the spaces in between

I was invited to give a workshop with my knitted sensors on August 2nd at SIGGRAPH 2017, a huge computer graphics conference in Los Angeles.  It went great-- everyone's knitted sensors were up and running in just over an hour! 

Hands-on workshops require a lot of planning. People progress at different rates and can get impatient waiting for each other or for assistance. Too much waiting and the workshop loses momentum.  

So I like to work with small groups. I move around to offer assistance, and encourage people to help themselves to materials and progress at their own rate.

This wasn't going to work at SIGGRAPH-- the classroom was spread out with no middle aisle. And I'd be wearing a body mic. If I walked in front of the speakers, I'd set off ear-piercing feedback (which I did, twice, oops...). Plus... I wanted to give people sleeves that fit their hands but there was no way to measure hand sizes of participants ahead of time.

So we had to get creative with solutions.

Dylan responds to a post-it note call for help.

There wasn't room for participants to get their own materials, and asking for help would slow the presentation down. So I gave everyone bright yellow post-it notes. If they needed something, they wrote it on the post-it, attached it to top of their computer monitor, and one of our volunteers would sprint over to read the note and help or retrieve materials.  Worked great!

Ziploc full of goodies

Materials were distributed to each workstation in baggies, in advance, thanks to workshop coordinator Brittany Ransom. Plus, we put a pdf of the powerpoint presentation on each computer's desktop (see below). I invited people to use it to progress at their own rate.
 
Sewing diagrams

I tested out the activity with the volunteers ahead of time, and realized that tech people were going to struggle with sewing the wires in place. They needed sewing diagrams! Luckily I had time to add a few. We didn't have to worry too much about the knot because we had Fraycheck-- a fabric glue. And glue makes sewing seem easy!

I also made diagrams on Fritzing for the breadboard connections--super helpful.

Fits like a glove

Instead of sizing participants, everyone randomly received either a 10x30 or 12x40 size-sleeve on it (with the size labelled). I figured this would get the right size into the hands of at least half the attendees. I invited people to swap with their neighbors or flag us down to request another size. (I also brought 10x40 and 12x50 sized sleeves.) I was surprised to find that only a few people requested another size.

The one thing we didn't pass out in advance was the resistors. In order to get the best range from your sensor, it's important to match it with an appropriate fixed resistor. But the resistance of the sleeve depends on how it fits the wearer.  So I had everyone measure their sleeve resistance and write it on a post-it. The volunteers picked up the post-its, and passed out appropriate resistors.

In preparation, I had taped the resistor packs onto a large cardboard backing with the values labelled. During the workshop, it was easy for the volunteers to grab the exact resistor they needed to "fill the order" on each post-it.

 
Materials for Knitted Finger Sleeves
Resistive yarn (80% polyester, 20% stainless steel)
Snaps #199 10 Line (6.9 mm), nickel finish
Striveday silicone coated stranded wire AWG 26
Male crimp pins  these are great for breadboarding
tapestry needle
yarn for sewing wire
Dritz Fraycheck

Also used:
Breadboards
Hookup wire
Arduino uno
piezo discs
resistors
multimeters
scissors

My tools (used to knit the sleeves ahead of time and attach wire with snaps)
Superba Knitting Machine
Snap Press Machine (with punch/die)
Crimp tool (I use Engineer Inc PA-09 crimping pliers )

img: Tesia Kosmalski