Greetings from Kitty and Andy at Digital Naturalism Laboratories (Dinalab) in Panama! We are a boutique lab that helps field biologists and animal rescue services build tools onsite for interacting with wild animals. We also teach university classes and field workshops; organize and administer large scale conferences; upcycle plastic waste; and host visiting artists, designers, and technologists at our lab in the rainforest.
This is a big recap of fun things we have accomplished in our little lab. There are lots of links to games, software, activities, how-to articles, designs, workshops, and conferences you might find interesting. As always, everything we do at Dinalab is free and open source, so please share and remix!
Also, our lab's original sources of income came from doing consulting and design work, along with leading classes, workshops, and invited talks. Unfortunately a lot of these opportunities kinda evaporated over the Pandemic. If you are interested in hiring us to consult on a project, direct a large event, or teach a class or workshop, we would love to hear from you at info@dinalab.net! (And thanks SOOOO much to those who have helped keep us going by hiring us for consulting gigs and professorial jobs!)
It’s been a very hard couple of years, but we are happy we are still pursuing our vision of a future or curious crafting in nature!
Here’s a quick rundown of some Dinalab achievements to date:
THE PAST FEW YEARS (2019-2021)
Projects
Creating online outreach games for the Smithsonian in English and Spanish
Upcycled over 100 kilograms of plastic garbage for the Gamboa community
Donated upcycled artwork to Adopta Bosque in support of conservation protests against mining
Helped found and run a initiative, “Oleoducto Volunteer Services,” for maintaining important field sites which had been abandoned by the institutions that normally take care of them
Kept 5 bridges maintained and passable on Pipeline Road
Completely rebuilt Juan Grande bridge
Created upcycled signs for trail navigation
Awards/Grants
Conservation X labs grants
360 Camera Trap
Small Insect Sensors
Academic
Invited Talks and Teaching
Harvey Mudd
New Mexico Highlands University
NYU’s ITP camp
Invited talk at ART&&CODE presented by the STUDIO at CMU
Reviewed papers for the Journal of Open Hardware about open source Covid technology
Visiting Professor at the Copenhagen Institute for Interaction Design (https://ciid.dk/)
Field station in Las Cruces 2020
San Jose 2021
Set up and funded an initial round of free public language classes for the Gamboa community
LAST YEAR - 2022
Service
Dinalab functioned as a free, anarchist community Rapid Testing covid clinic, giving out over 300 COVID tests in 2022. In Panama, it is illegal to sell at-home covid tests (many speculate this was to keep money going to the expensive clinics). As a result, many folks were not testing because they couldn’t afford paying $50-$90 for a test (it was also difficult to find rides to clinics in the city(. We also helped identify many people who had no symptoms but were actually contagious.
Thanks to all the people who donated tests while visiting Panama!
In 2022, we raised more than $4600 in donations to the APPC animal rescue from upcycled artwork created by Kitty.
Worked on an open-source automatic light trap for insects for Earthshot Labs
https://www.earthshot.eco/
Academic
Taught at the Copenhagen Institute for Interaction Design
3-week capstone field course in La Selva
Taught at the Glasgow School of Art
Forres field site 2022
Dinalab work cited in “Ultimate Guide to Informed Wearable Technology” by Christine Farion
Reviewed papers for the Journal of Open Hardware
THIS YEAR - 2023
What happens in 2023 is partially up to you! Thanks for checking out the fun things we have been up to and maybe we will collaborate or adventure together soon!
Right now is when Andy would have put together his Tenure application when he was working as a professor, but hopefully he'll manage to get tenure at Dinalab!
