On Tuesday night, Innovation Lab held an exhibition at the Bruce Museum. For the exhibition I displayed my infinity mirror with an Epsom salt painting. Through this project I had up hill battles scattered with moments of ease. In the beginning I wasn’t sure how to create my flag until I figured out how to use the sin equations. Once I learned the equations I was able to complete my flag easily. Then I had to decide what I would do for my physical piece which was harder than I had anticipated. I knew that I had to have a chemical change but I wasn’t sure how I was going to do it. I didn’t want to do something that was too easy and I knew how to do, I wanted to try something new. I saw someone making crystals and decided that that’s what I wanted to do but I wasn’t sure how I was going to display it. I looked at different forms of paints, sculptures and lighting until I found the infinity mirror.
I decided that an infinity mirror would be the best way to display my image because I would be able to put my image inside of the mirror. Then it was just a matter of making an infinity mirror. I wasn’t sure how it worked so I searched the internet until I found a tutorial of how to make one and how it works. I rounded up the materials and got to work. Through trial and error I got my final design. I had everything finished and brought it in to school just to find out that the stands that we were going to use were not strong enough to support the heavy mirror. I had to run to the wood shop and build a stand from scratch. I cut three pieces of wood and screwed it all together which turned out to be perfect. Finally everything was ready to go and I was able to set it up in the Bruce Museum.
Through this project I learned many things about myself. I knew that I was strong with the building portion of this project but what I didn’t know was that I was very skilled with the Desmos graphing calculator. I also found out that I am more skilled with electronics than I previously thought and believed. I was able to take a broken strip of LED lights and turn them into a fully functional set of lights with quick disconnects to change colors. I also found out that I have many weaknesses. I often don’t manage my time properly which hurts me in the long run. I saw that I had two and a half months to complete my project so I didn’t work as fast as I wish I had. At the time, I didn’t realize how much of my schedule was going to be taken up by hockey and other obligations. After the first week of the project and the clock hit 2:15 on Friday I was already 30 minutes into what would become a 43 hour weekend of hockey. I got off to a slow start with my image which delayed my physical piece. If I spent more time with my physical piece I believe that it would have come out better. I would have liked to have larger crystals and tidy up the lights a bit more, but I am still happy with how the piece came out.
When I saw what other InLab students were making I realized that my project was not the best nor the worst, with some projects I wasn’t able to completely see what the chemical change was and others were very clear to me. with mine you could see the crystals but they were not nearly as big as I had hoped for. I had mixed feelings about my project, I felt that some aspects of my project were well constructed but some were not crafted as well. For the short amount of time that I was at the exhibition I feel that the overall experience was a great learning experience for not only myself but other students and teachers.
To view my in class research and Desmos image click the links below
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