Denmark. The trip will go something like this (if everything goes right of course):

Ljutomer -> Klagenfurt (car)
Klagenfurt -> Frankfurt-Hahn (plane)
Frankfurt-Hahn -> Odense (car)

Odense -> Köln (car)
Köln -> Frankfurt-Hahn (bus)
Frankfurt-Hahn -> Klagenfurt (plane)
Klagenfurt -> Ljutomer (car)


I will report back with pictures on Tuesday.

Short link to this post: http://skrci.me/dss04

Crysis - Thesis is falling apart

After a month of waiting I finally got the right component. I was happy as fat kid with candy, all until I tried to make it work. After a few failed attempts, I opened it up and find a damaged cable. At first I thought that it's my fault, but the cable was in the middle and it was thicker then all the surrounding ones. So in order for me to damage it, I would have to damage the other cables. This means at least another two weeks of waiting... F*cking great!
I also ordered a screen component 5 weeks ago and I don't know where the hell it is...

Damaged cable...

I give up...

Short link to this post: http://skrci.me/dss03

My interface and Flash Catalyst

It's Sunday all over again and it's once again time for my blog post.
I have considered using Flash Catalyst for my (physical) prototype many times. I have tried both beta versions and am now using the trial version. But it seems to me that it is always missing something I would like to do. For example: It has no "click and drag" actions, which I desperately need for my interface to work properly. Well, there is a scroll component, but this won't do the job. I already gave up on Catalyst, but my mentor insisted that I try to create as much as possible with it and then outline the drawbacks of Catalyst. Yesterday I created the first simulation of my interface. If you would like to play with it you can do so here. If you have any comments, I would love to hear them.

 Image of my interface in action

I will try to learn as much as possible from the Catalyst simulation to avoid mistakes in the final version. But I will still create the final version in standard Flash.

Short link to this post: http://skrci.me/dss02

Design competition

Yesterday I entered an international design competition. I submitted my concept one hour before deadline, although I knew about it for more then a month. I was working on this design concept for the past two weeks, but still I've done 90% of the writing, 60% of rendering and 10% of modeling the last day (working 15 hours straight). It's not that I never learn from this "do it all the last day" mistake, but I rather need it. I need the pressure and a tight deadline to function.
Sadly I won't be able to show my concept anytime soon. Because of the competition rules I'm not allow to show it to the public until December.


Short link to this post: http://skrci.me/dss01

Busy with thesis

My blog is suffering under the lack of my attention. But don't worry, I haven't been lazy all this time from my last post. I created more than 30 icons, but there are still 20 to be done. I laid out the whole menu architecture, created 2 iterations of paper mock-ups and annoyed some people with them (its called user testing). In the last two weeks I created a 3D model of my camera and send it to 3D printing to test ergonomics.

Image of the 3D model and print, I also left some room for the batteries to get a better feeling for weight distribution.

I decided that I won't be doing online testing with a simulation of my interface, but will rather create a working prototype. I spent many days trying to find the right components. On Friday I received the first component, but they sent the wrong one (PS/2 interface instead of USB).

And from now on I will write at least one post per week (on Sundays).

Short link to this post: http://skrci.me/2yUX6

All the Crazy Menu Options

How does it look like when I'm working on a project. Well... its a mess. Today I was working on icons for my digital camera interface. It looks something like this:

At the moment it looks more organized, because I already filtered the fonts twice; from more than 50 chosen ones down to this. I also created something inspired by the Microsoft Courier concept interface (and I really want to have the Courier when and if it comes out):

The font used here is called Blackout, its an Open Source Font and you can get more of them here.
I will show you the icons and menus when I finish them.