Head of the Technology Centre
BIO
Assistant Bachelor Media & Interaction Design 2014–19 Head of Technology Centre 2019–22
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
with Mindmaze, Laura Nieder, Tibor Udvari
“Harder, better, faster, stronger” was a one week workshop in collaboration with Mindmaze exploring playful interactions with medical sensors and devices.
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
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
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
by Alfatih
The image of a garment nowadays has more reach and value in the digital space than the physical one. And as we are embracing multiple personas at an ever-increasing pace, we see ourselves consuming more garments that quickly go to waste. Base is a clothing service offering an alternative economic model and a way to reflect on the nature of garments in the physical and the digital space. What does the physical garment look like when stripped down to its primary functions? And in what contexts can the digital garment be worn?
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
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
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
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
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
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
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
with Pauline Saglio, Vincent Jacquier, Laura Nieder
Information Mesh is a web platform celebrating the 30th anniversary of the World Wide Web that explores social, technical, cultural and legal facts throughout different interactive timelines. It was initiated in October 2018 during a one week workshop in partnership with swissnex San Francisco, where students visited key partners and began developing the project. The timelines present an overview of Web history, starting with the proposal for hypertext by Tim Berners-Lee at CERN in 1989, initially under the name “Information Mesh.” From this start date, users can then explore 30 years of evolution. infomesh.org
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
with Gene Kogan
This workshop was a hands-on introduction to machine learning with a focus on creating artistic and interactive applications. Machine learning is a field dedicated to teaching computers how to perform tasks given examples and human oversight and has been used by artists, musicians, and designers to add a dimension of machine intelligence and interaction to their work. The students focused on the core algorithms used for discovering patterns in complex multimedia data, including images, sounds, and text. They learned how to use neural networks to create real-time, cross-modal interactions for use in video, installation, live music performance, and physical computing. They were provided a suite of tools and code for clustering, visualizing, and searching through large collections of multimedia.
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
with Cyril Diagne, Stéphane Halmaï-Voisard
This project is the result of a collaboration between students in Bachelor Industrial Design and in Bachelor Media & Interaction Design following a workshop led by Map Project Office. “Double action” is part of the exhibition “Ligne de Mire” presented at mudac in Lausanne, from 14 March to 26 August 2018.
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
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
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
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
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
with Christophe Guignard
I never promised you a garden offers an immersive journey inside a fantasized hanging garden using virtual reality. The public is invited to walk among chimeric plants and make them blossom with a simple touch. Having noticed that some spectators have a tendency to be uninvolved and passive before an interactive design artwork, this project questions their willful participation. What is to be done when a spectator makes the conscious choice to not interact with an interactive project? What is the design of refusal?
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
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
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
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
with Chris Sugrue
“…mass can neither be created nor destroyed, although it may be rearranged in space, or the entities associated with it may be changed in form…” - Law of conservation of mass In this workshop we explored the concept of a hybrid sculptures - creating works that use technologies such as augmented reality, computer vision, virtual reality and optical illusion to create hybrid physical-digital sculptures.
MEDIA & INTERACTION DESIGN
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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
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).