[wikilike_img src=http://www.interaction.rca.ac.uk/alumni/01-03/danielle/images/periscope/peri3.jpg|width=231|align=thumb tright|caption=The Periscope used within the context of the Equator Project’s Ambient Wood|url=http://www.interaction.rca.ac.uk/alumni/01-03/danielle/docs/periscope/periscope.htm]
Regine blogged this a few days ago, a project by Danielle Wilde that uses RFID tags as semantic gems that create a point of entry to an “information/navigation device”. The tags contain indexes to the rich-media content available at the location.
[wikilike_img src=http://www.interaction.rca.ac.uk/alumni/01-03/danielle/images/periscope/10b.jpg|width=164|align=thumb tleft|caption=The Periscope Project|url=http://www.interaction.rca.ac.uk/alumni/01-03/danielle/docs/periscope/periscope.htm]The periscope allows children access to information that would not necessarily be available to them within the context of a field trip. Basically an information/navigation device, the periscope contains a movie showing a panorama of the woodland and thumbnail images linking to other movies.
By navigating through the panorama and the links, users can view the lifecycles of woodlice; to see up close some of the tiny creatures who feed from the leaves and leaf-litter; to see the way the wood changes over a season, or a period of fifty years, etc. Additional information, in the form of Flash animations, can be accessed by adding or removing RFID tagged objects within range of the RFID tag reader aerial which is among the objects protruding from the Periscope’s stem.
Why do I blog this? Seems I’m on an [w:RFID] and [w:NFC] kick these last few days, likely because of the Triggered by RFID workshop that happened and that I sadly wasn’t able to attend. But, I’m also thinking about RFID tags as locative, situated, semantic gemstones. For the Vis-a-Vis framework, I’m thinking about how RFID or NFC tags could be used to do location awareness in an indoor context where GPS wouldn’t work, and even as a potentially easier way to do location tracking for the games. Also, there’s the idea of using them as “power ups” in game scenarios. (You have to run over to some kind of physical totem in the real world to get more rubber balls to toss at your opponents in Dodgeball, for instance.)
More about the Equator Project’s Ambient Wood Project.
Technorati Tags: locative media, pervasive media, RFID, sensors