Environmental Design Proposal

Transformers: Robots In Design
Environmental Design Proposal
As Written by Jeremy Helgeson
For our Environmental design, we have decided to split up within our group to each design a robot out of boxes and other materials. We will then place our individual robots in different areas in the environment of UCSC and the Santa Cruz area. Our experiment will be to track the progress of our robots as they are left to the harsh realities of the world and the whims of whoever decides to pass by them. We will then report on what has happened to each of our robots within the group and eventually to the class when we present them on the due date of the project. Each robot will also have a central experiment to go along with them. For example, one robot may be left with pens near it and a note that says “please give me a voice.” We would then observe if passers-by choose to write, or draw, or do anything concerning the request left with the robot. The point of this design is to see how our out-of-place creations hold together when left unattended in nature, and to see if the requests of our robots are fulfilled without any assistance from us. If they are, or even if they are not, our robots will be changing the environment they exist in, be it physically or visually. We are also testing the idea that it is easier to destroy something than to create it. This will be tested by our hypothesis that at least one of our robots will either be destroyed completely or stolen. We are also interested to see that in the case that they are removed or destroyed, how they will continue to change the environment that they exist in after the fact, whether it be because they now look like an ugly pile of destroyed boxes or because they now decorate some SantaCruzian’s lawn somewhere. We are excited to build these “transformers”, as we have called them, and also to see how they change people and the environment they will soon inhabit.