Nocturnal Neighbours
How can the future smart home cater to the larger ecology that the home and its inhabitants are part of?
Press: Article by 4TU Design United
Duration: 16 Weeks
Feb 2024 - Jun 2024
Collaborating on Future Deployment: Ecodorp Van Boekel
More-than-Human Design
Arduino
Interaction Design
Woodworking
Sound Design
Context
In our rapidly urbanizing world, creating environments that welcome both humans and nocturnal animals is increasingly important. The Nocturnal Neighbours project explores how smart home technology can help us coexist with nocturnal wildlife, specifically focusing on bats in De Blaak, Tilburg.
Music, Sound Design, Videography & Editing by Myself
"To design is to negotiate the possibilities of a shared future."
Tony Fry,
Framing
For the case, we had to come up with 3 connected products that functioned as a family. Very quickly we settled on the themes of:
ACCOMODATE, INDICATE, NEGOTIATE.
Lo-Fi Prototyping
The initial phase involved extensive research on shared spaces and cohabitation with nocturnal animals.
We focused on bats due to recent news in the Netherlands of their habitat being destroyed due to insulation practices in old homes.
Utilizing frameworks to identify conflicts between humans and bats, we pinpointed opportunities to foster mutual benefits.
First lo-fi prototypes were made using foamboard models, simple arduino code and a servo motor to explore bathouse concepts and a first version of the indicator.
Mid-Fi Prototyping
Following this, three decisions were made after multiple expert interviews:
Bats like walls with cavities because the temperature difference inside lets them move up and down to find their ideal temperature.
The bat house will be placed on a corner of a house so they can access different areas of shade and temperature.
The indicator will use light and movement to inform, based on sensors in the bat house
Second iterations of the bat wall and indicator were made using esp32 sensors which send data using OOCSI.
When a bat lands on the entrance, data is send to the indicator turning on the light.
Second Iteration
After making the first prototypes, we gathered feedback through expert interviews once more to continue:
1. The bat wall needed minor tweaks, and was put on hold until making the final prototype.
2. The indicator needed more iterating, I took this part upon myself.
3. My group members started thinking about the community aspect of negotiating.
I liked fluttering wings from an earlier sketch.
However, I felt the metaphor of a literal bat was no longer appropriate for a home setting. I decided to explore alternative forms to achieve a similar effect.
As we were using a piezo sensor to detect input, I thought of transforming it into a contact microphone to capture bat sounds.
These sounds were routed to Ableton and modulated with effects, creating an ambient soundscape from real bat sounds
Final Synthesizing
For the final efforts, i focussed on realising the bat wall and indicator. Together with my teammate Maxime, we used woodworking and more advanced electronics to realise the final designs and make them fully working and connected.
