Copper Wire Prototype

For the Copper Wire Prototype, I first started with two separate pieces of wire, twisting one around the positive part of the LED and the other wired around the negative part of the LED. I then tested it by putting the negative and positive wires to the corresponding sides of the battery. After that I twisted another LED onto both pieces of wire. Then I began to think of where I wanted to take it, and decided I wanted to make sort of a tree-like structure (the green lights made me think of leaves and the copper wire made me think of branches). I continued adding more lights on in the same method, checking to make sure they all lit up when touching the battery. Along the way, the lights fell of a few times and I’d twist them back on, at the same time attempting to not cross the negative and positive wires and avoid them accidentally touching, because then the LEDs wouldn’t light up. By the time I went to add the 5th LED, I had run out of wire, so I was attempting to twist wire onto the top of my existing structure to add the 5th light. It wasn’t really cooperating and the wires were pretty knotted at this point.

In response, I began to iterate, evaluating what I had so far and where to go next, and decided to start from scratch, using two longer pieces of wire and adding the lights on as I worked my way down. The end result was definitely an improvement from the first attempt, being neater and more aesthetically pleasing than the previously knotted up wire. When I was finished adding the lights on, I realized the white lights had gotten pretty dim so I added two extra batteries to the circuit and then taped them together. I then experimented with different containers and glass, first playing around with how the glass or container bent or projected light onto the surrounding area, and then moving on to more of how to purposefully combine the container with the light-tree. When I placed it up right in the container, I thought it resembled one of my plants, and even contemplated what it it would look like if I filled the bottom with sand or dirt to directly reference a potted plant (not sure if that would effect the current though).

In my group on Blackboard, Kait inspired me to just dive into it and start playing around with the materials, as she had. So instead of spending a lot of time thinking about what I was going to do, I learned along the way as I was building.

I feel that this could be used in the classroom as a fun way to teach students how circuits work, and have them make their own art works out of it in the process. I think that this connected to my own experience of art education in that it was like building a small sculptural piece. And of course, the process of trial and error that comes with making anything came into play when building this prototype.

Copper Tape Prototype

<— Click on this image, it’s a gif!

This prototype was similar in process to the wire, and I think it was also easier because of the concepts learned by making the wire prototype. I began prototyping by creating the simple circuit with one LED as demoed. Then I added in a switch by breaking the circuit path, and then creating a tab that worked sort of as flap/button that turned the LED on when pushed down to the paper, completing the circuit. I then went on to add two more circuits to the main one, following the same process of the first. As had happened in the copper wire prototype, the lights dimmed as I added the circuits, and so I added two more batteries to my circuit so that the lights were brighter.

Like the wire prototype, I iterated along the way by experimenting, continuously testing my design, making adjustments, and sharing my progress with peers.

I think being in a group while working made us more engaged in what we were making, as we shared our progress with each other along the way and sort of encouraged each other.

I think that copper tape is more manipulatable than the wire, and thus has greater possibility. This is especially useful in an art classroom, because I think the nature of it being tape and paper based is intuitively craft-like; I think most children experiment with making things out of paper, tape, etc. early on. Thus it might be more interactive and more easily engage students (especially younger students), possibly just out of familiarity. This is also a pretty interesting way to teach students about circuits, as before this I didn’t even know copper tape was a thing – It might get younger students excited, appealing to them as being cool and unordinary. For me, this related to my prior experience with art mainly because it was like making art-and-crafts.

Tribute Card Ideation

I had begun to brainstorm elements and ideas for my tribute card. I jotted down some possibilities as well as sketched out the design I want to incorporate into the tribute card. The card will be for my Aunt, and sunflowers are her thing, so I wanted to do a design using them with yellow LED lights, and write “You Are My Sunshine on the other side of the card. A few things I was thinking about: whether to put the flowers on the inside of the card or on the front of the card, whether or not to incorporate the circuit into the design, possibly even make a pop-up flower instead (It would be easier to have the circuit underneath it design-wise), how many lights and circuits I’d use. I wanted to have the petals glow yellow, but then noticed that the light naturally made a circular glow on the paper, so it might be more cohesive to place the light at the center of the flower. I debated creating one circuit with three lights, each at the center of the flowers, or if I only wanted the petals to glow maybe three separate circuits for each flower with multiple lights for each circuit? Lena suggested darkening the center of the flower or making the paper extra thick if I wanted only the petals to glow. I have a lot of choices!