About SlumberLights
A SlumberLight is a networked nightlight in the form of a small luminescent cube containing your photograph that glows with a calm pulse when you are sleeping. The SlumberLight responds to when you are in bed and for how long and sends that information to another remote slumberlight that mirrors the behavior. I designed them for a specific long distance relationship between my son, age 3 and his great grandmother, age 95.
Context
In the past four generations, families have spread out over greater and greater geographical distance. Filling the need for closeness and connection are active channels of communication like the phone, email etc. but what about passive communication? How important is the sense of presence? What value can we gain from a communication channel that does not require active participation? SlumberLights were designed to explore these questions.
Solution
The
Slumberlight is a networked object. It has it's own IP address stored
on an Xport, limited memory and processing power from a PIC chip and within
any home with an internet connection, can send real time data to one or
multiple other networked objects. This project is interaction design from
scratch. Every element form circuit to chip, server code to hardware was
designed and built by hand. More
on the design.
Scenario
Sam, age 3, climbs into bed for his nighttime stories. Below his mattress
cover is a threadlike wire that picks up on his bodies electrical field
activating a switch and simple program that turns on the SlumberLight
on his bedside table. The soft dim light pulses, slowly growing softer
and slower as he falls asleep. An hour later, Sam's great grandmother
is going to sleep. On her night stand, next to the many photographs of
her family is a SlumberLight with a photo of Sam. She recognizes the soft
glow, signaling that her great grandson in Manhattan is peacefully sleeping.
The next morning, when Sam wakes and leaves his bed, the SlumberLight
turns off, waiting for the coming nighttime stories to turn on again and
send a new signal to his great grandmother's night stand. Slumber
Movie 5mb Quicktime.
Status
The prototype is complete and has been tested successfully. The next
step is to research it's viability as a real product.