The focus was on Wearables for our Interactive Media workshop today.
We were tasked with building a rough wearable prototype for a persona that we came up with, using the wide variety of fabrics and tools at our disposal.
Our users name was Harry, a male in his twenties who works in tech support. He was quite an active individual before injuring his lower back whilst training. It’s been a while but now he’s looking to get back to the fitness level that he was once at.
What we built was an electronic back-brace prototype. This brace used a combinations of motors, vibrations and haptic feedback to support a number of purposes throughout Harry’s road to recovery.
Firstly, the brace would use motors to ensure that Harry was lifting weights correctly, positioning his back correctly. This feature could also be used in the workplace to encourage better posture during the workday.
The brace would also use sensors to measure the users body fat and provide them with biometric data that would hopefully help the user keep on the right track. As an extra, the brace could also use it’s motors to massage the users lower back, helping with the rehabilitation process.
The world of wearable and what they can offer us in our everyday lives is growing day by day and it was a great experience to not only build this prototype but also to discuss the possible design iterations that we could develop. Of course, we settled on a back brace but this was after considering a number of options such as an interactive top that would cover all areas of the persons torso or we could have also made multiple bands for different parts of the body, providing a more diverse set of use information.
Sean Fogarty 