Nov 27

Nov 27 E ink Research

E ink Research: Architectural Application of Digital Papers

Humphrey Yang, Chia Ching Yen, Kane Yanagawa, Jia-You Lee, Cheng Luen Hsueh

Role: Project Management, Machine Design, Physical Prototyping, Conceptualization

By adopting the Design by Research ( by Design) methodology, we reimagine the digital papers into analogous displays to create a modular system. This project leverages wireless communication and power delivery to create concealed E ink tiles. We customized a gantry system to demonstrate the use case of this system.

Origin

This project is a joint research and development effort between NCKU and E ink. Invented in the MIT media lab about two decades ago, E ink is by far exclusively used for display panels, specifically indoor devices. To kick-off the research and to better understand the material properties, we adopt digital papers in several architectural design projects.

Research by Design

Through several architectural design attempts, our team realized that the biggest weakness of digital papers is moisture. Outdoor deployment of E ink is particularly challenging due to precipitation, even more so in the humid climate of Taiwan. To resolve this, we propose to use induction coils to drive the digital paper, such that the display end can be packaged into a perfectly enclosed package.

Design by Research

Prototyping

In order to illustrate the concept of magnetic induction tiles to the company and to further explore the system’s limits and potential, we designed a prototype to demonstrate and examine the idea.

The affector end is a gantry system driven and controlled by an Arduino Mega board reading G-code. We hacked the firmware (Marlin) by inserting codes to switch on/off the transmission coil and to trigger the color change of tiles. In addition to the machine, we have also composed a proprietary slicer to plan and compose the G-code files.

We used a hobbyist 3D printer for fabrication and took printing directions into account for optimal structural strength and convenience of assembly. Parts are designed to be exchangeable and the machine is easy to repurpose for other applications.