Greg the Egg
By Reyhan Danişan, Nikki Rademaker, and Yanna Smid
Overview
For the course Artificial Creatures, I teamed up with Reyhan Danişan and Yanna Smid to create this project. The purpose was to pick exactly one quality of creatureness and create a creature that maximizes the immediate experience of this quality with minimal technical means possible. The creatureness we decided to focus on was gregariousness. A gregarious creature is typically a being who is sociable and enjoys being in the company of others.
A lack of social interaction can lead to negative feelings. This also applies to the creature "Gregary", also known as "Greg the egg". Greg is in need of constant social interaction. During the exposition for this course, people could play with him in his handcrafted playground. People could also interact with him by holding him in their arms and gently rocking him back and forth.
The Project
The final product shows a cute little gregarious egg. Whenever he is alone, he gets sad and starts making sad soft noises. These noises convince people to pick him up and play with him. This cheers him up, and instead of crying sounds, he starts making happy beeping noises. We found that during the exposition people would be drawn towards Greg the egg, wanting to play with him and handle him with care. We noticed many people from the audience looked at Greg as if he were their own creature, making sure to interact with him. This means we achieved our goal of creating a creature with gregarious characteristics. Greg did not want to be left alone, and the audience did not want to leave Greg alone.
Tools and Materials
Greg's hardware consists of:- Arduino Nano
- Accelerometer (detect movement of Greg)
- Battery (9V) (power source for Greg)
- Small piezo speaker (sound effects)
- Jumper wires
Greg's appearance is intended to look soft and cute to attract people. This encouraged people in the audience to comfort Greg and play with him. His exterior consists of:
- Pink plastic egg shell (Greg's body)
- Soft pink yarn (Greg's exterior)
- Pink bow
- Velcro (attachment of Greg to playground attributes)
He also has his very own playground, consisting of a swing, seesaw and merry-go-round. These were handmade to fit Greg the egg perfectly, using wood, paint, paint-stirring sticks, velcro, a basket, a hamster wheel, two small easels, paper, and flower decorations.