Prototype Appraisal

My laptop is back and running! This week, it was really nice seeing different projects of everyone. I was surprised that there were so many things that can be done. I only used servos, microphone and ultrasonic sensor but there were colorful lights, beautiful screen displays and even technology to "hack" the television and laptop.

From the feedback I received, they said that the noise that the servos make when moving was too loud which might effect the experience of interacting with it. I think it is because I got cheap, analog servos instead of digital ones. I won't be able to do anything about it but I kind of like the sound it makes, the old, traditional robot sound. Suggestions were also given that instead of using a microphone piece, I can use my laptop and Unity speech recognition. I will definitely look into that and integrate it in Spud.

Prototype

Video

For my video, I first drew storyboards for each part and wrote down my script. I then asked my housemates for help with interacting with Spud while I recorded the video with the iPad. We had a lot of fun doing that and they kept laughing at the gestures Spud makes. I then took all the video clips and edited them into a video with Adobe Premier Rush and did a voice over.

Work to be done

I have to do user testing on the movement of Spud to obtain feedback on how to improve it to provide a good user experience. Then start to work on second phase of implementing the distance sensing, volume detection and speech recognition in Spud.

Reflection of the prototype:

Having read the comments of my video, there are many things that is helpful.

communication

Well, first of all, I'm really glad that my communication with the video has been praised by other classmates. I actually was concerned about it as I have put a lot of things into the video. Turns out, it works well. But having watched others' videos, I think I still need to focus on some of the size and sharpness of the images.

concept

My audiences have raised the question about the concept. The original aim is to help the housework, but we might put too much effort into the game itself rather than thinking of whether it is helpful. With two modes and a collection system, I think the game might be too complicated and could influence the housework itself. As the main aim is to improve the experience of doing housework, it might be better to focus on the housework again. I might go deeper with the PVP and PVE mode. As said by another team, finding out what the teenagers really like would be helpful.

Moreover, I have not thought about the mis-scan during the housework, so, thanks for pointing that out. But now, as I would focus more on simplifying the game, I would not pay too much attention to the collection system.

technique

I have been working with Vuforia for several weeks. From the experience and tutorial on the website so far, it is really hard to use it to make a dynamic game. So, I'm concerned about the final experience. The collapse of the AR objects is hard to simulate by using image target and when using the plane ground, it would require a long time to react on the screen. What’s more, the ball always goes through the racket because the computer needs some time to calculate. Thus, I have to control the speed of the ball to make sure there is enough time for calculating. And as the speed of the ball would not be too quick, the possibility of damaging would also be decreased.

The tutor has advised using Accelerometer. Having watched the tutorial, I think it might require too much movement on the human body, which I'm concerned would influence the housework. Thus, I would put it as a third choice.

From other teams concept

From the other's video, I have learned something about communication. First of all, it is interesting to make the video interesting. While now we are compelled to watch the video carefully, The video would not be paid attention to of the investors in the future if it is not attractive enough. I really interested in the fourth video of CDI because of the beginning. The second video of CDI gives a timeline of the whole video which is also helpful. However, some of the videos have using stationary images for a long time, and it is easy for me to lose some of the content.

My next plan

Considering the final submission would be in week 14, I plan to end all the work at the end of week 13. And I shall reserve a week's time for building and writing the portfolio.

prototype

There are two weeks for the prototype.

• one week to try the projector

Actually, I still want to try the projector. Having to rethink the control mode, I would use a function that can help the housework. So, now I'm planning to detect the speed to control the racket. I need to use rather a speed sensor or a distance sensor.

• one week to adjust it if successful

if the projector works well, I would definitely go with this, but need to think about the monster and the connection between players. I mean, the data transform.

• one week to adjust the Virtual button if not successful

If the projector does not work, I would still work on the ar. But, because of the weakness of the physical collapse, I would prefer to use virtual buttons to control the rackets. The game would require less movement if I use this. The place that shows the virtual buttons could be space that is still dirty.

portfolio

last week is for the portfolio. I have made the portfolio last semester for DECO7180. While it focuses more on the web building, I would use the frame of it and change the content. The work would be more on writing.

Reflection

During this week, we critique each other on miro. We got some useful and practical feedback and inspired by some works. I will continue to optimize the work by this feedback.

Change log base on the critique

The critiques I received:

1. Why people of different ages and genders do not like to do housework.
2. Have you considered the safety of each space? In addition to the kitchen, other spaces may also have some valuable and fragile items. How to ensure that these items are not touched during the game is a question worth thinking about.
3. Consider whether using games to do housework will affect the quality of housework. For example, if the user sweeps the ground in a game, will there still be some unswept ground at the end of the game?
4. The use method is a little complicated. Please consider how to make this product easier for users to learn.
5. The voice stays at the same tone the entire time and doesn’t fluctuate when you move onto a new topic.
6. Could you somehow make an avatar for each player?
7. We recommend that it may increase the motivation to use the product is a daily mission system like other mobile games.
8. Mention what features of the concept and prototype you have contributed before introducing the prototype.
9. How your work is related to/ contribute to the deeper exploration of the team domain is unclear.
10. For users who have never used your system or similar systems before, they might not able to correctly interact with your system

The corresponding solutions:

1. Do more research on why people do not like to do housework on different ages and genders.
2. Plan a safe area in advance, and just set the target images in this zone.

Prompt the user to check in advance whether there are dangerous objects in the selected area before cleaning.

·PvP mode: the main zone should be considered because it is more fierce than the PvE mode. Empty space should be planned in advance to let people prevent bumps.

·PvE mode:This area is safer than PvP mode because the players do not need to move too much. Its solution will be the same as the PvP mode.

·Colelction system:Some objects that are easy to move or sharp need to be deleted. For example, unstable chairs need to be replaced with safer sofas and cups with shoe cabinets (to be determined). Try to select large stable targets as target images.

1. Each game only selects a part of the area to ensure the cleaning efficiency as much as possible.
2. Try to let users use only one operation to achieve their goals. For example, when changing the shape of the ball, change it directly, no longer set confirmation operation.
3. In the next record, my voice will be more emotional and change the tone according to the content.
4. Avatar is acceptable, but consider the complexity of the game operation and uploading target pictures is too troublesome. We will preset multiple avatars in advance, each randomly generated in the game. This will not only enrich the gameplay but also make the player feel that the game is not too complicated.
5. The daily mission system is a good idea, I have considered it, but it is too complicated to be suitable for the AR game. In addition, I think that daily tasks could make players resist the game, so I set up that the player only needs to log in every day to get rewards.
6. Actually I have marked it in the video by words, but I will use voice to emphasize it next time.
7. I think I have mentioned it clearly in my report. I focus on continuous motivation about doing housework. In detail, I mainly work on the collection system of the game and a part of the PvP game. These two areas are interconnected and contain each other. More elements of PvP would be mentioned in the next report.
8. Since this is an exploratory AR game, especially the collection system, it is good for players to have some unknowns, but we will also provide some beginner's guide before the game, and then they just need to touch the objects in the first game. In the next games, they will be very familiar with the meaning of related game item locks.

Research

Impact of utilizing multimedia technologies on enhancing the effectiveness of teaching children at early stages.

Multimedia technologies

Learn math through visuals approach can enhance students’ understanding of mathematical concepts.

Visuals approach

Interview link:

Interview

Critique

Our group has done critique of other group's prototype. We have watched the video and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each prototype. There are some interesting concepts such as the group Hedgehog, the idea of developing video games through auditory output is good, the game is engaging and funny. However, some of them have not presented much research which is related to the problem space.

Link

Work done

I previously make the audio output by encoding audio data, but the Arduino IDE doesn't support the file size of encoded audio data and the audio quality is not good.

To improve the quality of the audio output, I used DFplayer module to store the audio file, and it loads the audio data to the speaker module, it helps increase the storage and the audio quality is improved.

User research

During this week, and completed the rest of user research, adjust the AR function, and the individual report.

Affinity diagram

I have extracted some information from interviews, probes, and questionnaires. Then I generated the infinity diagram. From this picture, we can see the motivation and disincentive of the participants clearly. Based on these points, we can utilize the motivation and avoid the disincentive in our design. For example, we find that target users generally lack the motivation to do housework for some reason, such as tired of repeated housework, uneven division of labor or feel lonely when doing alone, and the continuity of his motivation is low.

We use the PVP mode to increase competitiveness. In this mode, the person who wins will indulge in a sense of superiority, and the person who loses will want to win back again so that the player has the motivation to continue playing.

Some participants feel lonely when doing housework alone, so the game needs a cooperation mode, which is the PvE mode of fighting monsters in cooperation. The monster will be clean when players win the game. Some participants "like the feeling of making things clean", which just fits their psychology.

In addition, we integrate all of the existing systems into the collection system. This system will be mentioned in My focus part.

Interaction plan

We generated three interaction structures: PvP interaction structure, PvE interaction structure, and the collection system interaction structure.

My focus is on the collection system. When the player blocks the virtual button, enter the next level of the menu, such as product detail / Ball appearance/sound options.

All of the elements are hidden in some objects at home. When the camera scans the object, they will get game items connected with the object. For example, when they scan the watch, they will get an accelerator. They can press the detail button to the next menu and view the details.

I also use a similar method to cope with appearance and sound props.

AR function

All AR elements are based on the principle of identifying the target pictures and then presenting the virtual image in the interface.

Star and finish the game

Based on this principle, we set the user to start and end the game through gestures and standing positions.

Start the game

The start function has two modes: PvP and PvE.

When users stand separately, they start PvP mode.

When users stand in a row, they start PvE mode.

Finish the game

When two users show the same thumb gesture, the game is over.

My focus

As I mentioned above, I focus on the collection system.

This collection system can greatly increase the exploratory nature of the game and reduce the dependence on indoor space. Players can also explore together to solve the psychology of feeling lonely when they are unaccompanied. These categories can be achieved by exploring objects in the home, simplifying the game The form meets the needs of "game should not affect me too much".

When players find hidden objects, they will have a sense of achievement, which will provide them with continuous motivation. In addition, players have high requirements for sound and visual effects, so I let players collect sound and item appearance through the collection system. For example, when the player scans the golf ball, he will get the option to change the appearance of the ball to it.

Work done & Reflection

This week is mainly appraisal. Our group watched videos and documents from HiDistinction, Hand Gang and ZooKeeper. Some of them inspired me. For example, Kasey used 3D printing to make the shell is very pleasant. Although the technology behind is not complicated, the effect after careful design is very good. The hand made by Ryan is also very interesting. Although the function is not yet complete, it shows a strong playful attribute. If we take classes offline, we may experience these prototypes up close.

It also made me think more. My thesis is also making deign project for environmental protection and energy saving, and some literature I read about points out that people are easy to feel guilty in the negative feedback of energy saving and finally sacrifice their comfort. In the end they would stop using such products quickly. Therefore, we should try our best to provide positive feedback to users to encourage them to protect environment. I found some connection between my project and ZooKepper’s work, so I also fed this view to them. But this is a more conceptual suggestion. I wonder if giving this advice in the 10th week can really help.

In addition, I also saw Matt's decompression device, which was made using materials that are easy to find in life, such as roll paper. This also reminds me that I use a hanger to fix the display. This semester everyone is constantly developing in simplicity. But if there is a chance, I still want to make a good-looking shell for my device to present it to users more meticulously.

Finally, we discussed the final exhibition. I suddenly thought that my device, as a wearable device, has a small display screen and can only be seen by the user. This can be a challenge when stream online, because audiences on the other side of the screen may be difficult understanding what is happening. An alternative approach is that I may be able to connect my prototype to the computer with a cable and make a simulated display and show it to the audience, or I can find a way to hang a camera behind my head. I personally prefer the former.

Looking at feedback

New week! We started the Monday by looking at the feedback we got as a team. Prior to the the meeting I also looked at my individual feedback and made notes on what I wanted to change or do before the final deliverable.

I think we, and me individually, got some very useful feedback, and some not very useful. For one of the teams, I only got my questions answered and nothing else. But, all in all, I got even more feedback for what I should do with the colour adjustments, but I'm actually still not sure exactly what I'm gonna do with it. But, I have more to go off now. I definitely want to look at implement the haptic feedback further, as this was mentioned as everyone to be a good thing.

With the team we decided that we were going to try to put everything together, and then after that work on some individual parts. To make sure it was still valuable to put it together we had a round to discuss if it was necessary. In the end, we agreed that putting it all together would make it easier to display the full functionality of the prototype, and better the "proof of concept" feel, as opposed to having different parts doing different things. We agreed on having this as a main focus, as we didn't know how long it would take.. If we did opposite, worked on our individual improvements first, we might end up being very cramped on putting it all together, which would be less than ideal.

Plan for these next weeks are to meet on Friday to put everything together, and depending on how long that takes (might end up being a long and cumbersome process), we will plan the rest more in detail. But, we roughly agreed to spend around 1 1/2 weeks on putting it together and 1 1/2 weeks on our own individual implementations.

This week

This week I will be working on finishing the haptic feedback I started on Friday, and then meet with the group on Friday. If I have time, I'll start exploring the colour adjustments as well!

What did we do this week?

For this week, we have successfully submitted all of our prototypes and I am so glad that we have managed to finish everything despite having tons of assignments. I was amazed to see all the cool and interesting prototypes that my classmates have produced, and we were tasked to give prototype appraisals for a few of the teams. For team critiques, our team decided to watch the videos together and discuss the strengths and weaknesses for each individual’s prototype and integrating our feedbacks together. Most of the videos were done pretty well, however, there were some videos that didn’t explain the concept in detail and luckily there was the prototype documentation to help us understand the concept better.

Reflection

I went through all of the commands for my prototype video and summarise what I think that is important to improve for my prototype. One of major concerns that I need to look into is how I can improve teaching concentration for my target users as I do agree with Team Twisted that my interaction mode requires users to work with precision and coordination. I will have to do more research regarding this problem and also getting more feedback from contextual inquiry. Having colour randomisation to ensure my target audiences learns about colour will be my main goal for the upcoming prototype.

• Positive reward that encourages them to keep going and that they are doing well (More audio feedback introduces to reward users when the user correctly removes the bees)
• Teaching concentration of young age is not really talked about that much
• Colour sensor is quite disjointed from the main interaction and ways to integrate the colour theory element seamlessly should be explored.
• Colour randomisation to ensure learning as opposed to memorisation
• Shapes could also be introduced to enhance the complexity and learning outcomes for users
• Different users could be assigned different tasks which could encourage teamwork and consequently enhance the user’s communication and problem-solving skills
• More of a concentration exercise rather than helping kids to learn about colours

What is my plan for this week?

• Discussing with my team on how we can integrate our prototype together

Before Submission

By Tuesday, we had all delivered our prototype documents and uploaded the videos. I did most of my video and document last week but made some last changes on Monday. Given that our team chose to build separate parts of the same concept, as explained in previous posts, we also found it most useful to create a team-based video and include that in our videos. Looking at the finished video, I believe it turned out quite good and that we did well in creating the team-based video. Everything revolving the video and document took much longer than I expected, so for the last couple of weeks, I have focused more on PhysComp than my thesis.

Tuesday and out

From Tuesday and out, we focused solely on writing our feedback to the other teams, responding to the few questions we got and starting to look over the feedback we received. After meeting up for the studio on Tuesday, we all gathered and started to write out feedback. First, we tried to have one person share their screen and watch the videos together like so, to be able to play and pause along the way to comment. However, we quickly found this ineffective and started to watch the videos on our own and then meet up between videos to read the documents, discuss them and come up with rough bullet points with feedback. For the first group, we started to write summaries of our bullet points before going to the next person's video. For the second team, we just wrote down bullet points from the video and documents, discussed them to come up with more and then moved on. Before starting on the third group some members of the team wanted a break, and some wanted to go on. After discussing for a bit, we came up with an asynchronous solution where two of us, Thomas and I, continued to the last group straight away and the two others to come back and do their review of the last group later. Moreover, Thomas and I were to summarise the comments for the second group as everyone had already written their comments for them and then Tuva and Marie could summarise the third group when they reviewed them later that day. In my opinion, this solution worked much better and was more effective. We decided to go through all summaries after Thursday's workshop, before commenting on Miro.

For the rest of the week, I had to focus on my master thesis given that I had focused on PhysComp for a long time and had to pick up the slack on the thesis. Besides the feedback, this week was quite uneventful.

This week we finally presented our prototype and the individual parts that we had been working on. Making the video for both the team and myself took a lot more effort than I had anticipated but I was quite satisfied with it in the end and was eager to show it and get feedback. I also managed to deliver in good time before it was due which always feels nice.

Writing the appraisals

On Tuesday we first had some administrative information before we could start on the appraisal. After, my team and I decided to go right ahead and start so we could be finished as soon as possible. We organised it so we first watched the video together and then read the document for that video. After, we discussed everything together and wrote bullet points with feedback individually. Everything we could think of we wrote down. After we had finished the first team we divided the videos between us and wrote a summary of the bullet points. After working for approximately 5 hours we had managed to see all the videos for 2 teams and written 3 summaries. However, at this point, some of the teammates (especially me) had lost a bit of motivation and concentration so we decided that we would do the rest at our own pace as long as we were done by Thursday. I finished the last 4 videos and wrote the bullet points later that day. When everyone had gone through the videos and written their bullet points I wrote the final two summaries that were assigned to me. Overall, I think I spent 7 hours doing the appraisals when I add the ones we did together and the ones I did alone. This took a lot longer and more work than I anticipated but both me and my team wanted to be thorough and give full and constructive critique to every individual from every team.

The Miro board looks full of feedback and comments

Reflection

When it comes to the videos and prototypes themselves they were very different from each other in terms of how much each team member had done, how easy it was to understand and interpret and overall quality of the video. After some of the videos both me and my team was only left with a huge question mark since we hadn't understood the concept and what it was they were trying to display. Often the document helped to answer with some of the initial questions but where we felt there was a lack of communication to the audience we had to include it in the feedback.

Overall, I was impressed with many of the videos that we reviewed and how much work some of our classmates had been able to do in such a short amount of time. It was really fun to see what people had been working on and how they solved the issues that had occurred along the way. I'm excited to see the fully developed prototypes in the exhibit and hopefully will be happy with the one I will be presenting as well.

Prototype deliverable:

This week I submitted the prototype video and documentation. Overall, I was very happy with the stage my prototype was at for submission and feel that my documentation and video displayed my concept and progress well.

My demonstration video is linked below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3ie_xcnnZo

My current prototype provides a pretty accurate depiction of the final intended functionality and form, apart from being on a smaller scale. My colour mixing was very time consuming due to the method I used, although I wasn't able to get any more efficient methods working in time.

Next week, I am going to find some more ways to do this, probably using an equation to mix the chosen colours. If not, I will continue with the method of manually inputting each outcome colour for a selection. I will also focus on making a more durable, larger mat to more accurately display the intended form. I also need to purchase some more wire so that the sensors can be extended to reach each colour pad on the larger mat.

One issue I can foresee is my lack of a large screen to match the upscaled prototype. I have been using a Microsoft Surface up until now for the screen which worked well with the A4 sized mat. I may have to compromise the final form of the concept due to this issue and may not even have access to the Surface for the final submission as it is not my own device. I have talked to Alison and Clay about this issue and they said that as long as I can somewhat convey the intended interaction it is completely fine.

I did a drawing to depict the intended final form of the prototype so that I could visualise each element and start planning how I wanted to make the mat:

I have also been looking in to some existing "interactive mats" and found a really interesting one that is an interactive yoga mat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nNzJNcSu_s. I love the lights incorporated into the mat and how they provide instant feedback based on the users movement. While I might not end up building a similar concept, it really inspired me and broadened my view of the possibilities for an interactive mat concept.

Appraisals:

This week in both the studio and workshop we worked on our team appraisals. My team, Twisted, started by watching through all the videos and writing our individual comments in a spreadsheet. We then assigned an equal amount of critiques per member to be written up based off the collective comments. I thought all of the concepts were very innovative and fit well into the studio and individual team domains. It was really cool to see everyone else's interpretation of the studio and team domains as thus far, I have only really been exposed to my teammates concepts which all focus on the same theme of creative learning.

My appraisals:

I found that the appraisals I received on my prototype were very helpful and identified some very insightful points that I have failed to identify myself. The main points of feedback I received are as follows:

Appraisal 1:

- Your overall concept might be too complex for a younger child, maybe this is something you can test

- The prototype is heading the right direction but it might need to be adapted to something that a child can use with very little to no knowledge about colours

- The demo made us ask a few things, what if the kids started drawing different shapes at the same time? Will the colours get mixed up? How does the system handle it?

- It wasn’t very clear on how this concept can teach kids about colour. Finding a way to measure what they learnt might be beneficial for preschool teachers to know if their students have learned anything.

I found these suggestions very helpful and will try to implement them as best as possible. However, due to a lack of resources, skills and money, some of these will not be able to be implemented. With regard to the system being too complex for the young audience, I have tested it with children in the target age range and they were able to successfully understand the interaction and complete given tasks. If possible, I would complete testing on a wider range of target users but due to restrictions I cannot see any way to do so. Children currently don’t need any pre-existing knowledge of colours, and from testing, it has been observed that children will explore the system and manage to learn how to use it themselves.

With the questions around the technical issue of multiple users drawing at the same time, the current functionality is so for a couple of reasons. Firstly, with the resources available to me, the drawing feature only allows for one user to draw at a time. Furthermore, this has been decided to enhance the collaborative focus of the concept. If children could individually draw their own images, they are likely to keep an individual focus instead of working together on one subject. As there is only one mat, this could also lead to disputes over who gets to colour their image first.

Finally, the concept teaches colour through providing students with the platform to explore primary colours and the results that come when they are mixed. E.g if they step on blue and yellow at the same time they realise that this makes green. Although this seems simple, it is a critical step in visual art education to learn how primary colours can be mixed to create other colours. Measuring this objective was outlined in my documentation where I noted that teachers could ensure learning through testing students on their knowledge, asking students to list what colours would go into a final colour option.

Some of these suggestions hint to me that my demonstration was not clear enough in some aspects. Potentially, the video alone was not enough to convey the nuances of my concept design which is understandable. I feel that if my documentation was read as well, understanding of my concept and the rationale behind decisions would be clearer.

Appraisal 2:

- One team member suggested that the current functionality only works for one element to be coloured at a time.

- Another team member suggested can the users erase the drawing or revise what they have on the screen.

- We also thought an issue that may arise in the future after you get the colouring to work with the free drawing is non-enclosed spaces. As children aren’t the best drawers, they may try to draw a circle but not fully connect it. You may be able to fix this by adding something that connects the line to the nearest node.

- You could add a feature where the children can select a pre-drawn image segment and then fill in each part in their group.

- In saying this, how can the images be exported in case the children want to show their parents or take their creations home?

Some of these suggestions overlap with those previously discussed. An eraser is a really good suggestion that I will try to implement for the final deliverable. I have tried including a reset button, but seeing as this would remove all previous designs I decided to discard it. The non-enclosed shape issue is a very valid point. I will try to figure out how to connect nodes as suggested, however, I am not sure if I will be able to implement this.

With the last two suggestions, although including pre drawn shapes would remove some issues, this would be detrimental to the main focus of creative freedom and self expression. Being able to export their creations would be a great idea, I don't think this will be at the forefront of my focus for this project.

Appraisal 3:

- You did not explain clearly where you want your device to be placed. We don’t know if it's in a classroom or a museum, etc. If this device is more portable, we think it will attract more users of different ages.

- We suggest that you may be able to add a cancel or return function to your device.

- The colour on the panel could be better arranged. It could be a half-circle around the point the user is standing.

- The selection of the colours also could be re-considered. Like, it might be a good idea to refer to the colours in colour pencils.

The first suggestion raised a really good point that I forgot to include in the video. Whilst I explained that the concept was to be situated in Grade 1 classrooms in my documentation, I should have also included it in the video. Instead of a cancel or return function, I will try to add an erase option as mentioned in another appraisal. I think the colour palette design suggestions are very creative, yet testing so far has supported my current design and I think a simple design will be the most effective for the young audience

Reflection:

The appraisals provided me with a great opportunity to reflect upon the successes and drawbacks of my current prototype. Lots of the points raised were very good points, and ones that I would have liked to incorporate into the prototype. However, due to resource limitations, have not been able to as yet. This only gives me more points for motivation to improve my prototype. The appraisal exercise also brought to light the immense benefits of receiving constructive criticism from those who have a fresh perspective. Working on the concept constantly has definitely meant that I haven't picked up on some clear areas for enhancement. The feedback is also so helpful as it is coming from other students who also understand the context of the problem. I have experienced times where I ask friends or family for feedback or suggestions, yet don't end up receiving much help due to their lack of knowledge regarding the course and the project context.

Overall, I am really happy with the current progress of my report and feel that I have already learned so much about the domains and design process in the context of a physical computing project. I am eager to get started on building my full-scale mat over the coming weeks and plan to do up a sketch of how I am going to build the mat over the weekend.

Developing The First Prototype

With the prototype deadline looming, I cracked down on working on the functional aspects of my prototype. After getting the LDR to measure the varying light levels, I was able to provide visual feedback to the user through a Neopixel strip, with red alerting the user of high energy usage, yellow resembling medium energy usage and green resembling low energy usage. In addition, I managed to connect external lights within the build that represented lights within a home. With these lights connected, I added a delay for when maximum sunlight level was detected by Emily, however at this point, the lights would turn off instantly rather than after a period of time.

I feel that the visual display of how efficient the user's light consumption is is a clear way for the user to understand their light consumption.

User Testing

I did some user testing with this version of the prototype with my family and found that they felt there was not much user interaction with Emily and that Emily could be even more annoying. They also suggested having some sort of feedback in the end when Emily recognises that user's have been improving on their energy saving behaviours. With this feedback, I'm thinking about incorporating a way for the user to perhaps touch Emily in order to interact with her. I just have to develop a reason for the user to touch her now! In terms of providing feedback to the user regarding their energy saving behaviours, I think some sort of unique and pleasant visual experience would be cool, so that the user is made aware that they are making progress. This coupled with perhaps a song could be a unique and fun idea, which is a stark difference to Emily's usual annoying antics.

Taking On Feedback

I thought the progress that I had made so far was good, but based on the feedback from user testing as well as my own gut feeling, I felt the concept was too simple. From here I wanted to work on fixing the delay to begin delaying after a period of time, as well as adding further annoyance to Emily through the use of flashing the lights in the Neopixel strip as well as sound, and an element of interactivity between the user and Emily. With the stress of the upcoming assessment and figuring out all the components I was trying to include, I ended up having a bit of a mental breakdown and getting confused with my concept with exactly what I wanted to implement into Emily. So, I sat down and just drew out a plan of how I wanted Emily to react and respond to varying situations. I planned out the main components that Emily would respond to and then worked from there.

The finished prototype was quite successful in relation to the planning that I did above. I incorporated the flashing of lights, as well as an annoying beeping sound corresponding to the frequency of the flashing from the lights. I also managed to add a delay to both the red and yellow stages before the lights turned off, and incorporated a switch that allows for the user to interact with Emily rather than Emily just being an object that sits within the home. I didn't end up adding an element of feedback to the user, so that is something that I aim to work on for the finished concept!

The Finished Prototype

Energy Saving Emily is a household device that is designed to help users in saving energy around the house. Emily has been designed to fit within the domain of change through discomfort, where aspects of negative reinforcement can be used to promote behavioural change. When lights within a house are on, Emily can detect the amount of sunlight available. Depending on the amount of sunlight detected, Emily annoys the user through flashing lights and annoying sounds and can turn off the lights within a room in order to create discomfort for the user to push behavioural change in reducing unnecessary energy wastage.

Appraisal Feedback

It was actually quite fun to work as a team to provide other teams with feedback. Our team worked very efficiently, even though it took quite a while to get through everyone assigned to us! It was definitely a challenge to provide feedback that was thoughtful, specific, actionable and within the word limit!

I gained some interesting feedback from the team appraisals. It's really interesting to gain other people's perspectives as they always come up with ideas and suggestions that you've never really thought of before. I summarised the main aspects of feedback as such:

No. 1:

• Outlined Problem: Emily's light consumption may be contradictory to trying to save light consumption in the house
• Possible Suggested Solution: Solely rely on sound or less intense blinking
• My Response: This is an interesting thought and something I had not considered. I would like to keep some light alerts therefore I may look into less intense blinking and dimming of Emily's light exposure.

No. 2:

• Outlined Problem: User may not be alerted from the buzzer sound if they leave the room that Emily is in, resulting in unnecessary power cut due to user being unaware
• My Response: I can see where this may come from. Perhaps I will make the sound louder so that it can be heard, or a possibility I could include is having something attached to the user that alerts the user when Emily is trying to get their attention. I could also look into adding a proximity/motion sensor so that Emily can detect when the user is close by.

No. 3:

• Outlined Problem: Emily turns lights off lights rather than making the user change their habits.
• Possible Suggested Solution: Other outcomes could happen when the user engages with Emily.
• My Response: I understand this, however I wanted to incorporate a further element of discomfort rather than just annoyance through sounds and lights, hence why Emily has control over the lights. Emily does give the users a chance to correct their actions initially though, and only after a period of time when no action has been taken by the user will Emily have control over the lights.

No. 4:

• Outlined Problem: Many stages increases complexity.
• Possible Suggested Solution: Simplify process or only keep major stages.
• My Response: Very understandable, I will look into simplifying the stages of Emily for the final concept prototype, depending on my most necessary steps.

No. 5:

• Outlined Problem: What if user's need lights on during the daytime ie. in a dark house?
• My Response: This an interesting thought, however my concept of Emily only responds to the sunlight detected through the window, therefore in a dark house, I would presume sunlight exposure is not very prominent and Emily would be able to detect this and respond according to the appropriate stage. Nevertheless, if there is anything that I can think of that can be implemented into Emily to acknowledge this further, I will definitely look into developing it

Future Progress

From here I will take on the feedback that has been suggested by my peers. They have given some very interesting insights that I look forward to exploring. I also need to incorporate the feedback stage into Emily to alert users of their improved behaviour, as well as find the materials to come up with an appropriate form for Emily, possibly even making a paper mache dome that is semi translucent. I have also started developing my website portfolio this week, so will continue to do so over the coming weeks.

Inspirational Works

After doing some exploration around a translucent material, I came across this video showing how to make paper translucent. I would like to see if I can possibly incorporate this method and make a paper mache dome with the translucent paper, to allow for the Neopixel LEDs to shine through. We shall see how my testing pans out!

Tuesday Class

Most of Tuesday's class was allocated to watching videos, start critiquing. As a team we watched through and commented together on about half our allocated videos during class. I found it extremely useful that we were able to start this process during contact hours. Not only did that mean that it was easy to organize a group meeting because our entire team was naturally already there but the course staff was available within seconds to answer questions and help with issues. In addition, it was useful to have one of the other teams available to ask questions during this time, and for other teams, we were available.

Thursday Class

After the initial standup during the workshop, our team went to work on our feedbacks, fixing any issues and misconceptions, finally posting them to Miro. Thereafter, we decided on having a group meeting on Monday to plan out our group goals so that we'll be where we want to be by the end of this semester.

Critiquing Process and Thoughts

First during Tuesday's class we went through about half of the videos together, pausing between each one to discuss our ideas. However, by the end of Class Sigurd and I wanted to continue working while the other team members had other engagements. What we decided on was that Sigurd and I would continue watching videos and creating bullet points and comments on the remaining videos and documents. In addition, we converted the comments from everyone on the first half of the videos into a cohesive text so that it would be easier to read and understood by the recipients. After the other team members had a chance to write their own comments on the remaining teams they wrote out the rest in a similar manner. After all feedback was written out all members read through them and made sure that everyone's thoughts and feedback was present. Although this would have been a lot easier to do in person, as most things are, I feel out solution of running the feedback asynchronously was the best way of doing it. I find discussions over video chat are not as good and are often very tiresome. Running our collective feedback asynchronously did so that we were able to, in our own time, write feedback and think through everything in detail and give feedback when we had time. I believe this actually ended up creating better feedback then we would have done over video chat because it became a more iterative process, feedback becoming better with each iteration.

Further Plans

I'm currently trying to figure out what I'll need to do in preparation for my material study and how to best do it. Optimally I would have a selection of materials that participants can touch, this would mean that I could only do this with a small sample size of participants. That said, having the same materials for all users I think would be better than doing a remote test where participants either guess at how materials feel or use objects in their own home, resulting in me having to guess at how they feel. I'll most likely try and create some silicone objects and will try finding some other materials and objects in some stores to gather a greater range. This will be done simultaneously as attempting to connect all team prototypes and whatever we decide on during Monday's meeting.

Interactive Flower LOME

The Team Domain

Negative emotions and pressure people experience from intensified workload, pursuing of perfection, obsession with completion and exhaustion of balancing family relationships are becoming a general phenomenon. Workers who have obligations to a family are accounted as the majority labor force in metropolitans. To avoid the damage of negative emotions and relevant mental issues caused by, the team will design an interactive tool to help users to express their feelings and raise family concerns. The interactive flower will help people under stress to speak out and release negative emotions by complaining towards the flower and replacements of the flower petals.

The Individual Concept

The individual concept differences from the team domain by narrowing user groups, it's focused on parent-child relationships. One of reason doing this is because children are less presentable in terms of wants and needs, and parents need to raise concerns in the important stages of their children. (Manzeske, 2009) The study shows that a child who has a secure relationship with parents tends to regulate emotions and behaviours while experiencing difficulties. Thus, the individual concept will try to explore more interesting ways of interactions and promote the playability for children

Working Principle

1. This is when too many complaining received through the microphone.

1. User can play games and answer the question right to make the flower become green or take the petal out and place it back again to reset the green colour.

1. When user continues by answering questions right and repeat the placement action, the whole flower become green.

1. This state is the extra bonus to engage users with games.

Prototype

This week,i finished design process separate to three parts and I finished it with three weeks.

1.Design game flow with music and Finding music resource and recording audio narration

• Lightning sound outside the window

• The sound of opening the door

• The sound of the house leaking after entering the door

• The sound of the sword slashing towards the enemy

• The sound of the enemy being knocked down

• The sound of game victory

2.Design game scenes with unity

3.Creating 3D surround background music with previous music resource and then combine the music with game scenes

I use the software of Adobe Audition and the plugin Panorama to develop the music. I main chose two methods to create the six 3d surround sound background music.

Prototype

In this week,i finish the prototype.The concept is a game that help the visually impaired man who would like to exercise their hearing sensitivity. This project focus on how use the 3D surrounds music that improve the immersion and narrative of the game which is am responsible for designing the music used in the game. The technology will include using Adobe audition software to make the 3D game surrounds. And then I will using Unity to design the sounds as that put sounds in a 3d space and virtually move the player in the 3d space to change the sound levels from 4 speakers.

First, there are not many games on the market for training blind people's hearing. There are some cases on YouTube: Blind Men (Xbox One) Achievement Walkthrough and Inside the Deku Tree, etc. But these cases mostly focus on gamepads and simple storyline plots. Secondly, in the few game cases, games with physical interactions have not been discovered, and the settings of this game will fill this gap. At the same time, it can help visually impaired man to do some sports when training listening.

Critiques

After finished the presentation about the prototype, I finished the Team-based critiques for allocated teams on the Miro board about three people with 3 hours team online meeting.

Prototype preparation

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This week, I worked on the final modification of the prototype. To make it match the demands of the tasks, I design two different types of maps. One of them is designed for the tutorial part, thereby the construction of it is simple so that users can have a practice of the implementation. Another map is designed for users to train their programming ability to use if statement and loop function.

In order to test the voice outputting function, the robot will introduce the concept of the project and the way how users interact with the system. Ideally, the robot will drive to the object while this object is been introducing. However, the recognizing function of the robot doesn't support directly identify the object (Although I tried to link the robot with the google API for the recognizing database, the function doesn't work well). Therefore, for the prototype, I need to place all the tools in a certain space and programming the robot to drive with a predetermined route.

Reflection of prototypes

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During the contact session, we conducted a team-based critique of other projects. The project of designing an interactive elevator really impressed me because of the huge challenge that their target users usually spend less than 1 mins there. The situation will be even more complex with a variety of users' personalities. Therefore, our team suggested them to build some fringe scenario to have further empathy with their potential users. This critique inspired my project as well, as the initial design of the robot has the frustration system, which may arouse the negative emotion of fractious users. Therefore, in the next design iteration, it is necessary to build some fringe scenarios to prevent issues.

From the critique of team Garfunkel, they mentioned that From the critique of team Garfunkel, they mentioned that the finite numbers of blocks may limit users’ programming approaches and gave us the suggestion to improve the blocks by adding multiple pseudocodes. Besides, they also indicated that the robot may potentially distract the user from learning to program. Therefore, in future development, I will reduce the irrelevant emotions and motions of the robot and put more focus on the teaching part and feedback section. Or perhaps, users can compose a specific command with blocks to adjust the balance themselves.

From the critique of team Hedgehog, they mentioned that the age group of our target audience is not specific enough. It is one of my biggest concerns as well. In terms of our previous research, the programming ability difference of users is significant even in the same age group. Besides, it is hard to let a user truly master a programming language only through our system. Thereby one of the main purposes of the project is to enhance the motivation of novice and also eliminate their negative impression upon learning to program. To build the system with that starting, it doesn't matter how old you are but it has to be the people with the same problem and at the same skill level.

From the critique of team Supparoo, they suggested us to explore more possible interactive modes, like multiplayer mode, to enhance the playability and motivation of users. Besides, they also suggest us to conduct user testing based on the prototype to evaluate the functionality among each section. It will absolutely list within the recent developing plan, and aim for knowing the effectiveness of the tutorial and error feedback.

This week mostly focused on finishing the video, report and writing appraisals for the other teams we were assigned.

For the appraisals, it was difficult to write feedback that would appropriately express what we wanted present to them. All the teams put a lot of effort into their concepts and, therefore, we wanted to include what we found to be positive about their concept whether it was how it engages the users either through the output feedback or the prototype itself, or a clear explanation of how the functionality helps users learn, change or improve their lives. Other feedback given was written because we believed it would be beneficial for them, to help further improve their concepts through actionable critiques.

From there I read the appraisals I was given. This allowed me to see whether I had effectively communicated my concept and be able to identify issues that people have brought up or what parts are working. The feedback then provides me with a stepping-stone to start improving and fixing my prototype for the final delivery. At the moment the main feedback was how my prototype and concept doesn’t solve or help my target users and the problem space I am focusing on. For this stage of the process, I focussed more on trying to build a somewhat functioning prototype in a feasible way that I could then user test with a teacher aide and get feedback from the students they help. Therefore, I did not focus on researching further into the problem space for the previous project delivery. Based on the feedback from other teams and concerns I have had with whether the musical elements will help memorisation and learning multiplication, I will research further with my team and review the research already conducted. Other feedback was about the concept and confusions with the form, how its teachers’ children and concerns about it possibly being too complex for primary school students. I haven't made any changes to the concept or plan so far, based on these feedbacks, because I want to conduct user tests to see if the stakeholders and target users further support these comments.

Suggestions that were given, that I will look into more and see if they would further improve my concept to meet the aim within the problem space, are about using your hands instead of objects to produce sounds. This was an interesting suggestion as then it would allow similar sounds to be produced by any child rather than different objects. The intention was to have parents and teachers help the child connect the object with the digits, however, the suggestion would simplify things and make it easier for children. I have started thinking about how different hand interactions could produce different sounds, however, this would need to be further explored. Other suggestions were about having the multiplication table with the prototype to help them when they first start learning multiplication. Research, user testing and interviews would have to be conducted more to determine if this would help the students or hinder their learning as they can just use the table to find the answer rather than remembering the answer.

There have been changes to the concept as I am planning to no longer use Vuforia, instead, using an accelerometer and gyroscope to determine which number is rolled. One of the tutors in the workshop suggested this would be easier as I am working with a photon rather than an Arduino Uno, therefore, I don’t want it to be plugged into the laptop. I am currently researching how I can use accelerometer and gyroscope sensor as I have never used it before. I will also be doing some activities with the sensor to further understand what code is needed for the project and what changes I need to make to it.

Tuesday Studio Session

During the whole studio session on Tuesday. Our team spent 5 hours together watch the prototype demonstration video(also scanning the document as supply material) to discuss and give critique for the other three teams. Here are the details about how we conducted it and how I feel during and finished the whole process.

How we did it?

We first set up a Google doc as the place to write individual critique while watching peers; demonstration video. Then we watch the video individually but at the same time while writing down the personal thoughts and suggestions in the doc. After that we go back and discuss our thoughts as a team on Zoom. The discussion usually lasts for about 10 minutes for each project. We manage to gather thoughts from different aspects since we all have different specialists. For instance, Jay is more confident to give suggestions from the technical aspect. Listening to what he said definitely helped me to look at the same project from different points of view. As for myself, I tried to give advice from user experience aspect. Which including how could the intended experience could make more sense in that using scenario and how the technology is used could serve the concept more precisely. After the studio session, each of us assigned to summarise each individual’s critiqure together and pull it up as a collaborative team appraisal.

What do I feel?

The process of giving appraisals for the other three teams' works probably is the best teamwork we have done so far. We got all the four-team members together working on something together during the whole studio session. And we finished watching all the demonstration videos and write the critique in a really efficient way. Personally, I did with 2.5 team appraisals summary tasks assigned by Wednesday noon. I feel really good that I was finally have done some work without any procrastination these days. This is mainly thanks to the endeavour when we are working as a whole team. I wish we could work as a team efficiently, not only for this time but for more time in the future. Watching other teams' and individual's work is also inspired by me. Because I wasn’t really know about what other peers prototype building process and final result before. This session really gave us a good opportunity to look through other's work and rethink about how the work has been done so far of myself.

Individual Prototype Evaluation

I have also conducted an individual online evaluation. The complete evaluation document could be found here(→Prototype Evaluation doc:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ogrdpYUfY_sQ4ReFOyX76Jj0Ll31bCEj6idHkkVMurI/edit?usp=sharing), four participants have been involved in this process. Five feedback questions have been created for the evaluation. I'm aiming to collect five user evaluation feedback form people who may have experienced being with children from grades one to three in primary school.

Friday Workshop Session

On this Friday, I got the opportunity to talk about my own concerns about the process of building the prototype and the next movement for the following weeks. I did feel much better after share my feeling and got many advices from both Alison and Clay. Thank you both a lot! :)

This week, each of our groups conducted some evaluations of other groups. Although it is still taught online at this stage, the advantage of using miro is that it allows us to see some details of the installation. I mean, in the past, although we were able to communicate face-to-face in the classroom, in reality, we rarely had the opportunity to view the work of other groups, because the time in the classroom was limited. We had to concentrate on making our installations. After all the teams uploaded their assignments to miro, in addition to being able to comment on each other, we can also check those interesting devices in our spare time. You can also read some pdf documents, which makes it more convenient for us to understand the students' mechanisms. Similarly, I have received a lot of feedback, some of which can improve our product experience.

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Feedback 1:

We found your focus area intriguing and are happy to see that you have considered the safety of your users. Your scope and the intended functionally are clear and provide valuable information. It seems like you have a clear understanding of how Arduino’s work and utilise their potential effectively. With that said, you are lacking some background research. It would be useful to look into existing solutions that guide the visually impaired. Although the audio indicator that the user is outside of the safe zone is clear it is both loud and sharp and we can imagine it could become annoying. You could consider a milder or more pleasant sound without the indicator losing its core functionality. Some user research on what sounds would actually make sense for the users (do they understand what this loud annoying sound does?), would be great to see.

How I think about feedback 1

I entirely agree with some of the issues mentioned in this feedback. He was right. I did not do some background research when designing the safety alarm, such as reading relevant literature. The reason I used the Ultrasonic sensor is that I used it as a radar in a course last year. Since then, I have learned how this sensor works-detecting the distance between an object and the sensor. I used to spend a lot of time changing the code required by this sensor, so when I encountered this topic this time, I was able to think about it for the first time. So for this problem, I think, first of all, I want to figure out what I need to do with this device. I need a tool that can prompt the user. Specifically, users need to complete the tasks we designed within the prescribed scope. But because our equipment is for visually impaired people, we need to wear eye masks in our tests. This will cause a problem. People will quickly lose their sense of direction, which will lead to getting out of the safe range and causing some dangerous situations. For example, our sensors will be placed on some shelves. If people lose their sense of direction, they will easily trip over the shelves. As another example, we may choose to use a wooden stick as a sword. Therefore, it is even more necessary for the user to be within the venue at all times, because if people close their eyes to use it, it may hurt the surrounding crowd. This is what we don't want to see.

Feedback 2:

However, showing what will happen to the users when they cross the safe area might be more realistic for us to see how it would be like when users are playing the game. Having more distinct sound indication to tell the users that they are crossing the safe area rather than having beeps might be more beneficial to users as it will be easier for them to understand. In your documentation, potential risk like falling or tripping might be more prevalent for visually impaired users. How would your concept prevent this from happening as they are playing this game? It is good to consider the safety issues of this game to allow your target audience to have a safe and enjoyable experience.

How I think about feedback 2

If I understand correctly, this feedback is about our demo video. I showed in the video how the ultrasonic sensor detects people's location and how the buzzer works after people cross the safety line. This feedback mentions that it may be more beneficial to use more clear voices to prompt people, which will make them easier to understand. This suggestion is excellent, and indeed people may easily misunderstand the alarm sound. But I think it's the first reaction from people. Most people will stand on the spot when they hear the buzzer alarm and give up the actions they would have done. This will allow enough time for people around to remind the user to return to a safe location. But if the alarm sound is changed to a sentence, then when people realize the meaning of this sentence, it is very likely that the danger can no longer be avoided. So I may change the frequency of the buzzer instead of choosing other ways to replace it.

I found this video by searching related content. So in theory, we can set the tone of the buzzer ourselves.

My point of view：

These are two suggestions from two different groups. Both of these suggestions are related to my alarm system. You can see from the video that so far, the sound of the alarm is single, only the sound of the buzzer itself. In fact, this sound is very annoying and harsh. But in fact, our original design was to prompt people to return to safe places by playing people's voice prompts. But because we have not been able to solve the problem of using a memory card to play music. In the workshop, Ben suggested that we use buzzer temporarily.

Because our device is composed of many systems, for the moment I am only showing a part of our device, so it is not playable. In the next few weeks, our team will form the results of each person. Complete the device, then invite everyone to help test, and give some feedback.