Hairware: Designing Conductive Hair Extensions for Seamless Interfaces

摘要

Due to increasing advances in electronics, devices are getting even more small and powerful, making it possible the widespread of wearable computing. However, most wearable devices have the electronics very distinguished and placed on clothes and accessories. Our proposal is Beauty Technology, a wearable computing subfield that uses the body's surface as an interactive platform by integrating technology into beauty products applied directly to one's skin, fingernails, and hair. This paper presents Hairware, a Beauty Technology that fosters a seamlessly looking approach to wearables. It is artificial hair extensions that are chemically metalized to maintain a natural coloration and when connected to a microcontroller could be used as both, input and output devices. This paper describes the design process in creating these conductive hair extensions and discuses lessons learned in the development of them.