A group of 19 Fontys IT & Media Design students, working in two teams, presented their project results on Monday, January 7th. With cheap and readily available components a prototype was built to make freerunning within the Eindhoven city limits more exciting and more interesting for a larger group of citizens. Connected to the prototype is an online platform for community building. The major feature of the presented prototype is that it is already in a fully operational stage. No work arounds or Wizard-of-Oz techniques were needed.
The prototype enables freerunners to set out custom made circuits in all areas in the city and to monitor participants and their performances. Fontys lecturer Olaf Janssen: "To create this prototype a wide range of components had to be connected in a smart way. This was cleverly done by using low-key and easy to operate LoRa networking units."
Short video on YouTube of The Vitality living lab prototype testing at Strijp-TQ, Eindhoven.
A second prototype was a draft of an interactive playground. This proved to be a far more complicated concept that needed more research and testing.