人算不如天算
I was asked to make a blog for the NYU IMA Low Res graduate program. (I started with no tangible experience in interaction design.) Math is nature’s poetry, and these are just diary entries.
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Reel
I was asked to make a blog for the NYU IMA Low Res graduate program. (I started with no tangible experience in interaction design.) Math is nature’s poetry, and these are just diary entries.
Alter-Instagram
Reel
WHAT: IMALR-GT-408
1. Core concept: the observer effect
Throughout the program, I’ve spent some time on this idea of wave-particle duality (and the effects it has on reality vs. realism). Based on the double-slit experiment, the observer effect is a phenomenon where the act of observation changes the particle's behaviour from what it would have been if it hadn't been observed. It’s also described as “collapse of the wave function.”
2. Core interaction
In idle-mode, this timekeeper will display a (hopefully pleasing) particle-y, wavelike visual (representing the multiple potential nows) where there is no concrete “time” displayed. When a user gets close enough to it (maybe eye-tracking, maybe just distance), the wave will “collapse” into a “solid” time. This time will be displayed in small, analog numbers somewhere randomly along the wave.
Once the user’s presence (the “observation event”) is no longer detected, the “solid” timeline will dissolve back into the multiple potential wavelike states/visuals.
Super draft-y sketch:
I’m currently inclined to make this a standalone object. My first thought is to use pieced-together LED panels, but I’m not quite sure how that will look with this aesthetic... Maybe random, moving pixel art will look better than waves for LED? Or maybe... I’ll use a mini LCD screen...
3. The why
Philosophically, it touches upon a couple concepts in quantum physics that I often lose sleep over.
I’d like to discuss how a quantum system remains in superposition until measured. The clock is not definitive when unobserved, reflecting how our perception shapes reality. I also like the idea that multiple timelines (or states) may exist all at once, but only one is our current lived experience (the “collapsed” wave/timeline). The others remain as potentials or other branches. In addition, the observer effect is something that I find quite fascinating... and would love to know the answer to in this lifetime... though I doubt I will. Maybe some things aren’t really for us to know.
Also, constantly seeing the current “time” produces quite a bit of anxiety for me. I’d rather the process of finding out “what time it is” to be an active action, rather than a passive reception.