Category: Final Project

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Final Project – The Little Mermaid (Goldberg Machine)

After working on this project for a few weeks and through lots of trial and error, I managed to complete it!

However, there were a few challenges that I faced.

  1. Due to the plastic hose/tubes crossing each other at certain part and being tied to the metal frame, I had to trial and error on how tightly I could tie the tubes to the metal frame as problems like the ball bearing being stuck when it reaches the crossing if the tubes were tied to tightly against each other.
  2. Determining how much water to place in each of the containers as for the metal bucket, it has to be able to sink fully in the water to be able to trigger the pulley system to lift the plastic sphere upwards.
  3. Finding the best height of the wooden base needed for the structure with the metal frame and plastic tubes as the height determines how much force the ball bearing will produce once it drops out when exiting the plastic tubes.
  4. Exploring whats the best distance to tie the pulleys to the wooden stick as I found through trial and error that the distance between the pulleys greatly affects whether the pulley system will be activated when the ball bearing drops into the metal bucket.

Overall, I enjoyed myself while doing this project as it gave me a chance to think about how to link both the motion of the ball bearings to the story but at the same time, this project allowed me to think critically and learn through trial and error to see what works best in order to improve my work during the entire working process.

And thus, I present to you my final project (Image and Video on how it works) – The Little Mermaid (Goldberg Machine)!

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Final Project Research and Process – The Little Mermaid

My final project is based off the story of the Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen. Of which, I did some research on the story and presented my findings in class.

I have chosen the part of the story where the little mermaid jumps in to the sea and gains and immortal soul while the prince sails off in a boat after he got married to the princess.

I decided on portraying the story in the way the ball bearing travels in the artwork.

These are my initial sketches when I was planning for this final project:

I had also planned out 4 main parts for this artwork.

  1. The part where the prince and the little mermaid spends time together – to show that their fates intertwined which I use the crossing of two plastic tubes to portray that as the two ball bearings would travel along the tubes at the same time but pass by each other while they are moving down the tubes.
  2. But they ended up being separated as the prince chose to marry a princess instead of the little mermaid – shown by having one ball bearing exiting from the left and the other from the right.
  3. The little mermaid then jumps into the sea as the prince marries the princess,  but instead of turning into foam, she was given an immortal soul – This is portrayed by having the ball bearing exit on the left, dropping into a small metal bucket which then is lowered into the water in the container through the use of pulleys (representing the little mermaid jumping into the sea) and a plastic sphere moving upwards due to the pulleys (to represent the little mermaid gaining an immortal soul and going to heaven).
  4. The prince marries the princess and moves off in a ship – This is shown by having the other ball bearing representing the prince to exit on the right and then falls into a boat which then moves off

After planning out, I went out to source for materials. Such as the wooden base to place the tall structure with tubes, the containers for the water, wooden sticks, the metal frame to hold the tubes. I did have go out to source certain materials which were not easily sold outside such as a plastic tube/hose that could accommodate the size of the ball bearings and the pulleys. The image below shows the process of my work in progress.

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3D Assignment

My chosen item that was dear to me was my Buddhist charm that I often carry around. Thus I decided to make a small art piece that represented my devotion to my religion and at the same time it created a halo reflection when the light reflects from the water in the curved bottom of the artwork. The metal spiral was representational of the incense that we regularly used during prayer and the halo was often represented in artwork where Buddha is featured in.

Example:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My Final Artwork: