Replace Your Smartphone With These Arcane Amulets

It’s hard not to feel the constant pull on our limited attention from the very interesting rectangles in our pockets and packs. [Antoine Pintout] is fighting against it with three interesting pendants.

The three objects each have functions. Sablier, tells time, but rather than giving the numerals it vibrates on a set interval to give a relative sense of the passage. Boussole is a compass like device which doesn’t tell the cardinal directions. Instead it tells you which way to go in order to get to a pre-set location. The last, Sifflet, is a pager, but rather than sending a text it plays a melody reflecting the sender’s mood.

We love the look of the objects. The circuits are beautifully laid out and showcased in well machined brass cases. Small details abound; in Sifflet for example, the coil antenna is symmetrically presented with its own cutout in the board. Laying out a board is hard enough, but taking this much care in component placement easily doubles the time.

All the files and models are available,  though we’re not sure we possess the craftsmanship to reproduce these to the same standard.

17 thoughts on “Replace Your Smartphone With These Arcane Amulets

  1. Love the craftsmanship and concept. Interesting devices.
    For me the compass like device should contain an actual compass (magnetic probably) too, and as it contains a GPS chip having it give you your co-ords translated to whatever format you ask for would be nice too. Maybe have it vibrate or blink in morse for your lat-long or for the grid square refrence of whichever local map you would be on..
    The timer I’d rather just have a sound/vibrate on a watch/pocket watch, or even just a nice old mechanical watch/pocketwatch without. But its again a lovely looking thing.
    Pretty sure I don’t get the point of that pager thing at all however…

    1. That’s probably the most interesting. Really, it’s just telling you if you should respond or not. That is, depending on how well it can detect the ‘mood’ of the message. I can only image how “GODDAMNNIT WHY AREN’T YOU RESPONDING TO MY TEXTS?!” melody sounds

    2. Thanks for the feedback !
      The compass thing does contain a real compass ;)

      The pager one is not very well defined yet. It is meant to enable communication between two intimate person. When activated, the sound you send to the other person is modulated by moving the device, as you may do with an instrument. The goal is to communicate emotions with sound instead of voice or text. But it has yet to be tested !

      1. Hmm, that would leave me able to only communicate with my Dad.. Nobody else I know will have a clue what the tunes are trying to mean (and while my music library is huge I doubt I’d get what many others are trying to send either) Great movie, and now I see the point of such a device. How much fun that would be as a means of communication with the right recipient..

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