Howdy! Time for another installment;
I'm not sure if this has been discussed elsewhere before, though surely thousands have already thought of it... Murphys law of ideas on the internet: chances are if you can think of it, somebody else already has, and has put it on the internet...
Lets waffle a little about futures fashions;
specifically, smart fabrics, composite materials and effects... digital clothing.
We'll consider at the front of mind the ERoEI implications of this sort of stuff as well,
So, we've already seen raspberry pis and smaller and smaller chips, fabrics and smart fabrics, multi-modal LED/MED emitters... we've seen simple scrolling effects...
but, have we seen the cartoons from the 50s yet become reality?
- have we seen loop/hoop skirts that do not in any way actually 'touch' a person become reality? (some nice maglev like effects at apparently low and non-lethal/interfering voltages etc... some superconductors/monopole and gravity exploits, such as orbiting rings etc).
Can 'emotive clothing' become a reality? Variable geometry clothing? (imagine spray-on non-newtonian clothes which ALSO have variable geometry capabilities and different refraction indicies...)
Im envisaging more than novelty gear, more than the Kaku clothes and smart glasses of the near future... I'm envisaging 'organic' clothing that allows people to have an ethereal breeze around them in clothing form for visual effects if they wish. Im envisaging clothes that do what nike shoes did in back to the future: clothes that put themselves onto people who can't or dont want to dress themselves.
I'm envisaging clothing that can reflect your mood visually (not like the hocum mood rings heh): jelly fish for : im floating around the room calmly, storm/hurricane for "I'm sick of breaking up with you! We're over!"
I'm envisaging clothes that flap or point intuitively and expressively: like My Favorite Martians zootsuit. can it be done now? How much would such a thing cost - ERoEI wise and monetarily?
How dangerous or fragile would such a thing be?
I think there are ways we can integrate technology now, and have begun drafting patents (if the big indie and mainstream fashion companies havent already)
We can integrate small smart fabric circuits and solar panels and use that as the basis for our costume/outfit.
We'll use mylar ionisation strips or nitinol to physically move the clothing at crucially 'safe' parameters (so as to not electrocute people, cause ill effects or interfere with any nearby electronic equipment). we stitch the nitinol into a seam/pouch, and we use stretchy lightweight synthetic fabrics: stretchy because we want the product to have some give in it for our variable geometries...
We attach the smart fabric battery and circuitry to the nitinol strip: this costume will be hard-wired and hardware only, later there might be software to finetune it all...
Imagine self-flapping tuxedo, lightly flapping as if in a breeze: WHEN NO BREEZE IS AROUND! it would scream: I've got money, I'm defying nature... attention to me please...
I think these are different substantially from say novelty ties of the past...
much more interesting at least.
Getting clothes to have no connection and be a superconductor/suspended from a smart fabric surface is going to be trickier... especially if the fabric surface also has variable geometry... not to mention requiring more rare-earths and power sources/materials...
It can be done though at present, with minimal safety risk to the science/fashion model wearing it!
Many scientists can be beautiful people as well: I think if science and fashion/the arts come together and collaborate again, we can have another renaissance of awesome (we'll need to have one soonish if we want to exceed the present limitations etc...).
It'd be a great win-win: the serious scientists, who are coincidentally beautiful, can take some of their downtime to also be a fashion model - breaking stereotypes of science and bringing science to more people. Simultaneously, hopefully it raises awareness of the scientists profile - (more than the losses/negatives of 'this scientist is associated with 'quakery') - and so they can get their serious work done faster, cheaper AND look awesome while doing it!
I've been inspired in part by various novelty clothes (via Grand Illusions on Youtube)
partly by Thunderfoot and Gilesfilbrond (Giles is a brilliant practical fellow who shares and encourages wonderment and exploration).
Partly by Kaku - very far-seeing futurist and all round wise/enlightened fellow.
partly by Dr Nakamats (brilliant man, somewhere between a John Hutchison and a modern Da Vinci),
partly by many recent rapid funding cuts worldwide into substantial inroads in science in favor of military-industrial paperweights (how many weapons do we need?)
and partly by modern fashion cycle - which so often repeats and repeats and repeats... Clothing can be seasonal and cyclic, but it need not be: that construct is an artifact and a limitation stemming from ERoEI etc...
I look forward to sharing more with you or to discuss this concept further;
where do you see eutopian futures fashions heading inside the next 50years?
is there a way in which cutting edge fashion, science, and sustainability can be brought together?
PS:
Imagine the uses as an animatronic stageprop for places like taylormadeclips etc:
variable geometry clothing would likely start there as a niche subset before becoming widespread I intuit: such variable geometry clothing might lend more verisimilitude to the VFX that film projects strive to achieve...
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