Week 7: Digital Microscopic Images, Brain Waves, Volumetric Rendering, Porphyritic Micrometeorites, Stephen Hawking, & Project Updates

On Tuesday, week 7, my group members and I decided to focus on individual project tasks. I worked on creating our protection mapping dress with digital materials/textures using microscopic images I took with my iPhone 14 Pro macro mode camera. I took pictures of myself, Bela, Maxine, and my sister. They’re all skin photos from various facial and body parts. The images feature macro facial hair shafts with moles, blackheads, whiteheads, scars, bellybutton hairs, bruises, dry dead skin, and stretch marks. I made a video with the images to alternate and project each separately on the dress.


Converting Macro Skin Images to Projection Mapping Textures by Jess Rivera 


Max's Macro Belly Button Hair Shafts, Jess Rivera


Projection-Mapping Dress Macro Skin by Jess Rivera

On Thursday, Prof. Vesna returned to class and brought a few new gadgets to experiment and play with. She first showed us the Tomlov digital LCD microscope with LED fill lights. We experimented with various objects and species by looking at dead ants, bee legs, scoby, hand tattoos, scabs, cuts, and plushies underneath the microscope. We played with the mind wave headset by NeuroSky and watched a few of our classmates interact with the app games.


Tomlov Digital Microscope Dead Ant, Jess Rivera 


Tomlov Digital Microscope Max's Scab, Jess Rivera 

After our class break, Prof. Vesna showed us Stephen Hawking’s original computer and speech synthesizer housing from 1999! Which was gifted to her by Hawking. She then gave a lecture on plankton, retopology, volumetric rendering images, and mesh structures. She also taught us about stardust, specifically porphyritic micrometeorites. Micrometeorites are some of the oldest matter that exists. “The word “meteor” refers to the flash of light that appears in the sky when a chunk of interplanetary debris burns up as it passes through Earth’s atmosphere. Those chunks are called meteoroids. Most meteoroids entering Earth’s atmosphere are so small that they vaporize and never reach the planet’s surface. Parts of a meteoroid that survive the trip to land on Earth are called meteorites. They can range from millimeters to a kilometer across. Micrometeorites enter Earth’s atmosphere at very high heat, and their journeys change their appearance and chemical makeup. Their new textures and shapes depend on the speed, angle, and rotation of their travel. By finding many, many micrometeorites, most of them recent and unweathered, urban micrometeorite hunters have helped build a micrometeorite classification system or typology. Micrometeorites range from very rare Unmelted types, which enter the atmosphere at 1350°C (2400°F), through Scoriaceous, Porphyritic, Barred Olivine, and Cryptocrystalline types. Glass micrometeorites sit at the far end of the scale, forming at 2000°C (3600°F). The friction of entering the atmosphere melts and heats micrometeoroids. The surface tension of their liquified elements pulls most into a spherical shape. But those that spin on entry are drawn out or elongated. Some micrometeorites have a distinctive iron-nickel bead formed as the particle travels through the atmosphere. As it melts, heavier elements condense in its center. As travel slows and the particle cools, these elements continue to move forward due to the momentum of their heavier mass.”


Stephen Hawking's Computer & Speech Synthesizer Housing from 1999, Jess Rivera 


 Retopology, Plankton, & Volumetric Image Rendering, Jess Rivera 


Prof. Vesna Lecture on Micrometeorites, Jess Rivera 


Elongated Micrometeorite


Porphyritic Micrometeorite


Finger Scale Micrometeorite

In the upcoming days, my group members and I will begin to create 3D-printed buttons for our clothing, design handcrafted insulated mannequins, and print our canvas trench coat.

Citations:
https://www.heavy.ai/technical-glossary/volume-rendering

https://micro-meteorites.com/

https://www.bellmuseum.umn.edu/blog/searching-for-stardust/

https://mymodernmet.com/franck-sorbier-haute-couture-fall-winter-2012-2013/

https://www.wired.com/2015/01/intel-gave-stephen-hawking-voice/

https://www.wikihow.com/Print-on-Canvas#:~:text=In%20your%20page%20set%20and,tray%20after%20the%20canvas%20feeds