Wk 3 Omni Creature

Interview with Steve Chambers

Although Steve and I are in the same program, I never talked with him in person. My interview with him lasted 10-15 minutes. Below are some notes.

Goals: find 3 identities

Three areas I would like to explore in order to find identities

  • Mobility- fast, slow, like moving, like staying still
  • Habit - group/alone/family…food.
  • Spirit

Interview Questions.

1. What do you usually do during weekend in nice weather or rainy days? Why?

Tennis. Work out at gym. Lift weights. Hang out on the deck by the water.

Movies. Sci fictions. Fantasy. High-school situated Movies others think stupid. Mean girls. Broadway show. Actor. TV shows movies. Used to sing.

Business executive. Front of camera to behind camera. Produce Soup opera. $, change. Interested in how business worked.

2. What way of transportation do you like? Walk, bike, bus, T, drive,…. Why?

Fly. Interesting. See more.

3. Do you like doing things alone or do you like being with others? Why?

Being with others. Does not like being alone. Always be in relationships. Social very important. Laughing is important.

4. What food do you like? Why?

Sushi. Italian. All food. Chinese Indian. Adventurous to food. been to many countries. China japan Australia. India. Middle east. UAE south america. CEO of robotic tech.

Due to time constrain, there are two questions I did not get to ask:

1. What's one thing that happened during you childhood that you recall all the time. Why?

2. If you could live again, rebirth, what is the thing you don't want to change, what is the thing do you want to change?

Step 2: Conceptualize Abstract Identities

I was really surprised to find out that he used to be an actor and performed at Broadway and later became AI robotic company CEO. This combination of art and tech is fascinating. I also found it cute that he likes high school themed movies. I mentioned Mean Girls and he said that was his favorite. He took his niece to watch Mean Girl’s broadway show. There are some key words remained in my mind after the interview and they can be categorized in different themes.

Step 3: Design and Make Process

  1. Printed out the base to have a 3D sense of the structure. Tested to find out how snap fit works.
  2. Designed 1st version. Printed out with plywood to test the fit.There are places that do not fit. Kerf bending broke a couple of times. Retested kerf bending. Reflection: do not need to finalize the details yet. Found out whether the fits work. Can use small blocks to test.


3. Decided to use frosted white acrylic for the base and swan, use blue acrylic for the wave. Couldn’t decide whether to use wood or acrylic for wings. But since it is hard to make kerf bending work and I already figured out the wings with wood, I decided to go with plywood. (plus I need to use two materials!) Reflection: Kerf bending is more fragile when it is more densed. Stiffier when it is more spread out. Also kerf bending can come in all different shapes. For the wing, it might work better to do kerf bending on the acture wing instead of at the joint. Will retry.

4. Learned that acrylic fits differently from plywood after trying with acrylic and talking with Sinan. Measured and adjusted the size of the slots on the base

5. Hoping to install the screws as wheels. But it did not work out becasue I couldn’t fix the base board. It falls to the wheels. If I could fix the base board with glue or just with friction, I could have wheels. So now they are holding the wave and serve as decoration. Reflection: Laster I figured out how wheels work after seeing Eric’s project(using wooden poles to serve as axils). So I will try that next time. (I was literally laying in bed couldn’t fall asleep becasue my wheels don’t work but after I thought about this axil solution, I slept very well. #workhard)

6.Tada- swan who carries Mean Girl broadway sheet music and robot on each of the wings, with hearts and antanea as tail, wearing music notes as necklace.