StructCode: Leveraging Fabrication Artifacts to Store Data in Laser-Cut Objects

👉 We introduce StructCode, a technique to store machine-readable data in laser-cut objects using their fabrication artifacts. StructCode modifies the lengths of laser-cut finger joints and/or living hinges to represent bits of information without introducing additional parts or materials. We demonstrate StructCode through use cases for augmenting laser-cut objects with data such as labels, instructions, and narration. We present and evaluate a tag decoding pipeline that is robust to various backgrounds, viewing angles, and wood types. In our mechanical evaluation, we show that StructCodes preserve the structural integrity of laser-cut objects. 📝 Mustafa Doga Dogan, Vivian Hsinyueh Chan, Richard Qi, Grace Tang, Thijs Roumen, and Stefanie Mueller. StructCode: Leveraging Fabrication Artifacts to Store Data in Laser-Cut Objects. In Symposium on Computational Fabrication (SCF ’23), October 08–10, 2023, New York City, NY, USA. ACM, New York, NY, USA, 13 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3623263.3623353 📰 MIT News: https://news.mit.edu/2023/structcode-new-way-integrate-data-physical-objects-1018 🌐 Research page: https://hcie.csail.mit.edu/research/structcode/structcode.html