Martin Skelly
I'm a Creative Tech at Uniform, a leading brand comms agency.
This blog is all about design, digital technologies, electronics, and making stuff.
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Playlist Player
The Playlist Player takes digital music away from the dusty old pc in the study and positions it as a desirable consumer object to accompany a “separate! hi-fi system. The device is based on the rich interactions of vinyl records and turns digital playlists into physical objects that you can touch, treasure, drop, lose or spill beer on.
The insight that sparked this idea was the realisation that people put a lot of time, thought and effort into compiling playlists for occasions, events, special people or moods, but will rarely play it again after the occasion has passed.
There are two parts to the design: the player, and the record box containing five different coloured covers. Once the playlists are chosen and synced to the player with a memory stick, the user customizes the outside of the sleeve with artwork of their choice. It could be photos of a memorable night or person or typed and hand drawn tracklists. Once the record is placed on the player, the music begins and the outer ring of lights illuminates. As the playlists plays rings of light visible through the translucent record move towards the centre of the disc, like a needle tracking on a record. These lights represent time and not the number of tracks, meaning your music must be enjoyed from start to finish with no distractions like the temptation to skip tracks, fast forward or rewind.
