How to Record TRANSFORM’s Moving Pins as Object Supports and Temporary Dividers

Record the scene as one pin field changing height: show which pins support objects, which form temporary dividers, and how their roles change. Pair a fixed-view sketch with an ordered sequence and brief height labels.

What must remain recognizable in the record?

The defining relationship is that the supports and dividers emerge from the same independently moving pin field. Preserve the individual vertical elements, their relative heights, the objects resting against or above them, and the sequence of visible changes. A drawing of separate stands and freestanding partitions would lose that relationship.

MIT Tangible Media Group describes the actual TRANSFORM installation as three dynamic shape displays with more than one thousand pins moving vertically. Its related furniture project explicitly includes holding and moving objects and creating dividers. These primary sources establish the relevant physical arrangement and demonstrated roles; they do not establish the particular layout or order of changes in the scene being recorded. TRANSFORM (https://tangible.media.mit.edu/project/transform/), TRANSFORM as Dynamic and Adaptive Furniture (https://tangible.media.mit.edu/project/transform-as-dynamic-and-adaptive-furniture/)

Begin with a short inventory of visible elements: the pin field, supported objects, raised divider regions, and surrounding lower pins. Keep object names as specific as the available view allows. An indistinct object can remain “object A.” The project’s examples are reference information, not permission to add objects to the record.

How do you establish the geometry without inventing a layout?

Start with the visible boundary of the pin field and the outlines of any objects. Choose one orientation for the record and keep it throughout the sequence. If you use “near,” “far,” “left,” and “right,” define them from that viewpoint. This gives changing pin groups a stable location on the page.

Outline drawing is a suitable starting method: the National Gallery of Art describes contour drawing as using continuous lines to convey an object’s shape. Apply that approach to the field boundary, object silhouettes, and raised regions before adding individual pin divisions. The specific recording procedure here is an adaptation for this scene. Lesson: Drawing Everyday Objects (https://www.nga.gov/educational-resources/lesson-drawing-everyday-objects)

Draw enough repeated pin edges to show that each raised formation consists of discrete elements. Preserve visible steps between neighboring tops. If you simplify a dense area, label it “pin detail simplified” and retain the boundary and height changes that distinguish its shape. Avoid smoothing a stepped formation into a continuous slab.

Use a small supplementary view only when the main view leaves a necessary relationship unclear. A view from above can clarify where a divider runs; a side profile can clarify the heights beneath an object. Label a constructed supplementary view as a diagram, and leave unseen geometry unspecified.

Record the spaces between formations as carefully as the formations themselves. The National Gallery of Ireland’s drawing exercise directs attention to arrangements, interacting shapes, and negative space—the space between objects. For this scene, that means checking gaps between a support and a divider, exposed lower pins around an object, and any visible interruption in a raised band. Drawing Activity: Shapes and Spatial Relations (https://www.nationalgallery.ie/drawing-activity-shapes-and-spatial-relations)

How should relative heights and material relations be shown?

Choose a visible reference level and label other pin tops relative to it. The reference can be a surrounding patch of lower pins; it need not be the mechanism’s lowest possible position. Use words such as “level with,” “above,” and “below” when dimensions are unavailable.

A simple illustrative notation is L for the chosen lower reference, M for an intermediate height, and H for a higher region. These are drawing labels, not measurements or TRANSFORM settings. If several distinct heights matter, add another descriptive level rather than forcing them into three categories.

At each object, record the visible relationship between its underside or edge and the pins. Separate contact you can see from contact hidden by the object. Useful captions include “lower edge meets raised pin tops,” “pins rise beside the object,” and “underside concealed.” An overlap in the drawing alone should not become a claim about an unseen support surface.

Keep the object’s contour separate from the pin boundaries. For material detail, distinguish known construction from visible appearance: MIT’s project credits identify plastic top pins, but that fact does not establish every object’s material, the enclosure’s finish, or the appearance of a particular scene. Record color, sheen, and texture only where available. TRANSFORM project and fabrication credits (https://tangible.media.mit.edu/project/transform/)

How do you distinguish a support from a temporary divider?

Describe the shape and its relationship to nearby objects before assigning a role. For a support, identify which raised pins visibly meet or hold the object and how neighboring heights differ. For a divider, identify the raised band’s path, extent, and position between areas. Height alone does not supply the full description.

Use the following prompts to make the distinction concrete:

• Support region: Which part of the object meets the pins? Are the relevant tops level, stepped, or uneven? Do raised pins sit beneath the object, beside it, or both?

• Divider region: Where does the raised band begin and end? Is it continuous or interrupted? Which visible areas lie on either side?

• Surrounding field: Which neighboring pins remain lower? Is there a gap between the support and divider?

• Role change: Does the same identifiable region change roles, or do different regions perform those roles?

Keep location and role in separate labels. As an illustrative drawing choice, name one region A and another B, then write “A: support” and “B: divider” where applicable. If A later lowers, retain its location label. Renaming it according to every new shape would make it harder to track the same pins through the change.

Use “temporary” precisely. If a divider visibly rises and subsequently lowers, show both events. If its disappearance is not available, record the raised state and leave the ending open. Do not add a return to a flat field merely to finish the sequence.

How do you preserve the complete visible change sequence?

Use a storyboard with one panel for each meaningful change. Stanford’s TeachingWriting resource describes storyboards as segmented frames presenting essential scenes or ideas in sequence. For TRANSFORM, adapt that structure to track geometry: each panel should reveal what changed in the pins, the supported objects, or the divider. Thinking through Storyboards (https://teachingwriting.stanford.edu/thinking-through-storyboards)

Keep the field boundary, viewpoint, object labels, and region labels consistent between panels. Add a panel when a cluster begins rising, an object’s visible contact changes, a divider becomes established, or a formation lowers. Several simultaneous changes can share a panel if their locations and directions remain readable.

The following is an illustrative recording procedure, not a reported order of TRANSFORM’s demonstration:

1. Draw the earliest available state, including any formations already raised.

2. Identify the first visible height change and mark its location.

3. Draw the next state where the changed shape or object relationship becomes clear.

4. Record whether support and divider regions coexist or appear at different times.

5. Continue through every visible lowering, reshaping, or role change.

6. End at the last available state and label any missing transition.

Place movement marks beside the elements they describe. For example, a short upward arrow next to region A can mean “A rises,” while a separate arrow on an object can indicate its observed movement. State that convention once. Do not use an object arrow when only the pins beneath it visibly change.

If the record jumps between states, write “transition not shown.” If two changes are known but their order is uncertain, say so rather than drawing an intermediate panel. Likewise, a still image can establish relative heights and arrangement, but cannot by itself establish which pins rose first or whether a divider later retracted.

What should the finished scene record let someone reconstruct?

Read the panels in order and check whether another reader could locate the same pin groups throughout. They should be able to distinguish an object’s outline from its support, compare the support’s height with surrounding pins, trace the divider’s extent, and identify every recorded change without supplying an unseen step.

Replace broad captions with observable relationships. “The surface changes shape” leaves the essential action unspecified. An illustrative alternative is: “Region A rises above the surrounding pins and meets the object’s lower edge; region B remains lower.” Use that wording only when those relationships match the available scene.

Finish with the last visible arrangement and a short statement of anything unresolved. The completed record should preserve one changing pin field, its distinct heights, its contact with objects, and its temporary dividing formations. Clear boundaries and explicit gaps in the sequence keep the geometry readable without adding a layout or movement that was never established.

Sources

• MIT Tangible Media Group, TRANSFORM (https://tangible.media.mit.edu/project/transform/).

• MIT Tangible Media Group, TRANSFORM as Dynamic and Adaptive Furniture (https://tangible.media.mit.edu/project/transform-as-dynamic-and-adaptive-furniture/).

• National Gallery of Art, Lesson: Drawing Everyday Objects (https://www.nga.gov/educational-resources/lesson-drawing-everyday-objects).

• National Gallery of Ireland, Drawing Activity: Shapes and Spatial Relations (https://www.nationalgallery.ie/drawing-activity-shapes-and-spatial-relations).

• Stanford TeachingWriting, Thinking through Storyboards (https://teachingwriting.stanford.edu/thinking-through-storyboards).