My name is Suyash and I am a Masters in Human-Computer Interaction student at Georgia Institute of technology
And today I'm going to talk about
our work on exploiting the slowness of electrochromic displays.
So lets dig right in!
Our agenda of this presentationis to give a brief overview of electrochormic displays
and our purpose for working on this topic,
followed by the fabrication setup that we used.
and ultimately going to the interesting behaviors that we explored.
Our entire research is focused on making these beautiful electrochromic displays and studying their behavior.
We looked at various patterns and tried to converge our design guidelines to develop prototypes of a desired behavior.
These guidelines could be used by any designer with simple craft tools to replicate our prototypes.
Electrochromic ink is a specialized formulation that changes color
on the visible spectrum
when voltage is applied across it. We used PEDOT:PSS as our electrochromic ink.
All our prototypes have been arranged in the co-planar arrangement.
It means that there are two traces of PEDOT:PSS on the same PET substrate
with an electrolyte acting as a bridge between the PEDOT:PSS traces.
The electrochromic displays are very easy to use.
They have three states that they can switch between.
When no voltage is applied, no pedot:pss pattern is visible.
When 1.5v is applied, one of the pedot:ss traces becomes visible.
When the voltage applied is reversed, the active trace also switches.
This functionality of the electrochromic displays
makes them easy to use and implement.
Our design exploration centers around how different forms of slowness
could be rendered through a closer look into the transitive states electrochromic materials.
We focus on the notion of traces, continuity and absence of data
along with techniques for utilizing electrochromic materials for such slow behaviors.
With these techniques and design opportunities,
the paper discusses how material slowness can be leveraged
to promote a seemless integration of wearable products with the human body
Now let's take a look at the fabrication setup that we used.
All the equipment we used are daily craft tools that any designer can get access to.
the overview of our process includes material preparation, followed by printing
and heat curing and then cutting and assembling the prototype
In order to improve the wettability of the PET substrate
we covered it with an anti-fog spray.
Once the material was ready, it printed out the desired design
using the EPSON 2860 inkjet printer.
We did multiple passes of printing for higher display contrast.
After printing we cured the prototype in a toaster oven at 100 degrees celsius
and ultimately assembled the prototype.
Now let's take a look at how we can express the slowness of electrochromic displays.
The geometric configuration that you can see here governs the conductivity
between display segments, so the thickness and length of interconnects.
So designers can change the interconnect dimensions
to make the displays transition at a particular speed.
The shade configuration utilizes inkjet printing
to create planar interconnects with low density.
In this primitive, the opacity of the interconnect
governs the display transition behavior.
The composite configuration configuration describes display textures themselves
containing variable conductivity across the surface.
Instead of having separate interconnects.
Specific patterns like the one shown here can vary the PEDOT:PSS conductivity across the trace.
This helped us achieve a particular transition behavior.
Now let's take a look at the different behaviors
that the previously discussed design primitives can afford.
The gradual transition behavior informs designs where immediate attention may not be necessary but slow realization is appropriate.
Spatial and temporal fuzziness is achieved
by targeting voltage at different parts of weakly connected segments,
resulting in varying specificity in where the stimulus is coming from.
This can help create displays that show information in a spatially encoded format
Transient suspension occurs when when weak PEDOT:PSS connections,
create short-lived visuals that gradually fade away
once the voltage applied is removed,
The encoded information starts to decay
as soon as the applied voltage is removed,
thus emphasizing the impermanence of the information that is shown
Here we can see a few examples that we explored.
The location of the prototype on the body plays a significant role
in choosing one of the desired ebhaviors we mentioned previously.
For example, a fictional body tag concept where private medical information is only shown to medical personnel.
In this situation a transient suspension behavior would be helpful
to keep the information private and accessible to the right people.
To conclude our presentation, I would like to thank my team
for their contribution and great work.
Here we have attempted at uncovering a view on electrochromic materials
through the lens of printing traces, their continuity
and also explored
how can designers exploit these amazing natural properties of electrochromic.
Thank you.