The starting point.
Smart home, smart meter, these terms are sprouting from the floors in the home sector like no other. Everyone wants to live more comfortably and more simply. Everything should be smart and make everyday life easier. Mostly, however, these are lifestyle products, but less about things that inform about the general own consumption. Ok. For the most part understandable – you’d rather be entertained instead of seeing what you’re consuming. I think, however, something fundamental must be changed in this attitude and rather the advantage to be seen, if one understands the own consumption, analyzes and in the best case responsibly can steer.
Searching for the right data.
My concept should be mostly about the own energy budget, it should be prepared data that arise from water and electricity consumption and generation. Therefore, data of the suppliers, costs, and the various influences on the price, the energy network in particular of the suppliers, as well as the own data in the household, through electricity meters, smart meters, etc. are of interest to me. This data should then be put into a meaningful relation, updated in real time and reflect the information in two modes: informative + abstract. Thus, the product can be used as an informative overview and control terminal, but also as regenerative data art to become a lifestyle product.
What is Data Art?
Data art or also referred to as data-driven art is based on data sets and thus conveys emotions. Compared to data visualization, which only visualizes data, or generative art, which creates emotions by chance, the art of creating data art is that it is explained in an understandable and appropriate way. Data art can be many things, from images, videos, interactive works or physical representation, so-called data physicalization can also be encoded sounds or music, this is then called data sonification. But this is relatively difficult, because pleasant tones and a sound spectrum generated by data do not always harmonize.
Next steps.
The next steps will be: Clearly define the concept and also the scope and find out the perfect target group for it. Also, I want to get more familiar with the already existing tools for energy budget measurements and determine which program and tools I need to implement the project.
Tutorials I’ve watched.
