E3: Pet Bond Notification
This week’s prototype involves two users, the pet and pet owner. The main prototype is worn on the pet owner. The product created allows the owner to track and understand when the bond between the owner and the pet is strengthened. The shirt the owner wears is attached to a band or collar that would be attached to the pet.
A lot of the time, new owners taking on a pet may have a hard time understanding what actions are improving their relationship with their pet versus what isn't. The product is simple to use and easy to have when training/playing with their pet. The user just has to wear the product. The light will on the shirt turn on when there is trust between the pet and the owner being built. By being in a position on the shirt that is viewable at most times, owners can freely maneuver and play with the pet while being in view of the flashing light.
The sensor in the shirt measures how close(proximity) you are to your pet and measures the vitals of the user and compare it to the pet. If the vitals are equivalent to each other, the light will light up to notify the owner that both parties are physically bonding. Bonding can be many things but in the video, bonding can look like kissing or petting your parakeet in a way that they are enjoying the interaction.
Prototype
I took a plain grey crewneck and embroidered a design on the corner left of the crewneck to accent the LED light so that there would not just be a light on a plain shirt. The LED light was sewn into the shirt using conductive thread and attached to a battery that is attached under the embroidery with tape because it is important to be able to take off the battery when washing the shirt.
In the prototype, the light turns off and off by the snap button used and the conductive thread stretched to the sleeves where it is easy to access to turn off and on the light compared to if the snap were to be inside the shirt in the chest area.
Originally, I was only going to sew the light on the shirt and sew a pouch on the inside for the battery but I knew I had embroidering skills that can be put into use. In addition, an embroidered design would add an appeal to wear the product if the design was customized to the pet owner.
Analysis
After testing the product on myself, the placement of the snap button on the sleeve to turn on the LED light works better and is easier to control than if the button were to be on the collar. The light placement was great and the embroidery complimented the LED light so it did not look like the LED was placed randomly.
The process of putting on the shirt is difficult because of how delicate the thread is and how heavy the battery is. It felt like if the battery were to be yanked on by accident, the circuit would no longer work. To improve this, I believe sewing a pouch on the inside to hold the battery and protect it from movements would be better than taping it. It would be useful to create a product that would attache itself to a shirt rather than the product being a shirt because I realized that I spend a lot of time bonding with my parakeet and it just wouldn't be realistic to wear this shirt every time I am playing with my pet. An attachment would be more useful so that the we would not need to consider a waterproof circuit for when it is time to wash the crewneck.
Overall, this was one of my favorite deliverables so far because of the sewing and this gave me a chance to embroider something on my crewneck as well. I had a lot of funny testing this out with my parakeet who enjoyed the light and did not seem to be bothered by the wiring on me. If there was more time to change my process, I would focus more on incorporating the snap button into the front of the shirt with the design and creating a sustainable circuit that would be easier to maintain if the prototype needed to be washed.