Projektmodul
Lecturer(s): Christian Doeller
Credits: 16 SWS
Date: Thursdays 09.30-12.45
Venue:  Room 204
BBB: https://meeting.uni-weimar.de/b/min-g3n-kqy-lol
Description:
This is a tool building seminar. Many of us today believe that we live in a dystopia. Our personal agency and autonomy have been slowly eroding. Many of the tools that were meant to liberate us -- the internet, computers, AI, biotechnology have turned against us. Is it possible to reimagine a future where humans take control of our own narrative or is it lost forever? Do we now learn to live in a dystopia or can we still dare to imagine a Utopia? In this seminar, We will borrow from the toolkit of hackers, designers, artists-collectives, activists and biohackers to learn the tools that they have imagined to create a utopia or fight dystopia. Our final project will critically examine these tools and techniques and attempt to reimagine or rebuild these tools.
Participants:
- Mavie Beisheim
 - Selena Deger
 - Eli Kiefer
 - Martin Müller
 - Jan Munske
 - Corinna Rausch
 - Dahye Seo
 - Jenny Soggia
 - Jemma Woolmore
 
Sensor Tutorials:
- Analog Temperature Sensor
 - Analog Sound Sensor
 - Water Sensor
 - Soil Humidity Sensor
 - Analog Gas Sensor
 - Analog Piezoelectric Ceramic Vibration Sensor
 - Thin-film Pressure Sensor
 - DHT11 Temperature and Humidity Sensor
 - Infrared Obstacle Avoidance Sensor
 - Triaxial Acceleration Tilt Sensor / Gyroscope
 - HC-SR04 Ultrasonic Sensor
 - Photo Interrupter Module
 - Knock Sensor Module
 - Capacitive Touch Sensor
 - Flame Sensor
 - PIR Motion Sensor
 - Digital Tilt Sensor
 - Hall Magnetic Sensor (Magnet not included)
 - Steam Sensor
 
Artists / Links:
- Rasa Smite & Raitis Smits
 - Neil Harbisson
 - Gil Delindro
 - Marco Barotti
 - Kerstin Ergenzinger
 - Niklas Roy
 - Agnes Meyer Brandis
 - Jiří Suchánek
 
Schedule:
November 17 – introduction
- - utopia in the context of DIY technologies
 - - utopia and technical sensors as interfaces to environments
 - - utopia and the maker movement
 
November 24 – Arduino basics + Sensors
- - breadboard connections
 - - analog / digital converter
 - - analog / digital input
 - - light sensor experiments
 
November 30 – Sensors (theory & hands-on)
- - sensor starter kit presentations
 - - first ideas & experiments
 - - Jennifer Gabrys
 
December 1 – project ideas + text discussion
- - presentation of ideas and experiments
 - - Byung-Chul Han: Shanzhai
 
December 8 – hands-on (I) + text discussion
- - hands-on session
 
December 15 – hands-on (II)
- - hands-on session
 
December 22 – Christmas holidays
December 29 – Christmas holidays
January 5 – updates
- - present the current state of your projects
 - - further reading
 
January 12 – hands-on (III) + text discussion
January 19 – hands-on (IV) + private consultations
- 09:30 - 10:00 – name
 - 10:00 - 10:30 – name
 - 10:30 - 11:00 – name
 - 11:30 - 12:00 – name
 - 12:00 - 12:30 – name
 
January 26 – hands-on (V) + private consultations
- 09:30 - 10:00 – name
 - 10:00 - 10:30 – name
 - 10:30 - 11:00 – name
 - 11:30 - 12:00 – name
 
February 2nd – final presentations
Topics:
Technology:
- Getting started with Arduino
 - Connecting and reading different sensors
 - tools to capture real-time sensor data
 - tools to transform the collected data into different phenomena
 
Art & Thinking:
- Contemporary (media) art positions that relate to the subject matter
 - Sensors as interfaces between beings and their environments
 - perceptual awareness and sensors as magnifying glasses of everyday processes
 - interactive prototypes and simple tools as interfaces to »the other«
 - Strategies in working with sensor technologies and input/output systems
 - Feedback mechanisms, cybernetic circuits
 - Relations between the physical and the digital
 
Literature:
- Make: Getting Started with Arduino, EAN 9781449363314
 - Arduino Cookbook, O’REILLY, German/English, ISBN Print: 978-3-86899-353-0
 - Das Sensor Buch, O’REILLY, ´German, ISBN 978-3-95561-902-2
 - Make: Sensors, ISBN: 9781449368104
 - Make: Getting Started with Processing, MIT Press, ISBN: 9781457187087
 - Processing: A Programming Handbook for Visual Designers, ISBN: 9780262028288
 - Arduino Tutorials 1: https://www.arduino.cc/en/Tutorial/HomePage
 - Arduino Tutorials 2: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfYfK0tzHZTpNFrc_NDKfTA
 - Processing Tutorials 1: https://processing.org/tutorials/
 - Processing Tutorials 2: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvjgXvBlbQiydffZU7m1_aw
 
- Jennifer Gabrys, How to Do Things with Sensors, https://www.jennifergabrys.net/2019/09/how-to-sensors/
 - Jennifer Gabrys, Program Earth, https://www.jennifergabrys.net/2016/03/program-earth-environmental-sensing-technology-making-computational-planet/
 - Byung-Chul Han, Shanzhai, https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262534369/shanzhai/
 - Hannes Bergthaller, Eva Horn: Anthropozän zur Einführung, ISBN 978-3-96060-311-5
 - Klimakunstforschung, ISBN: 3883962996
 - Christiane Heibach: Dem Spüren auf der Spur: Zur Wahrnehmung biologischer und technischer sensorischer Systeme, Link: https://www.medienobservationen.de/pdf/20200430Heibach1.pdf
 - Verena Kuni: The Plants Are (Watching) Sensing, Link: https://www.medienobservationen.de/pdf/20200430Kuni6.pdf
 - Field_Notes – From Landscape to Laboratory, https://s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/hybridmatters-production/media/Field_Notes-From_Landscape_To_Laboratory-2013.pdf
 
Criteria for passing:
- document exercises on the wiki, present them for the rest of the class
 - experiment, attend the classes and develop your own prototypes and experiments relating to the topic