Here are a few photos that have been sitting in my Sidekick gallery from my last visit to the Lab that I should post before I fly there tomorrow again.

The photos are of V. Michael Bove, Jr., principal investigator of the Object Based Media Group, and grad student Arnaud Pilpre demonstrating Smart Architectural Surfaces (SAS) to me.

SAS is a year-old prototype that functions like a modular video wall on steroids. Any number of sensor-enhanced video panels are snapped together on wall mounts which provide power. Each panel has it's own computer processor, WiFi-card and one or more sensors including a video camera, ultrasonic proximity sensor and speaker. The panels cost about $600 each and have the guts of a PocketPC inside.

One of the first applications is a teleconferencing system that connects the Media Lab in Cambridge, MA to the University of Korea where there is a similar cluster of wall panels. Each panel module scans the network for sister panels that are adjacent to it to know their physical location and make use of any special sensors. In a teleconference, face recognition software acquires a participant's face and passes the video image from panel to panel as they walk past the wall and all this is shared with the sister wall on the other side of the world in Korea.

Michael's group is using SAS as a platform to explore modular "ecosystems" of smart devices, and hopes to cover all the walls of a room with these panels.

I was also shown part of the Build Your Own Bag project. Like the smart wall panels, these experimental 4" square fabric pouches contain smart processors and special functional components that are electrically connected at the edges by patches of conductive velcro that carry data and power. Start with a fabric tile that has battery and stick it to another that has a central processor and the device comes alive. As you add other tiles, they are all registered with each other and work together where applicable. Tile modules can have lights, speakers, sensors, microphones and anything else imaginable create an interactive, reconfigurable contruction. What the team is currently showing is an interactive handbag made of the smart fabric tiles.

Not surprisingly, Michael is now head of the recently formed CELab, a Media Lab research consortium formed to work with consumer electronics companies to implement some of these ideas. PC World has a good interview with Michael.

- mike lee - posting from a traffic jam in delaware that is the resulted from the closing of 295 to philly