MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

REMIND ME I'M ALIVE

with Alain Bellet

REMIND ME I'M ALIVE is a companion that combines the functions of a fidget toy with those of a personal reminder. The gadget uses information on Wifi connections in its immediate vicinity to better understand the user's environment. By examining these connections - the only gateway to the outside world - the gadget can tell whether the user is in a busy or quiet environment, and even give indications of possible stressful situations. When the user is not interacting with the device, it constantly monitors his or her status via the surrounding wifi connections. These connections provide implicit information on social conditions, working environments, infrastructures and much more. If the user does not communicate with the companion for more than six hours, it “dies” and must be resuscitated. This feature underlines the need for regular interaction and ensures that the companion is always ready for use.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Betaverse

with Alain Bellet, Mario Von Rickenbach

Using a mixed reality headset, the students used their surroundings as playground. Through creative gestures, each experiment proposes a way of interacting with the environment.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Much Faster / Much Slower

with Alain Bellet

Fictional mobile apps based on the "Much Faster / Much Slower" theme, offering new ways of consulting, communicating, creating, playing, discovering and learning. Students in their 2nd year of Bachelor Media & Interaction Design designed a dedicated experience and graphic interface via interactive prototypes on Figma.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Handmade Reality

with Mario Von Rickenbach, Alain Bellet

Handmade Reality is a series of AR experiences using a mixed reality headset, the Hololens, created by the 2nd year Bachelor Media & Interaction Design students. Using the environment around us as a playground, each experiment proposes a different way of interacting with it, guided by our hands.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Talk To Me

with Alain Bellet

Talk To Me is a series of interactive objects designed by 1st-year Bachelor Media & Interaction Design students. These objects use dialogue as a playground and draw inspiration from conversational interfaces to create new interactions.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Much Faster, Much Slower

with Alain Bellet, Yehwan Song

Second year Interaction Design students developped a messaging app centered around the theme of “Much Faster / Much Slower”. The goal is to create a unique mobile messaging app that offers a distinctive experience compared to existing instant messaging apps. The project explores the impact of technology on our relationship with speed and communication. It focuses on how advancements in technologies have shaped our experiences and preferences for speed. The project also looks at the role of instant messaging apps in changing the way we communicate and interact, taking up a significant amount of our daily engagement time. The goal is to translate this fascination with speed and slowness into innovative interaction design concepts related to communication.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Jamy Herrmann – MEMOGRAM

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Today, for many, the memories that remain are only those of images taken with digital cameras. Through this continuous storage process, we offload those moments by trusting instantaneous backups. MEMOGRAM challenges this delegation by offering a time capsule in the form of tickets, accompanying our memories with textual clues and descriptions. www.memogram.ch

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Nora Fatehi – Mirror Me-rror

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

In an environment where the line between digital and tangible is becoming increasingly thin, having an existence in immaterial spaces implies shaping and maintaining an avatar that is often created in one’s own image. Living in these in-between worlds inevitably leads to the development of a more or less strong connection with one’s own digital representations. This is notably the case of my own avatar, with whom I share more than just a well-defined clothing style. In Mirror Me-rror, she and I become one. By using my physical and digital data to influence her abilities as my “virtual self”, I find myself constantly connected to her. With this project, I question the relationship that each of us nurtures with our digital identities and offer a gamified perspective of our own lives.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Samuel Dumez – Public Lectures

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

How can artists/designers share and enrich their practice in a context where videoconferencing is becoming one of the most used means of disseminating content? In the form of a mini web-conference, Public Lectures consists of a succinct presentation of the work of people active in the field of culture through audiovisual content. Encouraging interaction, through comments and content exchange, Public Lectures seeks to erase the usual boundaries between presenter and viewer. A form of horizontality is thus born within the platform, inviting people to contribute in order to bring out innovative forms of dialogue and to meet the challenges of this new means of communication.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Mélanie Fontaine – Latent*

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

The mirroring system of instant messaging implies the presumed availability of the interlocutor. However, while waiting for a response, certain questions become recurrent: “Alex is online, why isn’t he answering? What is he doing?” Latent* is a chat application that allows you to converse with your friends by developing the context of the discussion and what is not said. Just like theatre, it fuels the conversation by adding didascalies generated according to the collected data (response time, location). By highlighting the unsaid parts of an exchange, the generated reading mode enriches the discussion, creates poetic tension, and allows the interlocutors to become the characters of their own play. www.melaniefontaine.ch

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Elodie Anglade – Digital DNA

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Digital DNA is a 3D data visualisation platform that displays an analysis of the content that is shown to me on Instagram. The interface compares the duality of my perception with that of the algorithm. It results in a virtual space representing a digital genome that visitors are invited to explore in order to discover the subtleties of the intersection between human and algorithmic perspectives. While studying these “smart” systems, I became aware that their ability to analyse is somewhat biased. Some of the categories I was assigned were unexpected and did not match the visuals presented. In this way, Digital DNA highlights the gap created by this contrast between the categories and the visuals that are displayed. Try it here

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Martial Grin – Spectacle·s Museum

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Spectacle·s Museum looks at the photographs of visitors in a museum space. Through a web atlas, this project paints a series of portraits in one of the most photographed museums in the world, the Louvre. Using images published on Instagram, the project classifies and groups them according to their formal and spatial specificities. Through Spectacle·s Museum, I approach the theme of the staging of the self, particularly in the museum space.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Achille Masson – Phone Archaeology

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Phone Archaeology is an interactive installation that traces the evolution of mobile phones through my own experience. The project reveals a digitalised, speculated, and recovered private life, like traces of the past. This memory engraved in silicon that tends to be obsolete is the story of memories left behind every time we change phones. Research around Phone Archaeology brings to light a form of reflection on our data. The matter of data recovery is intrinsically linked to digital archiving and planned obsolescence. While the abstraction of a digital file may seem timeless, the imminent danger of losing even more digital memories forces us to rethink how we archive them. phonearchaeology.com

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Nathanaël Vianin – The Last Forest

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

The Last Forest offers a browser-based walkable forest of spatialised information about collapse in general. Internet users are invited to wander through it and to find posts from the r/collapse reddit community in the form of trees. The categorisation and index provide a more structured browsing of the information contained in the trees. The Last Forest aims to raise awareness about climate change and its potential to end globalised, consumerist civilisation as we know it.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Iris Moine – Twist

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Twist was thought out as part of the upcoming industrial design exhibition at mudac - Musée cantonal de design et d’arts appliqués contemporains. The aim of this project is to engage children’s curiosity about design, for whom the idea of visiting a museum is often not the most exciting. How can we encourage a stimulating visit and discovery of the exhibits? By bringing out an object from the exhibition, the Bold chair by Big-Game studio, this project transforms it into an interactive installation. Guided by a character on screen, children are invited to interact with certain parts of the chair: sitting, pinching, turning, etc. These interactions trigger games, and information is presented in a playful way, thus creating a direct and memorable relationship with the object and raising awareness of design.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Soraya Camina – Per Aspera Ad Astra – Five Women Who Mapped the Cosmos

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Per Aspera Ad Astra is a web-documentary that tells the story of five women astronomers who were in charge of discovering, calculating, classifying and mapping the cosmos between 1879 and 1979. This project aims to rehabilitate the crucial contribution made by women in STEM. In the early days, before the word “computer” was used to describe a machine, it was in actual fact used to describe a person, namely the women who made calculations and observations by hand. The “Harvard Computers” significantly contributed to astronomy and science by discovering many galaxies and establishing the stellar classification system that is still in use today. Nowadays, however, we speak very little about these five women; their work remains unknown, and their discoveries have often been attributed to the men who employed them. per-aspera-ad-astra.vercel.app

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Loris Briguet – FM42

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

“My project aims to demystify FM synthesis and to offer a new approach to its programming. After analysing various FM synthesizers and their interface, I identified two major problems: - The difficulty of understanding how they work - The complexity of sound exploration My project offers two objects to remedy these problems: a guide, based on texts in FM Theory & Applications, which enables the user to understand FM synthesis in a theoretical way, and a synthesizer that enables the user to explore the basics of synthesis with a more hands-on approach, thanks to an interface that offers all the controls without “menu diving”. These two objects provide the user with an ideal introduction to electronic music.”

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Antoine Contreras Salazar – Ballade

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

At a time when music can be accessed anywhere and at any time, how can one compose an interactive and evolving album that takes into account its environment? In an ode to strolling around Lausanne, the auditor discovers a polyphonic orchestra while walking through the city’s landmarks. The mobile phone becomes the tool for a composition that features different sound layers, revealed throughout the walk, where the music no longer has a pre-established duration but varies according to the places that are visited. By their geolocation, the listeners/composers initiate new musical tracks as they walk along. A more organic mode of listening is introduced, where compass and binaural sounds reveal the abstract and digital substance that floats around us.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Jorge Reis – Alter

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Alter provides users with a platform to take control of an alter-ego, whose virtual identity is based on archetypes observed on Instagram. The primary intention of the project is to explore the possibility that social networks offer to live experiences that are not our own. Thus, Alter highlights the typical profiles that have been instituted on Instagram over the years. These different archetypes incorporate various ways of showing off, staging oneself or communicating. These archetypes influence, despite ourselves, the way we use certain networks. The project consists of two distinct parts: on the one hand, the observation and study of these different archetypes, and on the other, their use in a webapp.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Guillaume Giraud – Goko

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

The Goko is a digital musical instrument that explores new ways of playing music. It is a chord machine in the form of a MIDI controller. This tool promotes and facilitates the composition of chords. It enables beginners to play while having fun and offers professionals a new understanding and visualisation of the rules of musical harmony.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Antoine Barras – Miksyn

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Miksyn is an installation that invites us to rethink our relationship with living things by challenging our natural aversion to the various insects and arachnids of our domestic ecosystem, my primary motivation being to highlight the unexplored richness of microscopic forms. Miksyn is part of research on digital interactions with the microcosm. By decontextualising these tiny creatures under the lens of a high-resolution optical microscope, my project puts the spotlight on their imperceptible peculiarities. Can we use technology to overcome our bodily limitations and awaken a holistic conception of nature?

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Ivan Chestopaloff – (un)load

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

In a world dominated by images, where content is constantly blasted at our brain, the race for maximum performance and ultra-high definition feels endless. (un)load chooses to go beyond the classic forms of digital experience. With this tool, we will try to dive into a molecular state, where the single unit becomes the whole. In a kind of reverse cinema, you will be deprived of some of your senses and will reach overload through extreme reduction. Expressing the constant overload we experience as a society and the capacity we have to construct our own relationship to the world, (un)load explores the narrative potential of immersive technologies, based on the senses and beyond representation. Warning: this work contains flashing lights.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Malik Sobgoui – Oblique Reasoning

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Nowadays, almost all of us have adopted the unconscious reflex of pulling out our smartphone when we are faced with some form of loneliness or passivity. Hence, it has become difficult for us to cope with waiting without the help of our cell phones. The aim of Oblique Reasoning is to invite users to question notions of attention economy and FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) while offering, in the manner of Oblique Strategies, reflections and alternatives. By recording unread notifications and quantifying them in units of time, this portable device offers us the possibility to step back and rethink our relationship with the smartphone.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Ignacio Pérez – Overloaded.supply

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

In 2020, we reached a tipping point with the mass of man-made artefacts exceeding the biomass on our planet. This is mainly due to an economic system of manufacturing and consumption where the overabundance of objects has become the norm. Overloaded.supply is a semi-autonomous system that exploits the control of creation algorithms in order to question current patterns of design, production and legislation. To do so, the installation allows users, via a physical interface, to control an intangible, invisible and vast universe of objects where they can take possession of them through a fictitious patent document. This document will be stored on a dedicated website that acts as a repository of already protected objects that may or may not be produced. overloaded.supply

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Michael Pica – Confessionnal

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Confessionnal is a web app that enables users to anonymously confess their behaviour on social networks. With the advent of social media years ago, the behaviour of users varies. Unmentionable acts are sometimes committed on these platforms. This project is inspired by the Catholic confessional as we know it but is based on the digital era we live in. Users live the anonymous experience with a mask as participants or spectators. They confess orally and personalise their mask based on their age, the platform or the main subject of the confession. On the other hand, they can observe other masks and listen to the confessions of other users.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Rayane Jemaa – Is This the Middle East?

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Is This the Middle East? investigates representation of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) in a selection of video games. I am interested in the patterns, repetitive artefacts, locations and texts in games that claim to be set in the MENA region. These objects become archetypes. Are these photo-realistic environments also realistic in the scenes they depict or do they become another backdrop for war-related games? Using photogrammetry to reconstruct these environments, I address the implications of seeing an abundance of often over-simplified images of the Middle East, especially in a world where video games are becoming not only a global phenomenon, but also a means to encounter other cultures.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Valentine Leimgruber – Sanctuaires

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Through a narrative experience, Sanctuaires invites visitors to discover their relationship with plants. This project is structured as an interactive exhibition on the great trees of the city of Lausanne. As in a treasure hunt, visitors have to look for the trees, thanks to clues and a map on the app. When they find one, they connect to it through touch, thus triggering the beginning of the experience. Like a wise storyteller, the sanctuary-tree shares a tale with the visitors, telling them about its sensitive experience and observable universe. Urban tree development coincides with the advent of issues related to the ecological crisis. What do trees have to say about this and how can their perception help us improve our lifestyles?

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Basil Dénéréaz – Reif

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Mention Très bien Through our entertainment media, partnerships and sponsored content are becoming omnipresent. Based on this observation, Reif i s a fictional account of the objectification of a digital influencer. Through different media created with computer generated images, we visualise the change of identity of this character who allocates areas of her body as advertising spaces, generating her metamorphosis from human to object. In order to realise the content for Reif , a process of digital production was set up, adjusting to the standards of avatar creation which affiliates this fiction to the current technical reality.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Sébastien Galera Larios – Data Riot

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Once upon a time, a few Homo Sapiens allowed humanity to escape the endless cycle of life and death. Together, leaving behind their individuality, they merged into a new form of existence, beyond humanity – as if in this second genesis man had created God in his own image. Data Riot questions the foundations of human individuality through a social science fiction halfway between a video game and a music video. Enter a futuristic world and experience your transplantation into a collective intelligence to the rhythm of the electronic sounds of the collective Curl. Based on your personal data and your decisions, the experience adapts to you and offers a disturbing experience of your own identity.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Valerio Meschi – Tone Alembic

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

The barrier of entry to sound synthesis software has historically been kept high by visually abstract, overloaded interfaces and expensive ecosystems like those of Pure Data or MAX. Tone Alembic seeks to make sound experimentation accessible to a beginner audience. It does so by offering a platform consisting of a digital interface that abstracts many of the concepts of synthesis in favour of a more visual approach and a set of MIDI controllers that allow more hands-on interaction with the interface while providing everything one needs to get started creating sounds.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Paul Fritz – Grappaa

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Grappaa is an artist-run exhibition space that I began working on in early 2021. It was built based on makeshift institutional spaces, e.g. art fairs and more recently, mass vaccination centres. The walls and furniture in these mega events become modules in the landscape of barren multipurpose warehouses. For Grappaa, through a process of urban hacking, the car parks become the grid for any spatial configuration. I pay rent by the hour. It’s not cheap.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Dorian Jovanovic – IFTTA

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

IFTTA (If This Then Authenticate) is a modular authentication kit that allows users to design passwords to access their digital environment. Nowadays the majority of online services require complex authentication from their users. However, our ability to manage our passwords is becoming time consuming: we forget, make mistakes and retype. By default, we have accepted the present systems in place: double verification, SMS, phone calls, e-mails, etc. What if we tried something different? A more personal approach for example. This kit reflects the way we want to view our relationship with passwords. Each of the proposed modules involves a distinct mnemonic interaction: touch, position in space, hearing and sight. These elements can be added up as well in order to design a personalised authentication system.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Living Room

with Alain Bellet

Living Room is a collection of three “add-on” augmented objects that bring your home to life. It is based on digital interactions and surrounds you with movement. Living Room reconnects you with your physical world and gives a sense of presence to your digital life with a simple and sensitive approach.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Excentrique 2021

with Alain Bellet

Content produced during a course given by Alain Bellet to the 2nd year students in Bachelor Media & Interaction Design.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

BrainDead

with Pauline Saglio, Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard

BrainDead is an interactive music clip where a dancer wearing a tracking suit. By using this device, he leads the movements of the avatar and can then interact with the environment. Made with Unreal Engine during a course led by Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard and Pauline Saglio.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Bastien Claessens – Taalee

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

At bedtime there is nothing like reading a tale alone with your child to smoothly transition from excitement to calm. Snuggled up against you, your child enjoys this intimate moment and escapes into his/her imagination to the rhythm of the story. With the help of soundscapes, Taalee seeks to reinforce this magical moment. Taking the form of a mobile app, Taalee offers a creative and sharing space accessible to all and thus enables anyone to add to their stories with the use of featured compositions or by creating your own.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Aurélien Pellegrini – Pump and Surf

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Pump and Surf encourages internet users to find out how much energy is spent when they are surfing the internet. Before being able to view a website, internet users are asked to make a physical effort similar to the energy required to convey the data that will enable the site to be displayed. Through interactive experiences and graphic visualisations, Pump and Surf leads users to take the measure of the quantity of energy involved in the exchange of information, to the point of feeling them physically.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Paul Lëon – Caption

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Nowadays, we continuously capture images in which we place the hope of memory. In fact most of these images are left abandoned in the mass of our galleries and dormant hard drives. Caption exposes forgotten images taken from the gallery of its users. Through a series of questions we are invited to look inwardly at our relationship with these images. By synthesising and exposing all the answers collected, Caption immerses us into ethnographic research that addresses our collective relationship with the images.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Léonard Guyot – Concrete

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Concrete is an immersive experience that offers to discover digital architectures through lights and shadows that reveal the volumes and geometry of these environments. A tangible interface of concrete and electronics controls the parts of these buildings. To access the various structures, each person is invited to solve an enigma based on a pattern of light. With Concrete, I aimed to combine reflection on how we interact with a digital world with brutalist architectural inspirations and a playful experience of virtual reality.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Diane Thouvenin – Sun Connection

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

What time is it at Hortense’s in Montreal? What’s the weather like at Alexandre’s in Tokyo? When I communicate with my loved ones, scattered all over the world, I am disconnected from my physical time-space. Sources of constant artificial light and windows on the digital world, screens replace the sun as a space-time reference point. Sun Connection enables you to reconnect with your loved ones through a delocalised sun. Everyone is free to use their own physical and digital space with a luminous and colourful presence, to transpose themselves into another time and space.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Bastien Mouthon – MoodWalk

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

MoodWalk is a music player that enables one to discover music in a different way. It generates sound moods based on a city’s musical programmes (clubs/concert halls/bars/cultural venues). The app works in two different modes thanks to geolocation: a “compass” and a “walking” mode. Aiming to offer a local and radically alternative way of discovering music, MoodWalk seeks to burst existing algorithmic bubbles in order to offer a tool to discover the surrounding soundscape.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Kylan Luginbühl – FRAME-Lab

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

FRAME-Lab offers a series of immersive experiences that provide new ways of interacting with a virtual reality environment. The traditional controller is replaced by a physical frame that enables you to explore various worlds and functionalities. This new interface, both tangible and digital, can thus take the form of a shield, a portal to travel in time and space, or that of a parachute. This interface frame is offered to the community of makers as 3D files available online that anyone can transform and print at home.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Maya Bellier – Strike the Pose

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

In performing arts, there is often, by convention, some distance, an invisible screen that separates the audience from the actors in the performance. Yet these respective positions have changed over time. Bauhaus artists actually aimed for total theatre, where the entire venue would be the stage. Strike the Pose is a participatory VR experience that begins from the moment we wait. A re-interpretation of Oskar Schlemmer’s “Triadic Ballet”, this complete and inclusive work invites all participants to enter through their acting into a total composition, both physical and digital.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Pablo Bellon – Lockdown Memorial Archive

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

In 2020, with the emergence of Covid-19, people self-quarantined. For many this was an opportunity to reflect on their situation. Lockdown Memorial Archive enables anyone to share their story about the confinement and to become aware of the feelings of others. Through a web app, participants are invited to personalise an emblematic object and to link it to an account of their experience. The overall result thus constitutes an archive made up of several immersive memorials where one can relive this situation of isolation in a different way.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Evan Kelly – Invisible Network

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

Invisible Network is a portable device that makes the invisible and autonomous communications of machines perceptible and tangible. The way they interact with each other is akin to the modes of human communication, thus creating a real social network of machines. This device mediates between users and the machines around them. Via the screen it transmits fragments of its continuous and silent communications in the form of human social metaphors.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Yael Sidler – Lasius Flavus

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Laura Nieder, Pauline Saglio

“Lasius Flavus” is an immersive and didactic experience developed in collaboration with the Museum of Zoology. Throughout the tour, visitors discover the world of the yellow ant, its habitat and perception of the world. This interactive VR project offers an interpretation of these various aspects to lead us to reflect on the relationship that each species has with its environment. Moreover, the exercise of thinking on a scale that is not ours can help us question our own future.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Excentrique 2020

with Alain Bellet

Content produced during a course given by Alain Bellet to the 2nd year students in Bachelor Media & Interaction Design.

INDUSTRIAL DESIGN

China Hardware Innovation Camp

with Alain Bellet, Stéphane Halmaï-Voisard

CHIC (China Hardware Innovation Camp) is a program led by EPFL, in collaboration with HEC - Lausanne and ECAL. In interdisciplinary teams, students from different institutions have 9 months to create a prototype of a connected object. The final phase of the program takes students to Shenzhen and then Hong Kong to confront the challenges of industrialization, financing and the realities of the Chinese market.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Sébastien Matos – Sokomplex

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Pauline Saglio

Sokomplex pays tribute to the Sokoban puzzle video game series, first released in 1982. The main purpose was to push boxes onto target squares in a labyrinth. The contribution of a three-dimensional environment entirely composed of cubes now allows the use of brand new game mechanics, thus considerably varying the gameplay. This open universe makes it possible to move away from the well-known level system of “puzzle games”. Designed using web technologies, the game is available on a multitude of connected platforms. sokomplex.app

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Nathan Vogel – relations.watch

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Pauline Saglio

Conflicts of interests are often at the heart of issues like democratic or environmental crises. However, in today’s information landscape, we massively get and forget those bits of data. With an open and collaborative approach, relations.watch aims to summarise relations between people, companies, media, etc. so as to enable anyone to quickly discover potential conflicts of interests. One of the most challenging aspects of this project is to convey very dense semantic data in a visually simple and interactive way while staying as neutral as possible on highly political topics. relations.watch

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Anouk Zibaut – Lieux Ordinaires

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Pauline Saglio

Ordinary places are those corners of streets or that deserted bench that you can see from your window… They are spaces that we can reclaim and that narrate our everyday lives. They are neither places nor monuments but have their own stories. The surveillance cameras that increasingly scan our landscapes are opening up a new projection on these common places. From this medium I tell evolutionary stories (from the present) of indefinite duration. Juxtaposed, the camera images are edited live to form a unique narrative sequence. lieuxordinaires.live

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Jonathan Boulenaz – Light Perception

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Pauline Saglio

Starting from the observation that technology evolves by putting more and more the visual in the foreground, especially via VR, I have chosen to play on the partial deprivation of this sense, to appeal to more primary instincts. The user is in the VR space where light is captured and redistributed to represent the sound, giving him brief insights into what surrounds him. He will therefore have to use his ability to mentally visualize a space in order to be able to evolve in the experience.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Guillaume Simmen – zero lux(e)

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Pauline Saglio

Light pollution is a nuisance that humans don’t notice. But it disrupts the eco-system of thousands of species. The objective of my project is to turn off night lighting in rural areas. It is composed of three tools, a DIY geolocated luxmeter to measure the pollution of its village, a DIY box to place under a streetlight that allows to alert the municipality, and the website that gathers the collected information and that also serves as a support to mobilize people. This project has shown me how I can help in important causes. zerolux-e.org

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Maëlle Chenaux – Plug-in

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Pauline Saglio

Plug-in allows you to discover and enjoy music content in an original way at any time and in any place. The consumption of sound is affiliated with the environment in which it is found, creating an intimate and individual listening context linked to common places. The ambiguity of the object will allow the most curious to discover its exclusive content, combining private speeches and public music. Designed to promote a musical event such as a festival, it offers a tangible and different way of sharing and communication.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Tamara Virág – Bloom

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Pauline Saglio

In our fast-paced and stressful society, getting overwhelmed is easy. Bloom is tailored as a biofeedback-based tool that allows the subject to become more conscious of oneself and helps alleviate stress symptoms. This VR experience is accompanied by a therapist who follows and guides the patient through a set of different chapters; visual, auditory and kinesthetic. The project will be taken further as a study at the CRR in the Hospital of Sion, in order to verify the pertinence and efficiency in the treatment of stress, anxiety et chronic pain management.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Diane Bécheras – The Sound of the Links

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo, Pauline Saglio

Inspired by the text The Camille Stories written by Donna Haraway, somewhere in the future, groups of people are organizing themselves into micro societies. The installation The Sound of the Links is a fragment of this civilization about how humans experience communication with plants in an attempt to rebuild a way of living in communion with the species that surround them. I would like to raise awareness about these imperceptible phenomena discovered by biologists, so that we can imagine a different relationship to the world than that of exploitation.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Sonogram

with Alain Bellet

Content produced during a course given by Alain Bellet to the 2nd year students in Bachelor Media & Interaction Design.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Callum Ross – You can’t see the mountain from the peak

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

In the present day, the evolution of the quality of CGI forces us to question our relationship to digital representations of our world and the impact they have on us. This project explores the current ambiguity of the digital image through an interactive short film based around mountain imagery, used for its symbolism of an everlasting geological phenomenon, but which paradoxically, are some of the fastest images to generate. Through the use of a smartphone, we navigate this variable experience between real and virtual, gradually questioning the reality of the situation that is shown.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Dongwoo Kim – Moment Catcher

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Drawings appeared in our culture through the desire of leaving a trace of our reality, the same spirit that brought to life film and photography. In virtual space, experiences being as ephemeral as in real life, the desire to grasp and document them also exists. Is it possible to anchor a trace in a spatial context inside a virtual dimension? Based on Augmented Reality, Moment Catcher proposes its user to keep a virtual, spatialized sound imprint in shapes that can be drawn by moving a smartphone in real space.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Luca Kasper – Dyne Modular System

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Dyne is a modular synthesiser with a tangible interface. Instead of being controlled by fine settings and values, each instrument’s soft surface turns our hands’ gestures and the forces we apply into sound. While modular synthesisers usually have potentiometers and switches, the musical experience of Dyne revolves around the movements and limitations of our body. It gives us a new way to approach sound synthesis, oscillating between our haptic perception of the system and its own sensitivity.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Giulio Barresi – Tools for Connected Humans

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Nowadays, smartphones are seen as an extension of the human being. Both a tool and a distraction, these devices make it difficult to focus due to a digital overload of social interactions. The ability to interact with others without a connected devices is fading away. As an interaction designer, I question our actual relationship with technology face its utterly promises to shape a better world. In the search for space for more disconnected interactions, I designed Tools for Connected Humans. A series of connected devices ready to help the user disconnect from connectivity.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Adrien Kaeser – Weather Thingy

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

My project is using real time climate-related events to control and modify the settings of musical instruments. Through this project I wanted to propose a new way of composing and playing music by letting nature accompany us in our melodies. This project joins in a serie of sound modules that I’ve made to find a new way to compose and collaborate with environmental events.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

André Andrade – 300 000 km/s

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

The probable future expansion of the territory of Man towards Mars will bring us to communicate through an interplanetary Internet. The distance between the two planets will not physically allow the immediacy of the Internet as we know it on Earth. My project highlights the limit of the communication speed through a simplified visualization of a permanent ping (round-trip time) between Earth and Mars. In a world where everything is accelerating, 300’000 km/s symbolically illustrates the limits of physics and evokes a patience that we are not used to anymore.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Pierry Jaquillard – Prelude in ACGT, Chr. 1 to 22 and XY

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

2018: the recent technological advances pledge an eternal conservation of data. DNA seems to be the new medium for memory. Nevertheless, interpretation and therefore the understanding of this data is crucial. Will we be able to decode it? By giving a new interpretation of this code through music, I seek to discover it. How is it composed? Has it already been composed? This research is materialized by four screens to interact and understand different interpretations of only one code. Between science and music, this project interfaces culture, codes and nature.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Corentin Vignet – Light Them All

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Light them all is a multiplayer game taking place in an interactive installation composed of lamps, projection mapping and a mobile web application. When users connect with their mobile phone, a light source that they can control in the installation appears in projection. This ball of light turns on each of the physical lamps it touches for a limited time. When a lamp come on, it’s lampshade filters the light, thus recomposing the map.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Invisible Narratives - KIKK Festival

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne

Two interactive installations created by third-year Media & Interaction Design students were exhibited in two different venues of the KIKK festival in Namur (Belgium) this year. Commissioned by the festival, the installations address the festival’s theme of “Invisible Narrative” through two iconic items: drones and surveillance cameras.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Hélène Portier – 20°C

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Send a message: 140 milliseconds. Download a news: 1.4 seconds. Take a picture: 370 milliseconds. Information is accessible anywhere and anytime. Through our daily actions, we solicit the network without limits and without constraints. For most people, the internet is elusive and invisible. For GAFA, the network shall consist of data centers, submarine cables and coal mines. 20°C is a series of three objects that questions this physical reality and proposes a tangible interaction with our data.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Elise Migraine – Twins objects

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Twins Objects are three pairs of connected devices: Tits Me, Pianoze, and Dual Drums. Nowadays instant messaging is an unmissable actor of our long-distance relationship. However, if we discuss on these platforms with either a very old friend or someone we barely know, result to the same sensory experience. Twins Objects is a quest for new tools of communication, to reassert the worth of human connexions, using the possibilities of the IoT.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Pietro Alberti – Beyond Fields

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Beyond Fields is a plateform independent puzzle game composed of three chapters each inspired by the fundamental interactions of nature. Throughout the game the player pass through different levels during which he has the opportunity to interact with various graphical elements that will allow him to rebalance the force fields and to solve the level. Thanks to a system of filters, it is possible to travel through different representations of the game - graphical, analytical or mathematical - thus allowing the player to have a global vision of the forces that are exerted between the graphical elements. Play online

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Thomas Faucheux – Sockciety

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Uncovering an online socks store, “Sockciety” offers a way of consuming in which personal data issued from social networks are converted into rights or inhibitions to purchase. It is also a reflection on the consequences of the “datatification” of the world, mingled with a system of perverse gamification where all quantified actions become criteria for evaluation, necessary to the obtention of a uniform.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Salomé Chatriot – Distal Extension

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

The global context of personal and intimate data diffusion and the associated challenges enabled me to open a discussion on the contemporary medical sector and on the cognitive evolutions linked to the development of new technologies. This Rube Goldberg machine shows a chain reaction similar to the breath’s journey within the human body, thanks to the combination of electronic devices and a person’s sensory input. The spectator corporally extends himself spatially thanks to the real time interaction of his main vital functions with a physical and digital environment.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Erika Marthins – Déguster l'augmenté

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

What if we could augment our food? Would it be possible to experience a new dimension of a meal? This project is a desire to explore the potential of integrating data and storytelling in food. A proposition of expanding three desserts in a poetic way. A wedding of sound and chocolate, poetry and lollipop and animation and dessert. In collaboration with Chef Fabien Pairon Ecole hôtelière de lausanne, RayForm (Rayform light shaping technology), Jun Shintake Laboratory of Intelligent Systems (EPFL). Special thanks to: Michel Ferla (EHL), Dario Floreano Director of Laboratory of Intelligent Systems (EPFL).

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Stella Speziali – Tangibles Worlds

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Tangible worlds is a project combining virtual reality and tactile sensations, allowing us to feel as close as possible to the virtual elements present in the installation. My research aims to make sure that the user doesn’t limit himself by simply observing the virtual universe, but interacts with the material within and become attentive of the feedback through his sensations and feelings that come by touching these textures. The installation is composed of three different boxes. Each box contains an IR distance sensor, which detects when a hand is inserted and display the virtual world attributed to the box. This new virtual world surrounds the user. A sensor is placed on each wall within the boxes, this sensor recognizes the hand and activates an animation inside the virtual world. I tried to map the sensors in the virtual universe so that a little clue is given to the user and will lead him to trigger the animations.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Error is Human

with Cyril Diagne, Alain Bellet

“Error is human and to blame it on a robot is even more so” Mixed media installation with Thymio robots (EPFL/Mobsya), commissioned by Vitra Design Museum. Presented until 14 May in the exhibition “Hello, Robot” at the Vitra Design Museum. design-museum.com

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Semester projects

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard

Series of projects created during the 1st semester project of 3rd year Media & Interaction Design.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Lara Défayes – FOMO Survival Kit

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Cédric Duchêne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

The FOMO is a new word in our dictionnary. But what does it mean ? FOMO stands for “Fear Of Missing Out”. It is a compulsive concern that one might miss an opportunity or satisfying event for example, often aroused by our close relationship with social media websites. Imagine yourself alone in the wild city, going through a well deserved digital detox but yet hungry for new social interactions. Is there any way to find your path to the next event planned in your calendar ? FOMO Survival Kit offer you an urban survival kit that will take you to all the events you intend to go. Through a unique set of three connected object, you will be able to know the essential parameters of any social event, who, when and where.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Mylène Dreyer – Scribb

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Cédric Duchêne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Scribb is a computer game in which the physical area scanned by the mouse is an integral part of the interaction. The player must draw some black areas, detected by the mouse, to be able to evolve in the game. So, in the same time, he has to manage the position of the mouse and the surface on which it is placed. This double reading questions our way of switching from digital to analog. The mouse, diverted from its usual role, is not only used as an extension of the hand, but as a physical object influenced by its environment.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Mirko Stanchieri – Pyrite

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Cédric Duchêne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Pyrite is a puzzle game available on a tablet. The goal is simple: the player must reach a target randomly positioned in space by building a path and this in a limited number of shots. The view is an isometric projection which makes in particularly complicated and singles it out. In addition, the player’s levels and used paths freeze, creating new obstacles and increasing the game’s complexity. This project and its minimal universe is a continuation of the aesthetics that I have experienced at ECAL since the beginning of my studies.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Lina Vozniuk-Berzhaner – The Ptolemy Mission

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Cédric Duchêne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

The Ptolemy Mission is an interactive installation that encourages to experience the excitement of exploration by taking a look at everyday things from a different perspective. The project originated from my passion for the Space Exploration and my admiration of the beauty of the Universe. I wanted to show that ordinary objects we hold in our hands and think of them as simple and familiar can, in reality, be far from our understanding, like remote planets observed through a telescope. Exploring such ordinary objects can be as fascinating and surprising as exploring faraway planets.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Pablo Perez – AudioSight

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Cédric Duchêne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

AudioSight is a musical game on smartphone that has  the specific feature of not using the screen. The game’s principle is based solely on the sound the user hears using headphones. The only interaction between the game and the player is the latter’s head movements. The theme of sound in space, both real and virtual, is a topic that fascinates me - especially in the current context of democratisation of virtual reality, where our sensory perception switches between the virtual world and reality.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Alexia Léchot – Deltu

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Cédric Duchêne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Deltu is a delta robot with a personality that interacts with humans via two iPads. Depending on its mood, it plays with the user who is faced with an artificial intelligence simulation, who appreciates the small pleasures of life, sometimes too much. The relationship we have with robots/AI that have been created to enhance our performance, but have become a source of learning, is unique and exciting. The android’s place in society has not yet been de ned and remains to be determined; for me it is the best source of inspiration.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

When Objects Dream

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Vincent Jacquier, Florian Pittet (Sigmasix), Pauline Saglio, Eric Morzier (Sigmasix)

Do objects sometimes dream about themselves? What if we could enter their dreams? Virtual reality? Connected objects? On the occasion of the Milan International Furniture Fair 2016, the ECAL students of the Bachelor Media and Interaction Design present a collection of interactive experiments.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Romain Cazier – Rec All

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

This project is a personal interpretation of the geometrical puzzle game, widely popular on mobile. Taking some of this genre’s features, I also wanted to stand out and propose a singular universe, where strange creatures with a cyclic behaviour are generated from a simple gesture. It is composed of two parts: an “arcade” mode with different levels the player must resolve, and a “sandbox” mode where he can generate creatures at will. Rec All is the continuation of playful and technical experimentations I initiated at ECAL.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Bastien Girschig – Wimbi

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Wimbi is a riddle game based on a peculiar interaction: Instead of touching the screen as usual, the player uses the table as an input to create the waves he needs to unlock the targets. As the levels rise, he will have to be more and more precise, and make good use of chain reactions, bounding, and clipping of the waves. This project gave me the opportunity to work on a combination of real and virtual spaces, allowing the game to extend beyond the simple screen, to create richer interactions.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Caroline Buttet – World Wide Gaming

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

World Wide Gaming is a geolocation-based skill game. This internet platform allows different teams to represent their cities in a virtual tournament. Each team plays with a mobile, and has to aim at cities as accurately as possible, by moving their phone in space. Working on that project gave me the opportunity to develop playful and surprising concepts about the perception of space and distances. Oh, and now, I know where Riga is.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Tom Zambaz – It’s not quite the Hilton

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

It’s not quite the Hilton is a fashion film created for fashion designer Jonathan Ageneau’s diploma collection in which he imagined the hacker community’s changing room. The film refers to the “whistleblower” figure, presenting characters trapped in a blank space experiencing paranoia and boredom at the same time. Through its webcam, the user can interact with the film all along. This prolific collaboration was a great opportunity to design two distinct projects feeding off our exchanges throughout the project.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Martin Hertig – Sensible Data

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Sensible Data is an interactive installation consisting of three machines that invite to create a passport from your personal data. Take a picture of yourself and a machine will draw your portrait. Send an email and an algorithm will judge your age, gender and beauty. By pressing a dubious button, you can get a nice confirmation stamp. Thank you for your contribution! This project allowed me to question the confidence that we have in the data collection systems that surround us: fun in exchange for personal data.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Nicolas Nahornyj – Lazy Pen

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

After receiving a dozen handwritten letters from my grandmother, I finally decided to answer them. I wanted to combine the practical side of computer-based word processing and the emotional aspect of one's handwriting. This tool allows the user to distort the typeface as they write, using the moving palettes placed beneath their palms. The goal is to be able to produce one's own typography in real time, thus offering a more personal touch.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Maxime Castelli – Nelson

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Nelson is a tiny connected module designed to to bring everyday objects to life remotely. It’s based on a very simple forwards and backwards movement as we do in our everyday life, like pushing a switch. Connected to the internet it triggers setups previously defined by the user. Designed and built with the help of designer Arthur Didier, this project is the completion of my studies, working in most of the fields of interaction design and industrial design to mix both towards an innovative creation.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Sebastian Vargas – Postgram

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Postgram is my personal automated online bot dedicated to the practice of “fair hacking”. Using an @post.gram instagram account, each time a photo is published, the bot uses geolocalisation data to seek someone living close by, using a public directory. Once someone has been found, he/she is automatically added as a new contact in my phone and is sent a printed postcard of the image. New contacts are notified of the postcard with a suggestion to meet and film the encounter. Postgram counterposes public data and image making, using a process of “fair hacking” of public services.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Guillaume Cerdeira – Moon River

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Moon River is a 2D top-down view game. The player is locked in the screenplay: when he crosses the boundaries, he finds himself teleported to the opposite screen side. Three levels challenge the player, leading him to use the abilities of the character to solve a series of puzzles becoming more and more complex along the game. This project was an opportunity for me to create a coherent universe, but also to offer an entertaining and challenging experience.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Edoardo Parini – GET

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

GET is a project that connects your senses, usage and behaviours with your everyday tools and mobile apps. GET is a bracelet which allows you to gain access and control over such tools through an invisible and intuitive interface which is so smart that it can recognize your gestures, thus interpreting your intentions. I have always found human–computer interaction fascinating. Thanks to this project I had the chance to test new kinds of interaction which do not require any physical connection with the object and to imagine a hypothetical future where the perfect interface becomes the body itself.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Victor Férier – SkyRod

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

SkyRod is a family of three games that transform tiny physical objects into video game heroes. Suspended with a rod fixed on the screen, the objects become integrated into the virtual environment of the screen. Moving in front of the webcam, the user make the objects interact with the content of the screen. I combined simple visual effects with advanced technologies to create intuitive interactions playing with space and perception, which are main subjects in my work.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Pierre-Xavier Puissant – EURI - LOW RES AWAY

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

LOW RES AWAY is a modular telepresence system of which EURI is the first module. The goal of this work was to extend one of the reflexions of my Bachelor Thesis: the idea that the instantaneity of the Net “makes geography obsolete”. I decided to work on the sound representation of weather data based on simple idiophonic objects. For this first module, I worked on rain data. An app allows the user to define a point to retrieve weather data from. The EURI then create an abstract sound composition, replicating a distant reality.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Hugo Simon – #OneMinute

with Alain Bellet, Cyril Diagne, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

#OneMinute tends to propose a new way to create an image. Users are invited to enter a Hashtag of their choice, then – connected to the famous Instagram network – the machine records every picture uploaded with that similar hashtag during the last minute prior to execution of the programme. By gathering this information, each time the machine is able to produce a new singular image mapping the flow according to the popularity of the hashtag. This project is a follow-up of a reflection on the relationship between digital and print.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Thymio meets ECAL

with Alain Bellet

During a one week workshop students were asked to develop projects using the Thymio robot. 50 Robots were available. The week began with an introduction to Thymio and its secrets by Prof. Francesco Mondada from EPFL. Students worked then in group with the task to make Thymio(s) write a word, all those words was then put together to form a sentences that you can discover in this movie. Thymio is an affordable educational robot. It provides three main features: a large number of sensors and actuators, an educative interactivity based on light and touch and a programming environment featuring graphical and text programming. Thymio Robot has been developed in a collaboration between the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) and the Ecole Cantonale d'Art de Lausanne (ECAL).

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Beijing Connection

with Alain Bellet, Vincent Jacquier

Beijing Connexion is a web platform hosting projects realized during a one week journey in Beijing with 15 students. Our objectives were to work around the topic of quantified self, data logging and also on a reflection about regular picture and movie that people usually records during their own journey. To realize precisely those projects we had to perform 24 hours per day to get our datas and visual materials. We kindly thank the “Summer University” program of the Canton of Vaud who made this possible and also all the people who welcomed us at Tsinghua University, CAFA University and the Beijing Maker Space. beijing-connection.ecal-mid.ch

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Tessa Donati – Viwo

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Sound, illustration and construction are the key elements of the Viwo box, which contains 16 little wood blocks prepared to disclose six amusing illustrations. By placing these living cubes in the right place it will be possible to discover the supporting role of sound in solving the puzzle. This first game encourages children to examine the shapes of the objects, stimulates them to recreate the images accurately and increases their listening skills. To get started, just touch the word Viwo. The lid of the box and the available cards function as an amazing game! The senses involved are mainly touch, hearing and sight. In planning and building this box, my aim was to combine the traditional qualities of a wood game with those of modern games that capture children’s attention.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Marc Dubois – Open Controllers

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

This project suggests combining common industrial objects with several sensors that smartphones are equipped with, such as the gyroscope or the camera, in order to create controllers that are easy to reproduce: a sphere and a cube that transmit 3D movements, as well as a cone that can locate a source of light. These controllers work with a game specially developed for them. This project remains full of possibilities which I look forward to discovering.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Laura Nieder – Matter

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Matter is a puzzle game where the player follows a light beam, reflected or refracted from a material to another, revealing new structures and new possibilities of interaction with light along the way. Creating a game was a new experience for me that I had long wanted to achieve and that allowed me to share my passion about the particle world and its emptiness. What we call matter is almost an illusion as it is only energy and information.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Simon De Diesbach – OccultUs

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

OccultUs is an Oculus Rift installation that immerses the user in the midst of a sensory experience playing on the interpenetration of visual and sound elements from two distinct realities, one tangible and another simulated. I wanted to exploit the technical and artistic potential of Oculus Rift without achieving a purely digital experience. I preferred imagining a hybrid installation to shake the sensory habits of users while questioning their relation to the world.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

David Colombini – Attachment

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Attachment, a poetic machine connected to a website, allows you to send messages, images, or videos into the air through a biodegradable balloon. The basic idea was to take a stand against the current use of “smart” technologies by creating a poetic concept, using current technology that allows us to communicate differently and rediscover expectation, random and the unexpected. The site allows you, by entering your name and e-mail, to send a message and attach a picture, sound, or video. Once your content is validated, the machine prints the message and a code on an  sheet, slips it into a biopolymer cylinder attached to a balloon, which is released into the air. The balloon then travels haphazardly to a potential recipient.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Alice Robbiani – Spira

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

Spira is an interactive picture. Using the magnetic principle of inductive charging, it frames our telephone, giving it a place of honour in the home atmosphere. The way of charging changes completely, and in spite of the power of gravity, we are challenged to let the telephone hung up, keeping us informed of the current time and state of the battery. The telephone puts aside its usual functions and reinvents itself to become a key: its presence allows energy to spread to make the (heat-sensitive) painting react. This is how a new image appears.

INDUSTRIAL DESIGN

Delirious Home

with Alain Bellet, Chris Kabel

A home full with extraordinary objects for ordinary life. A playful interpretation of the “smart home” concept by ECAL Bachelor Industrial Design and Media & Interaction Design students.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

One minute repeater

with Alain Bellet, Vincent Jacquier

On the occasion of the 24th edition of the Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie (SIHH), which took place in Geneva from 20th to 24th January 2014, the ECAL/ University of Art & Design Lausanne created, for watchmaker Vacheron Constantin, a special installation named “The Minute Repeater”. This installation is the result of a research work directed at ECAL by Vincent Jacquier, Head of Visual Communication Department, and Alain Bellet, Head of Bachelor Media & Interaction Design. This research, which brings together students from both Bachelor in Media & Interaction Design and Industrial Design, permitted to develop a stand for the watchmaker based in Geneva. Not less than 12 screens reveal the oneiric sense of the Calibre 1731 of Vacheron Constantin. Thank to the animations unveiled on each screen by the magic of magnifying glasses, ECAL proposes its interpretation of this minute repeater movement, known to be the flattest on the market. Animations, production and technical development : Pauline Saglio, Mathieu Rivier, Guilhem Moreau With the help of : Philippe-Albert Lefebvre, Matthieu Minguet Students involved in the project : Laurent Bernaert, Nicolas Nahornyj, Hélène Zeis

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Roll the ball

with Alain Bellet

FOUNDATION YEAR

Option media & interaction design

"Slice", comme dans un puzzle, chaque partie d'un objet a sa place respective. Les étudiants sont amenés à réféchir à ce principe de parties et d'ensemble, et produisent un univers visuel réactif. En parallèle du projet, les étudiant suivent un cours de programmation leur permettant de comprendre les bases du code et de modifier les comportements des animations.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Fabric of Light – LANTAL

with Alain Bellet, Vincent Jacquier

Lantal is opening the “Fabric of Light” exhibition on Saturday, October 27, 2012. It showcases imaginary and interactive installations with glimpses of the future in textile design. The exhibition was conceived and implemented by students enrolled in the Media & Interaction Design unit of the ECAL/University of Art and Design Lausanne. Fabrikraum 5 c/o Lantal Textiles Berghofstrasse 1 CH–4917 Melchnau

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Siméon Brandner – Spin Motion

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

“Spin Motion is an iPhone application that allows you to create and share stop-motions. On shared animations one can participate in the realization by adding an image at the end. It will create two types of animations, made either by a person or exquisite corpse. The application is divided into three parts: the creation is made frame by frame. For each picture taken, a main line that crosses the screen trough its middle is a guide to align something on it. This line turns a few degrees after each shot to make a complete revolution. The visualization is effected by turn- ing the iPhone, making the animation play forward or backward. The baseline created by using the guide remains horizontal when the screen rotates. Modifying stop-motions allows you to rework animations and to share them. I developed a lot of knowledge in the ergonomics and the design of a sharing interface on iPhone.” Siméon Brandner

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Matthieu Minguet – knot(e)

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

“knot(e) is a device that offers a new way of using objects that we connect to our mobile devices. The prototypes, shown in the form of a rope, harness themselves to revisit the new node as input data. As an extension of a conventional listening device, it allows the user to generate visual and sound compositions. The intersection of the rope amplifies the signal. Conversely, the absence of knots and curves restores the application to its original position. Each prototype has its own forms, colours, atmospheres and sound effects. During the writing of my thesis, I was led by my interest in the theories of John Maeda and Hiroshi Ishii. The former describes the idea of “ tangible bytes ” and proposes to reduce the separation between digital information and physical space. Inspired by the work of Ishii, one of Maeda’s theories questions the importance of simplicity of language in the human / machine interaction. This project allowed me to explore new types of interactions around a physical object.” Matthieu Minguet

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Mathieu Rivier – Light Form

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

“This project implements a faceted structure placed on a plinth to support the content, which permits interaction with the content by touching it. The installation allows different forms of representations and interactions to be explored with a solid display. In order for the shape to become a surface of multi-touch visualisation, it was necessary to design a shape in heat-welded semi-transparent plastic which allows the projection and detection of fingers from inside the structure. I then made a structure in welded steel which supports the system of projection and detection on the shape. The software used allows detection with a display that is specific to the faces and their orientations. Making the installation required more work from me than producing the software. In fact, in the projects which I have undertaken to date, there was no material construction to implement and this was consequently the first time that I addressed the problems of ergonomics, scale, solidity, etc. I particularly liked not just working on the code of a software programme but also on its material implementation.” Mathieu Rivier

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Joelle Aeschlimann – Little Boxes

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

“Little Boxes is a music box concept for iPad. It consists of a tangible part composed of three separate music boxes that interact with an iPad and an application. When placing one of the boxes on the iPad, it recognizes it and activates. The idea is that each box contains its own universe revealed by the action of the crank with an animation and melody proper to each. The aim is to give a new dimension to the music box, and transcribe visual sensations that don’t exist in a standard music box. This work reflects my desire to play with the physical and digital elements by making them interact. It allowed me to embrace different areas, and confront myself with creative and technical challenges. The result is the creation of a world through the music box, where everyone can enter and interact with it.” Joelle Aeschlimann

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Ruslan Gaynutdinov – Sona

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

“During the first half of 3rd year at ECAL, I made an installation project based on the visualization of sound. I am interested in how the spectator is immersed in the interactive piece in the presence of this ele- ment. I decided to continue my research on the themes of sound and atmosphere. Sona is an experimental game on iPad inspired by the classic “ Simon game ”. The universe is composed of enigmatic sound paintings that the spectator must solve through simple interactions. The game is played with headphones to focus attention on the sound. This project allowed me to study in detail the acoustic phenomena and how we store and perceive sounds. The immersion and sound have become essential elements for me in an interactive project.” Ruslan Gaynutdinov

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Lucien Langton – Tilt Tower

with Alain Bellet, Christophe Guignard, Gaël Hugo

“Tilt Tower is an interactive monumental projection that took place during the Transat Festival in Lausanne on the 28th, 29th and 30th of June 2012. The main idea is to offer the public a fun and original way to interact with the projected content. Any spectator can launch an animation by dropping a ball in a hole situated in front of the building. The aim of this installation is to put in perspective differences in scale as well as the contrast between a physical input and a digital response. The aspect that I enjoyed the most while developing the project was the creation of animations and their micro-nar- rations. However, as a whole, it is often hard to find such events with interactivity. It is also extremely rare to see anything different from the aesthetic clichés of 3D rendering engines. Most of the time, monumental projection takes place in the public space. That’s why it was simply a pleasure to build a different way to give a little life to it.” Lucien Langton

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Pyramid Cascade

with Alain Bellet

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Who is the Plotter

with Alain Bellet, Angelo Benedetto

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

FireWriter

with Alain Bellet, Gaël Hugo

The FireWriter is a graphic butane/propane torch printer running on Processing and Arduino.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Karian Foehr – Timor

with Alain Bellet, Gaël Hugo

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Guillaume Chabot – Box-it

with Alain Bellet, Gaël Hugo

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Dimitris Dimoulitsas – Space A Maze

with Alain Bellet, Gaël Hugo

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Marius Aeberli – Elapse

with Alain Bellet, Gaël Hugo

« En accord avec la vision subjective de l'utilisateur, ELAPSE offre une extension visuelle aussi subjective et adaptée à chaque représentation personnelle du temps. L'informatique et le traitement de l'information ont toujours eu la prétention d'être précis et exhaustifs avec une tendance à privilégier la standardisation. Jusqu'à présent, cette logique absolue a comblé la subjectivité et les imperfections cognitives des utilisateurs. Aujourd'hui, un seul utilisateur interagit avec l'univers numérique des dizaines de milliers de fois par jour et, dans son évolution, ce même univers tend à s'inspirer de nos propres comportements. Néanmoins, les interfaces restent à l'image de leurs hôtes : froides, précises et standardisées ou inspirées des codes graphiques obsolètes auxquels elles sont habituées. Intitulé ELAPSE, mon projet propose une approche graphique différente du design d'interface. A travers un principe de calendrier/calendrier, symbole de l'informatique appliquée, l'interface graphique peut être entièrement modélisée par l'utilisateur en fonction de sa conception du temps. Cette approche cognitive permet aux utilisateurs de laisser le superflu et de contourner le pouvoir de la précision. Ainsi, les semaines et les jours peuvent être déroulés dans des directions différentes et les jours de la semaine ainsi que les heures peuvent avoir une durée visuelle différente. Dans la même pers- pective, certains jours peuvent être préférés à d'autres et certains rendez-vous peuvent être indiqués comme plus agréables que d'autres. ELAPSE recommande également le moment le plus approprié pour un rendez-vous particulier et permet à l'utilisateur de créer une liste de choses à faire en fonction du lieu où il se trouve et, par conséquent, d'éviter un surmenage inutile. Naturellement, cette application ne s'adresse pas nécessairement aux utilisateurs désireux d'être organisés de manière forte et précise, mais plutôt à ceux qui doivent faire un effort lorsqu'ils utilisent un calendrier, malgré l'expérience des années et du temps. » Marius Aeberli

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Cem Sever – Muno - Museum Notes

with Alain Bellet

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

(in)visible Spectrum

with Alain Bellet, Angelo Benedetto

Interactive installation - Milan Furniture Fair 2010 Sunglasses by Industrial Design Department for Visilab.

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Log a Rythm

with Alain Bellet

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

Florian Pittet (Sigmasix) – Light my Fire

with Alain Bellet

Light a match on the wall to trigger virtual fireworks.

INDUSTRIAL DESIGN

MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN

A Third Hand – Creative Applications for Robotics

with Alain Bellet, Andrea Anner, Thibault Brevet, Martin Hertig

Robotic arms have long been a common sight in many industries. They are currently making a rapid entry into art and design studios and practices. Yet, at the same time, difficulties remain in accessing the workflows and work methods demanded by these machines given a clear lack of reference resources suited for this community. The same applies to Art and Design schools, which are increasingly investing in this type of equipment, often without having the resources to run it. This research project uses applied case studies to explore and define a set of exemplary work methods, capable of both informing and inspiring future users.