Processing, Pure Data, Arduino et set eh rah

So we had a workshop today with Dr Ed Kelly who is another of our lecturers. Think he specialises in Processing which, and excuse my ignorance here, is a free bit of software that can be used to program all sorts of interesting things. As far as I could make out actually you can turn it to almost anything as it’s pretty much a computer programming language? I think, sort of.

I will make the admission here that I know sweet eff all about programming so apologies if I’m getting this all arse about tit. Regardless of my lack of skills and knowledge it was still a fun day. Mucked about making colours, shapes and images do odd things by typing lines of code, then had some fun with capture software and the odd sorts of stuff you could do by feeding a live feed of your own face back through various programmed bits of Processing. Lot less gory than it sounds.

Finally we got to play with some Arduino kits(?)/boards(?)/circuits(?), not sure of the correct terminology..again. Anyway they were basically little bits of electronic hardware that allow you to effect what’s happening on your Processing things(technical term) by physically interacting with sensors. So like, infrared, ultrasound, distance etc. Again all very cool and fun to see and play with.

If I’m completely honest although I could probably come up with a couple of applications in relation to my work the actual technological side of things isn’t something that massively inspires me. That’s not a knock against it at all, it’s just to do with my personal perspectives and my own practise. I tend to be more generally interested in how technology allows aspects of ourselves(humans, culture) to be revealed and shaped, rather than the nuts and bolts of the technology that allows us to do this. Possibly that’s a somewhat ignorant stance to take, I don’t know. I do enjoy a lot of work that uses these sorts of tools it’s just not necessarily something that wets my whistle, so to speak.

Having said all that it’s still early on in the course and perhaps I’ll become obsessed with programming and create a mobile app about birds that makes me a millionaire. Who knows.