Physical transformability is emerging as an important element of interaction design as advances in material science and computational control give rise to new possibilities in actuated products and kinetic environments. However, this transition also produces a new range of design problems-how do we visualize, imagine, and design the physical processes of transformation? This paper presents Bosu, a design tool offering kinetic memory---the ability to record and play back motion in 3-D space---for soft materials. It is used for motion prototyping and digitally augmented form finding, combining dynamic modeling with coincident sensing and actuation to create transformable structures. Evaluation from a workshop with architects and interaction, product, and fashion designers is presented discussing the ramifications of physically programming motion with a new soft materiality, moving toward new ideas in body mimesis and material construction for kinetic design.

Physical malleability is emerging as an important element of interaction design as advances in material science and computational control give rise to new possibilities in actuated products and transformable environments. However, this transition also produces a new range of design problems-how do we visualize, imagine, and design the physical processes of transformation? We must create tools for intuitive motion investigation to train and develop our motions sensibilities in 3D space, moving towards interfaces that makes sketching with motion as easy as drawing with paper and pencil? This paper presents Kinetic Sketchup, an approach to a design language for motion prototyping featuring a series of actuated physically programmable modules which investigate the rich interplay of mechanical, behavioral and material design parameters which motion enables.

Piezing is a garment which harnesses energy from the natural gestures of the human body in motion. Around the joints of the elbows and hips, the garment is embedded with piezoelectric material elements which generate an electric potential in response to applied mechanical stress. The electric potential is then stored as voltage in a centralized small battery and later can be discharged into a device. As a concept, Piezing explores a decentralized and self-reliant energy model for embedded interaction, pushing forward possibilities for mobility.

What issues arise when designing and deploying tangibles for learning in long term evaluations? This paper reports on a series of studies in which the Topobo system, a 3D tangible construction kit with the ability to record and playback motion, was provided to educators and designers to use over extended periods of time in the context of their day-to-day work. Tangibles for learning - like all educational materials - must be evaluated in relation both to the student and the teacher, but most studies of tangibles for learning focus on the student as user. Here, we focus on the conception of the educator, and their use of the tangible interface in the absence of an inventor or HCI researcher. The results of this study identify design and pedagogical issues that arise in response to distribution of a tangible for learning in different educational environments.

We present Senspectra, a computationally augmented physical modeling toolkit designed for sensing and visualization of structural strain. Senspectra seeks to explore a new direction in computational materiality, incorporating the material quality of malleable elements of an interface into its digital control structure. The system functions as a decentralized sensor network consisting of nodes, embedded with computational capabilities and a full spectrum LED, and flexible joints. Each joint functions as an omnidirectional bend sensing mechanism to sense and communicate mechanical strain between neighboring nodes.

The majority of large scale media embedded into public spaces clashes with the existing architectural and cultural characteristics of an environments. This paper discusses the challenge to overcome this phenomenon through the design of new embedded artifacts which tie interactive media elements into existing physical properties of an environment, whether material, spatial, cultural, or social, to fluidly mesh and compliment a shared public space. Design challenges and guidelines are explored through the presentation of two experimental installations developed by the authors- the Algorithmic Topiary and Thermochromic Laundry Line. The site specific installations were created as physical interventions as part of the History Unwired Project, a mobile device based walking tour in the Castello neighborhood of Venice, Italy, and were intended to bring attention and dynamism to the physical and ephemeral elements of the environments which the tour describes.

Digital Manipulatives embed computation in familiar children's toys and provide means for children to design behavior. Some systems use "record and play" as a form of programming by demonstration that is intuitive and easy to learn. With others, children write symbolic programs with a GUI and download them into a toy, an approach that is conceptually extensible, but is inconsistent with the physicality of educational manipulatives. The challenge we address is to create a tangible interface that can retain the immediacy and emotional engagement of "record and play" and incorporate a mechanism for real time and direct modulation of behavior during program execution.We introduce the Backpacks, modular physical components that children can incorporate into robotic creations to modulate frequency, amplitude, phase and orientation of motion recordings. Using Backpacks, children can investigate basic kinematic principles that underly why their specific creations exhibit the specific behaviors they observe. We demonstrate that Backpacks make tangible some of the benefits of symbolic abstraction, and introduce sensors, feedback and behavior modulation to the record and play paradigm. Through our review of user studies with children ages 6-15, we argue that Backpacks extend the conceptual limits of record and play with an interface that is consistent with both the physicality of educational manipulatives and the local-global systems dynamics that are characteristic of complex robots.

We introduce Topobo, a 3D constructive assembly system embedded with kinetic memory, the ability to record and playback physical motion. Unique among modeling systems is Topobo's coincident physical input and output behaviors. By snapping together a combination of Passive (static) and Active (motorized) components, people can quickly assemble dynamic biomorphic forms like animals and skeletons with Topobo,animate those forms by pushing, pulling, and twisting them, and observe the system repeatedly play back those motions. For example, a dog can be constructed and then taught to gesture and walk by twisting its body and legs. The dog will then repeat those movements and walk repeatedly.Our evaluation of Topobo in classrooms with children ages 5-13 suggests that children develop affective relationships with Topobo creations and that their experimentation with Topobo allows them to learn about movement and animal locomotion through comparisons of their creations to their own bodies. Eighth grade science students' abilities to quickly develop various types of walking robots suggests that a tangible interface can support understanding how balance, leverage and gravity affect moving structures because the interface itself responds to the forces of nature that constrain such systems.