Junichi Yamaoka: Creating New Media from Everyday Challenges

The "Future Crafts Project," which I lead, is a research group themed around solving everyday challenges through new forms of manufacturing. We create new media by developing machine tools such as 3D printers and, at times, even the materials themselves. As a "design" laboratory, we do not confine ourselves within the university. Our activities begin by going into the field and listening to the voices of the people there.

One day, a student came to me for advice, saying, "I want to do research related to animals." While I personally enjoy taking my children to the zoo, I had never treated animals as a research subject. "Well, let's start by visiting a site," I said, and we contacted the Yumemigasaki Zoological Park in Kawasaki City, which is close to our campus.

The director welcomed us warmly, but at the same time, he shared a dilemma unique to zoos.

"We want to emphasize the importance of touching the lives of animals, but it is difficult to provide experiences where people actually touch them. It becomes a source of stress for the animals," he explained.

From there, the student's trial-and-error process began. What she eventually created was a device that allows one to feel the "life" of an animal without direct contact. She built a mechanism that expands like a balloon using pneumatic control to reproduce the movement of a heartbeat. To pursue further realism, she attached shed llama wool provided by the zoo to the surface.

The completed device pulses warmly, as if it were truly alive. When we exhibited it at an event in the park, many families were surprised and smiled. When we told them, "This is the llama inside the park," the children stroked the device with a sense of wonder.

Through our daily design research, students take me to worlds I would never have known on my own. "I do Chinese dance, so I want to create costumes for performers." "I'm from Hokkaido, so I want to support the traditional crafts of Ainu patterns."

While I am in a position to teach them research methods, in reality, I am the one learning from them and being shown new worlds every day.