Description  of Work

For our midterm project, Adi Marom and I built a machine whose purpose was to create an “inflatable” structure.  Our original proposal was the transformation of the shape and size of these structures through air using a piston-and-crank mechanism, powered by either a servo or DC motor.  In the end, we chose to focus more on the mechanism itself and using the idea of  paper-folded “puffer fish” as a whimsical counterpoint to the solid sleek nature of the linkages and pistons used to make them expand and contract.

In the same vein as utopian architectural movements from the 60s, it was to be an outlet for us to creatively play with a structure that is at once grounded in the mechanisms of our machine but also ephemeral in its final result. We are fascinated by the ephermalization quality of the structures, transforming between a compact and an expanded state.

Components / Structural requirements

The geared DC-motor powers the mechanism that controls the expansion and contraction of our structures. A crank and double-piston mechanism was used to convert between the rotary motion of the motors to the reciprocating motion of the “pumps”. The linkages were first drawn in AutoCAD which was than converted to an illustrator file to create the template that  was laser-cut out of a clear acrylic sheet.  The “pumps” were made from acrylic rods & tubes.

Puff. the Machine from Angela Chen on Vimeo.

lego machine 1 from Angela Chen on Vimeo.

lego machine 2 from Angela Chen on Vimeo.

and just in time, this new post from the nytimes from illustrator Christopher Niemann.