Seduce the Train
Album

The Eniarof week, during which Seduce the Train was made, started by exploring materials that everyone had brought with them. / Photo by Efest

My attention was caught by a model train, which no-one else seemed to be interested in. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

I thought it would be fun to have two players move the train with seductive hand gestures. A pair of abandoned 'Essential Reality P5 gloves' were perfect for this. Here they are being disassembled, as I wanted to use only parts of them. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The 'cyber gloves' contained flex sensors in the fingers, which change electric resistance when bent. Here I'm investigating the changes in resistance. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

I bought a pair of comfortable, medium-sized fabric gloves and sew the bend sensors on them. The idea was to use only the index finger for moving the train, so the sensor was placed on this finger. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

I planned to use a straight train track, which would have two stations at each end. Here the station huts are being built from a cardboard box, which seemed to have contained mangoes. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

Just like the gloves, the stations were colour-coded in orange and green for the two players. Here the station roof is being decorated in traditional German style. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The finished station at the end of the train track. As the train arrives to the station, it presses the big arcade button, signalling to an Arduino that it's the other player's turn. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

Here's the Arduino Uno used for the game along with the messy wiring. In addition to being connected to the gloves and stations, it was connected to a dual H-Bridge motor driver, which was in turn connected to the train tracks for moving the train. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The Arduino and the rest of the wire mess were hidden in a tape-decorated lunch box. Colored LEDs were added to signal which player's turn it is. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The train needed also passengers. I found these two lovely ladies in a little general store during our first evening in Tunis and was very happy to find use for them. Special thanks to Sophie for styling the ladies! / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

On the opening day we also made with Niklas a tape-art sign for the game. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

Testing train seduction. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

Here is the whole Eniarof #22 group. We were all sad to leave Tunis! / Photo by Antonin Fourneau

After arriving back to Berlin I made an improved version of the game. First I ordered a proper 'Fleischmann 4335' Deutsche Bahn locomotive, as the cheap toy train that I used earlier had some contact issues with the rails. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

I also got some Fleischmann train track pieces. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The passengers were of course saved from the old train. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The old cyber glove bend sensors were also somewhat noisy, so I bought two new ones. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

Screenshot of the Arduino IDE serial plotter, which shows how bend sensor input (blue line, bottom) is turned into pulses that indicate when finger has moved from straight to bent (purple spikes). The pulses increase train speed (PWM, top lines), but the speed also decays, so one has to keep bending the finger in order to get the train moving fast. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The new bend sensors were integrated into the old gloves, which also got some new decoration. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

Already in Tunis I planned to add a timer display to the game, but ran out of time. So it became part of the new version. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The display shows elapsed time for each player since the train hits the button on the opponent's station. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

The final schematic for the game. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

I noticed in Tunis that it amuses the players if there is a bit of a show around the game, so for Paris I prepared a train conductor costume and also a high score list. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

Playing in Paris. Players of all ages seemed to enjoy the game. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

Players who managed to get the train to their station in about 10 seconds or less, got their name on the high score list. The fastest times were only about four or even three seconds, in which case the players also got a medal. / CC BY Kati Hyyppä

These three siblings were all the time on the high score list and played until the last evening. They're real train seduction champions! / CC BY Kati Hyyppä