Who am I?

My name is Marie Thoresen, I'm 26 (soon 27) and at my last semester of the master of interaction design program. After I graduate I aim to work with web design and graphic design since this is something that I've been passionate about for a long time.

What I hope to learn/achieve in PhysComp

Since this is my last semester I'm aiming to get better in areas that are connected with future employment. Programming is something that I've never been good at so this will be my main focus this semester. Especially programming languages who are related to web design would be a major plus.

I'm also looking forward to make something physical since I enjoy making things with my hands with various materials. If I had the time and money I would probably engage in more DIY projects so this course is a great excuse to do just that.

Lastly, I hope to achieve a good grade in this course and make something that I can add to my portfolio at the end of the semester.

Week 1 activities

The first week we spent getting to know the course and what to expect. I must admit that at first I was a bit sceptical as to if this course would be something that would peak my interest or not, but after the first two lectures I must say I got excited for what the coming weeks have in store.

After the first lecture we were tasked with reading a chapter in a paper. The chapter I was allocated was about ethics, privacy and security which is a bit funny since this is exactly what my thesis projects is about. Because of this I knew a lot about the topic from before which made it easy to join in on the discussion. I felt the discussion went fine, except that it was mostly just three who discussed while the other sat on their phones/computer and didn't contribute much.

In addition, we got to do some ideation for the main project by using a card deck and some notes which allocated different locations, design etc to those cards. This exercise turned out to be very difficult since there were many factors to consider and the different cards woulds always match one another.

The ideation went for three different round where, the first the group would come up with ideas together. In the second round we would come up with ideas alone and in the last we would change one idea from the first round.

These were the ideas I generated from the second round:

Design to embrace a ruin from different dimensions in an aggressive way

• Make life like scale of ancient ruins so people can interact with them however they like without the fear of permanent damage
• Idea above using holographic means instead of building materials
• Idea above only making the ruins as they were like before they became a ruin (from another time).
• Idea above using cameras or holographic to show the decay of the ruin from its prime to current standard
• A smaller scale remake of the ruin that shows the entirety from the bottom and up so people can see every single detail of the building process
• An invisible shield surrounding the ruin so people can interact with it as closely as possible without damaging it.

Design to embrace (in) a hot air balloon by sliding it in an aggressive way

• Instead of having the hot air balloon as a high-altitude device it can be used to get people from A to B by sliding it with a rope etc. that pulls it.
• Using a hot air balloon to surf
• Couple therapy air balloon where they won’t be allowed to slide down before they have resolved their dispute.
• Force people to hug by sliding the air balloon so they crash into each other. Blind dating air balloon.

Introduction

The idea is to help autistic children and people with deaf/ mute.

Work Process:

Voice function --> information output on mask-screen

• Help autistic/silent children -->Encourage communication/visual transmission of information
• It can also be used in special occasions

Voice function --> Translation function --> information output on mask-screen

• Impaired Verbal Communication

Auto-Scan Gesture UI Function --> Translation function or not --> information output on mask-screen

• Help deaf and mute people to transmit information quickly / communicate with normal people who can not sign language / there won't have a language barrier

For a different level:

(1) Hard-of-hearing people: they are neither fully deaf nor fully hearing, also known as culturally marginal people [22]. They can obtain some useful linguistic information from speech.

(2) Culturally deaf people: they might belong to deaf families and use sign language as the primary source of communication. Their voice (speech clarity) may be disrupted.

(3) Congenital or prelingual deaf people: they are deaf by birth or become deaf before they learn to talk and are not affiliated with Deaf culture. They might or might not use sign language-based communication.

(4) Orally educated or postlingual deaf people: they have been deafened in their childhood but developed speaking skills.

(5) Late-deafened adults: they have had the opportunity to adjust their communication techniques as their progressive hearing losses.

My name is Sheryl and I’m doing Bachelor of IT in my last year. I am focusing on User Experience Design and Information System.

I felt both excited and worried about this course. Excited about having the opportunity to learn new skills, entering the lab of having hands on experience and seeing how the final outcome will be with the ideas from the team. On the other side, worried about the heavy workload and the ability we need to achieve the final outcome, since there are still many new experiences for me to explore.

I also would like to expand my knowledge towards novel technology such as raspberry pi and Arduino and use my knowledge to design a product that is beneficial to the public.

On Friday morning I set aside some time to come up with ideas for my Project Inspiration Pitch. My approach was to use pen and paper so I could sketch if I needed to, but I mainly wrote down descriptions and justifications for my ideas.

In this session I came up with the smart wardrobe, an assistive shower cubicle, a desk chair, an annoying coffee cup, an improved steering wheel, and a conversation table. I feel like my ideas were mainly driven by the environment I was in when brainstorming, which was at home with a view of my desk, dining table and wardrobe. I don't drink coffee but there is a normality of being addicted to coffee in university and in the hobby groups I'm in. The steering wheel idea was likely from a culmination of my frustrations with morning traffic.

In the end, I chose to pitch the smart wardrobe because it has a lot of potential for cool features to implement and a good purpose.

Running Hand

Explanation

One of the inspirations that came to my mind was from a hand-man fight in class with my classmates when I was in primary school. Walking with fingers as legs is a very common game in our lives. So, why not make it into a video game, use my figures as legs running all the way up and use it to pass the level. This is the original source of my inspiration.

I came up with the idea of using gesture sensor to project the hand into the game and use it as a character to play the 2D game. Because using fingers as legs of the character, I thought of some very intuitive gestures to control the character, such as the character can squat and then stand up to jump, or the two fingers can be exchanged to make a walk. We can also add kicks and other actions.

Because directly using gesture sensor will lack physical feedback, especially for events like landing or hitting. And lack of physical feedback can confuse players. So, I want to use small devices such as rings to give players vibration feedback.

Inspirations

Three inspirations helped me. One is the Xbox Kinect game FRU using body as bridge for character. The other is Leap Motion, a high-precision gesture detection sensor that makes my idea possible in some extends. Additionally, HD rumble from Nintendo Switch also helps me see the possibility of vibration feedback.

who I am

Hello, everyone! I am Bonnie, I'm a master student in Interaction design. I like to try new things, design for me is not boring professional learning, but in the process of trying new things! Therefore, I love the design course very much, especially when I have completed one after another interesting project, I will fill the sense of pride! My personality is lively and I hope in DECO7385 course with each creative designers to create new amazing works!

Expectations

What I expect by attending this course is to improve the finality of my product design, I mean, the ability to prototype the functionality of the various parts closer to the final real product, including some technical expertise. In addition, I hope that through this course, I can experience the process of the final product exhibition more realistically and get closer to the work in the future. Of course, the most important thing is to be able to design an interesting but functional and interactive device!

About Me

I'm Mengfan and this is my third semester. In the last semester, I have studied digital prototype and studio 1, so I have a basic understanding of the design process and physical interaction. I am interested in finding the interaction between cutting-edge technology and human. Technology can allow people to unconsciously learn new knowledge or change people's original views.

Expectation

I learned how to use Arduino and Unity last semester. I hope I can explore these two aspects further in this semester. Also, I look forward to learning some new programming methods during the learning process, such as C #. In the last semester, I thought more about making a physical interactive game. Therefore, in this semester, I hope to pay attention to AR and use it to design an interactive game.

The Smart Wardrobe

A wardrobe that keeps a record of how many clothes a user has and how many times each item is worn. It profiles each item with the composition of the material and an estimate of how many wash cycles it can endure. The mirror has an AR feature for users to see what they look like in different outfits before grabbing them out of the wardrobe which can save time. It can suggest outfits based on the time of day, activity and dress code. The wardrobe will help users to appreciate all the clothing that they own and alerts users if an item has not been worn in a long time to prompt them to either donate the clothing or sell it to someone else. The main goal of the wardrobe is to encourage the users to embrace slow fashion and work towards a circular economy. If users intend to throw clothes away, the wardrobe can educate them on the length of time it takes for their clothes to break down and users will move away from synthetic fabrics to more durable and sustainable fashion.

My inspiration for this wardrobe came from The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up (Kondo & Hirano, 2014), the Slow Fashion movement (Jung & Jin, 2014), and the Low Impact/Zero Waste Movement (Cleanlink, 2019). For the mirror AR example in my poster I used the Lily Story app on Android. There are already mobile applications out there that keep a log of different outfits, but it would be fascinating to explore this space with an environmental approach.

References

Franco-García ML., Carpio-Aguilar J.C., Bressers H. (2019) Towards Zero Waste, Circular Economy Boost: Waste to Resources. In: Franco-García ML., Carpio-Aguilar J., Bressers H. (eds) Towards Zero Waste. Greening of Industry Networks Studies, vol 6. Springer, Cham

Jung, S., & Jin, B. (2014). A theoretical investigation of slow fashion: Sustainable future of the apparel industry. International Journal of Consumer Studies, 38(5), 510-519.

Kondō, M., & Hirano, C. (2014). The life-changing magic of tidying up: The Japanese art of decluttering and organizing (First American edition.). Berkeley: Ten Speed Press.

Štefko, R., & Steffek, V. (2018). Key Issues in Slow Fashion: Current Challenges and Future Perspectives. Sustainability, 10(7), 2270.

Berggren, M. (2019, September 6). Fast Fashion Vs Slow Fashion – Difference & Advantages.

Retrieved from https://wearandsmile.com/blog/fast-fashion-vs-slow-fashion/

Cleanlink. (2019, November 23). Entertainment Company Sets Zero Waste Goals.

Retrieved from https://www.cleanlink.com/news/article/Entertainment-Company-Sets-Zero-Waste-Goals--23231

N.d. (2020) Ultimate 48 in. W - 96 in. W White Wood Closet System.

Retrieved from https://www.homedepot.com/p/Closet-Evolution-Ultimate-48-in-W-96-in-W-White-Wood-Closet-System-WH19/311040600

Who am I

I’m Horace, a master of Interaction Design student. This is the 3rd semester of my studying. I’ve been studying several skills in the previous study. Last semester I used Arduino to make a radar device that would keep people away from mobile phones. Since then I find this course of making physical interaction models very interesting

Expectation

As I mentioned above, I love these physics model-based courses. So this semester, I want to learn how to use laser cutting machine. However, now that I am affected by the coronavirus, I am undergoing self-isolation for 14 days, and I hope to apply for studio training after the isolation. In addition, my undergraduate major is animation, and I am very good at graphic design. I have strong hands-on skills, but my programming level is very poor. So this semester I hope to be able to team up with some students who are good at programming to complete an outstanding work.

Tuesday

Today we discussed our fears, hopes and expectations on the course. Some of my fears were that I would suffer from my lack of programming skills and that I might struggle to come up with good ideas. I am also concerned about the long hours as well as the stresses that come with working together in a team.

However, I hope to improve my programming skills throughout this course as well as work well together in teams to produce innovative and unique interactions through our projects. Additionally, I hope for the support and collaboration of my coursemates for the coming semester.

In looking for inspiration, I found I was drawn to projects found on the Hardware UX/UI Instagram account such as the modern piggy bank whose emotional wellbeing is solely dependent on how much money you feed it, and the Abanico clock that redesignes the way we interact with a bedside alarm clock in such a creative way.

I hope to be able to one day design cutting-edge technology that is both affordable to the average consumer but still effective and impactful enough to change the way they interact with their daily lives after incorporating such products into their lives.

Wednesday

My section of the HCI Grand Challenges were on wellbeing, health and eudaimonia.

During project ideation, we used playing cards with each suit having its own property that reflected each of the 13 values. For each design round, a sentence is made from the 4 properties by each team.

With the individual rounds, we were allowed to swap between the other suits of cards on the table.

I started with the following sentence, but then swapped cards to get the next sentence as I could no come up with an idea. The ideas I came up with are in the bullet points following each sentence.

Design for creating in a lounge room to shout using the quality of personal

Design for confronting in a lounge room to shout using the quality of personal

• A safe space with an interactive wall display that confronts you so you shout and release your problems

• A sound proof private relaxing room for resolving arguments

Design for confronting in childhood to look using the quality of personal

• A tv show that exposes childhood myths -santa, tooth fairy, but they cannot tell anyone

Design for confronting in the apocalypse to look using the quality of ambiguous

• Art installation that flicks between normal and zombie when someone isnt looking

Design for confronting in the apocalypse to point using the quality of ambiguous

• A watch that tracks when the user points at something and produces either an interesting relevant fact or shocks the wearer if no fact is found

Design for capturing in the apocalypse to point using the quality of ambiguous

• A game where the user captures zombies to free humanity by pointing and them but some are humans in disguise to survive the zombies

Design for creating in the apocalypse to point using the quality of ambiguous

• A build your zombie game where you get features by pointing at another zombie but being unable to choose which feature is taken

The final round had us choosing an idea from the initial team round and expanding it. We chose misdirectional sound, changing it to have users follow a prerecorded description of art pieces to find it, then being able to record their description for the next person to find.

While we had a rough idea of how we would run the tests, we still have a long way to go before the final idea is fully developed.

Magic Mirror

My idea is magic mirror. It is a mirror that can predict the future. The user stands in front of the mirror and tells the mirror their daily routine, the more detailed the better. Based on the data users input. The mirror will predict how they will look in the future if they continue to maintain current daily routine.

For example, if you are a guy who eat three meals of junk food a day, and never work out. You tell the mirror your daily routine, and then you might see a fatty you appear in the mirror. This is what you will look like in the future if you continue to maintain current daily routine.

Inspiration

This idea inspired by a new innovation of technology called virtual mirror, which provides a new way to try on clothing without getting undressed.

https://www.quytech.com/blog/how-virtual-mirror-technology-will-change-the-way-you-shop/.

The core technology in virtual mirror is augmented reality. This a also a core technology in my idea as well. Through AR technology, users can see the changes of their body very intuitively.

What is interesting about my idea

The interesting thing about this idea is that it no longer leaves the future out of reach. Specifically, standing in front of a mirror, people can see how they look, for example 2/ 5/10 years later. Another important thing about this idea is it a kink of way to remind or educate people who still have a unhealthy lifestyle. In this way, tell these people about possible future results in advance. So they know it ’s time to change their unhealthy lifestyle.

Work Done

As the first day of taking PhysComp, I was pretty excited since I had been to the exhibition once. However, what I experienced in that exhibition made me look forward to this course but also let me feel concerned in some areas. I am looking forward to building a product with my future team and that will definitely make me feel proud but I am not good at programming. I am a little bit concerned about whether the idea can be achieved. Today's course gave me the answer. The process should be more important.

HCI Grand Challenge

Challenge 2: Human-Environment Interactions

We started by sharing the individual challenge and interpretations through the reading resource.

The most challenge that impressed me is that the technology environment is more complex at present and finding a new technology to combine all of them is already a big challenge but it is not the end. Facing the public can be more intricate since it needs to satisfy multiple kinds of people.

Then we made the conclusion with examples.

We did the first round of ideation by playing cards. Our first selection was Design to shape using smell in the nightclub with the quality of nomadic. I got the idea of using smells to match the partner in the nightclub. The costumers can select their favorite smell of a perfume to find the group with the same preference.

In the end, our group chose to Design to calm in the hospital by blowing with the quality of family. We thought that for the hospitalized patient and the family can strengthen the cohesion of each other through the synchronization of breath together to complete a song in the hospital.

How it Relates

This process of ideation this week showed a lot of possibilities of the idea that I can come up with especially it was random. This process of thinking and discussion not only brought me some inspiration but also made me review the process of generating ideas at the beginning of the design, especially after a holiday. This kind of review made me no longer clueless.

Work to Do

Next week the most important thing is the pitch. I will prepare my pitch and the poster well and practice more for the presentation.

And I am looking forward to the World Cafe in week 3.

People's behavior and mental condition are influenced by their family environment, their experiences, and their sense of themselves. The maintenance of relations under the same roof is a subject that everyone needs to keep learning and to try.

LOME is an interactive home-installation. It can" listen" to how people behave and say under the roof, and the flower's condition reacts.

LOME can CAPTURE the following SOUND / VOICE at home :

~ Laughing

~ Love expression

~ Polite expression

~ Encouraging words

~ Praise

These features will raise the scale and the vibe at home will be judges as POSITIVE. It represents that the family environment is WARM and HARMONIOUS. The scale will keep within the safe area (green), and the flower will stay in FULL BLOOM.

Also, when these SOUND / VOICE be captured by LOME at home :

~ Crying

~ Loud noise

~ Shouting

~ Bad words

The vibe at home will be judged as NEGATIVE. It represents that the family environment is DARKand DYSFUNCTIONAL. The scale will drop to the dangerous area (red), and the flower will turn to black and die.

By this point, the dome represents home/family, and the flower represent the life and relationship between members. LOME works as a supervisor and reminder for people to be aware of the influence of their expression. It helps people to learn how to restrain themselves and form a healthy and warm home environment.

1. Work Done & Relevance

I believe these posts are meant to look at individual work over the week... but for the first week a large portion of our work revolved around group discussion.... so I'll include those activities while reflecting on what happened instead.

In general, the contacts felt quite short, I attribute this to some changes in habit that I made for this semester, primarily, writing when listening to course content.

Keeping my hands moving means I'm not getting distracted or disengaging, cause it demands more attention to get the content onto paper. The downside... feeling more fatigued after the fact than usual. Even with supplementary sugar it is a little draining to keep this up the whole way through.

Tuesday's Contact

The group activity on Tuesday involved breaking down concerns and expectations for the course, which to me was an opportunity to be clear about my intentions. In previous courses I'd simply go with the flow and work on whatever project the team decided on. This wasn't enjoyable, I have no interest or attachment to those projects after completing them after they were done.

To me, the activity was a chance to bring up things I was genuinely interested in, making it clear to potential teammates what I'm going for this semester.

Because the brief mentioned 'playfulness', the ideas I brought up were related to certain themes. It's hard for people to picture what social robots are, or how design fictions relate to existing spaces - in the past I found that if the idea is too abstract, potential table discussions quieten really quickly as everyone tunes out.

But if instead I say "I wanna build a giant robot" or "I want to make nightmares real", there's a chance to start a discussion as people try to figure out what those things mean.

While I think this comes off as pretentious, we did end up finding some common threads and general goals to bring forward to the classwide discussion.

Wednesday's Contact

There were two big activities today, a group discussion on HCI grand challenges, and idea generation for potential project inspiration.

I would say the group discussion was acceptable - it was focused around Human Technology Symbiosis. Our discussion went through mostly how tech trends like how much tech decides things for you, and who the tech works for... i.e., for technology to be symbiotic with you, it should be serving you and not mostly its creators, creating an imbalance of power. Some highlights were:

I'm a little concerned at my ... activity during the discussion, this first couple of studios everyone's been... a little shy. Im unsure if its because the semester is new, or because my presence in the discussion is overwhelming enough that people dont feel they have room to speak. I did take some action on this... by just not saying anything for some portions of the discussions - that just resulted in everyone going quiet however.

The next activity was idea generation, we received some prompts to work with, starting with prompt cards for the entire group worked on. A combination of the cards were used to pick an idea.

It was interesting to see how there was some constraints, so that we wouldn't try to come up with anything too out there, but options also felt limited because the spaces on the cards felt quite... general. It also had another downside... although unlikely, it was perfectly possible for every item on a card to be something one wasn't interested in, which could feel like wearing kid gloves while working on the concepts.

Next, We worked on some concepts alone. I preferred this opportunity to just... engage in the prompts as compared to the discussion, it was a chance to just have an idea without justifying why it was good or moral - it felt like with the group activity, too much time was spent on "fluffing" ideas to have a positive, happy outlook. But people are complex and feel many things. Sometimes a message is stronger when you deliver an ideological 'shock' to the user.

Finally, refining concepts... which was so-so. I blame this on being the last major group activity of the day... but it took longer to come up with tweaks and adjustments for these concepts than just making up new ones.

Perhaps this was partially because of the 4 levels of limitations, it felt like the selections of words in the cards for the fourth trait, "unbostructed", "nostalgic", "ephemeral" etc was the biggest obstruction, those words are so niche, that finding a way to get everyone to be on the same page on what they mean was a task in itself... what it means to be "ephemeral" for example is pretty unique to individuals experience.

2. What's Next

First off, the concepts, I'm not necessarily planning to use the ones that came from discussion during idea generation in class... Because most of those ideas were so far out of my interest area, that it feels disingenous to work on them. It was certainly useful to think of the ideas within the confines of specific limitations of course.

I've had brief sketches done for a few of them to give me something to start with, but going through a selection or expanding on ideas for it is what I've been working on over the weekend - separate posts coming soon.

3. Project Inspiration

One piece of technology I looked into the most was this set of arms worn as a backpack, which would be controlled by a partner over the web.

In some ways, it's a social robot - my main area of interest. But at the same time, it facilitates collaboration, because you could have someone literally point things out to you, and communication, now you no longer just see the things your friend is saying, but also how they're acting, supplemented by the robot head also attached to the arms.

https://qz.com/1372496/this-backpack-gives-you-a-pair-of-working-robot-arms/

4. Presentation of Review Posts

After writing all this up, I was a little concerned with the length and lack of detail ... but considering the need to keep the posts up, I thought I should post what I already had, rather than continously waiting for the right moment and the "perfect week review" to become possible.

Technically, week 1 is still ongoing, but placing a line down and working on activities that follow up what's already been done makes sure I'm not just running in circles doing the first few activities without making progress.

Tuesday

It was nice to be back at UQ attending classes again and meeting so many familiar and new faces that are taking the same course motivates me to work in a team. After the introduction of this course, we had to find examples of physical computing and i came across an example of a technology that transforms water droplets intro programmable, interactive tools for entertainment and communication. It was interesting to find out that we can actually turn almost anything from the physical environment into an interactive medium.

Link For Digitally Water Droplets

https://www.dezeen.com/2018/05/02/mit-develops-technology-digitally-programmable-water-droplets/

Wednesday

On Wednesday, we looked at the 7 HCI Grand Challenges and then discuss as a group based on the topic that was assigned to us. For me i was assigned to Chapter 7 of the article which was about learning and creativity. It was interesting to find out that there are many design challenges for using technology to enhance the learning ability of people even though the technology are designed to help them. In this chapter, we don’t just look at the technology itself but also taking into account of the learning system that are appealing to users of different ages, personalities, educational background and cultures. Although this is a brief summary of the article, I am really intrigued to find out how AI can build a smart environment for people to learn better or what other technologies can be use to cultivate people’s creativity and learning skills.

For the second half of the session, we were tasked to come up with ideas based on the card that we have picked. It was really fun and weird at the same time because we got random words and have to think of ideas based on the words that we have gotten.

Design to reuse gym by expanding with the quality high gravity ( This was what i have gotten and these were my ideas)

• Reusing the gym in space using high gravity exercises to expand the muscularity size of astronuats
• Reusing the gym for class by expanding size of the gym with high gravity for people with ADHD
• Reusing the gym for students to expand their knowledge on high gravity
• Reusing the gym for expanding research on high gravity
• Reusing the gym by expanding the gym for high gravity brewing (Producing beer with high alcohol content)

The Work done:

• This is the first week of this course, we mainly worked on a general introduction and inspiration. During the contact this week, I was introduced with lots of interesting ideas. However, I found it still hard for me to come up with some new ideas. For example:
  . After watching this, the key element I can found from this video is that when we cut/stop some moving things, some interesting interaction happens. But I am hard to combine this interaction with meaningful actions.
• The next part was working with the group to discuss the relationship between new interaction and Accessibility & Universal Access. By discussion, I understood the challenges that a new interaction may face when this interaction want to be accepted by a specific group of people(people needs accessibility access)

• There was also a brainstorming in this week to help me come up with ideas. But, it still looks like making up a story to me. With the different meaning of words, we can easily make up a story of them, but it may not have any actual function.

How it Relates:

• with this week's activity, I found the most difficult part of this course, for me, is to decide the idea.
• How to decide my idea:
• find out the region of this idea: general world → accessibility group → people need help ≈ people that need help in a specific area → people may not notice that they need help → general health problem → specific for university students →→→ Irregular lifestyle (Irregular sleep and so on) →→→ drink water Irregularly.
• At the same time, I am also thinking about what kind of new interaction can be used to support this idea: control something in a special way(basic idea) → something is not controlled but react to the human activity → what is NOT controlled by human but react to human activity? (have self-activity) → Pets → how to combine pets into design? → if the user did something, they will do something to draw the user's intention → to make the water cup to be a pets → health family include other products.

Work to Do:

Work that Inspired/Interested Me:

• when people use their finger hit the table to play some bits. it is easy to find the bits from a song. but it is hard to find a song with only bits. Is it may be possible?

When Lorna said we will be hitting the ground running, She was not joking.

Week 1 was a quite intense. Not in terms of complex work, rather the volume of information.

Tuesday

This day was quite important as we were given the full overview of the course. It was great meeting everyone and seeing people whom I might end up in teams with. It was quite fun finding examples of physical computing. I posted the one about the robot that picks out tomatoes from your salad, using Image recognition and machine learning.

I was there only for half the day, as I had to attend the UQ Innovate Induction from 1pm- 4pm. This was also a really good experience and I will most definitely use the facilities in the future

Wednesday

This day we looked at the 7 grand challenges of physical computing.

We were shortly divided into 7 tables for the 7 challenges, I was in Table 1 which was Human technology symbiosis. Our entire table came up with some cool ideas as listed in the butchers paper

Introduction

Hello my fellow DECO3850 blog-mates, my name is Fardeen and I am a 3rd year Bachelors or Information and Technology student. I am majoring in Information Systems and User Experience Design.

I am a hard working and determined student, I work very well in a team, I am guilty of taking charge by default however, if someone else can do the job better than me, I am more than happy to let them take lead.

Expectation

I didn't have any expectations initially, but I did manage to form some expectations after the first week of classes.

#1

We will have a functional prototype by week 13

#2

Things will be very fast paced and our team will be required to stay on top of our game

#3

Final week before showcase will be Insane

Expectation

We discussed our expectation to this course in group.

Seven HCT Grand Challenges

Challenge 7: Social Organisation and Democracy.

• Focused on using technology and creating products in the future with a wider scope, eg. local to global, including more users, awareness of impacts beyond the user.

Four keys areas: sustainability, social justice, active citizen participation, democracy.

• Sustainability: how technology can be used to monitor and manage resources and human impact.

• Social justice: closely linked to accessibility. How technology can be used to include more users and be aware of other demographics. Also how technology itself can be accessed by more people.

• Active citizen participation: including everybody in the use and development of technology.

• Democracy: equal engagement between citizens and authority, eg. technology used to give equal voice to government and citizens.

Basically, how technology should facilitate/consider the human population and environment in the future.

Ideation

Week 1

The Work Done:

This week was the first week of physical computing. The week was full on requiring a lot of attention for the 5 hour contact sessions. I did however, learn quite a bit for what I am in for and how to approach the course. This week we looked at interactive digital designs/concepts that are currently out there or in ideation. As a team we discussed these, this exercise was also a good icebreaker as I do not know many people in the course and it was good talking to others.

The second session looked at the HCI Grand Challenges. My section was Human Technology Symbiosis. As a group we discussed potential issues, challenges, benefits and opportunities to do with it. An interesting one for me was safety and how technology as subconsciously made us more safe to the point where we don't even have to think about it. In cars for example, sensors are used to break or let us know if cars are in the blind spot when changing lanes. This is a potential issue which can be dangerous as we put all our trust into technology to keep us safe.

The second exercise for the session was the Design Activity using playing cards with various categories. Our first design category was - “Design for youth in an art gallery, using sound with the quality of nomadic”. This was an interesting piece of subject matter and a view of the technology design can be seen below.

Work to Do:

Based on the work completed in the Design Activity, I feel this has given me a good base to work on my first piece of assessment - for the idea pitch. Over the weekend I will create an A3 poster which imagery and context for my idea along with an explanatory post.

Work that Inspired/Interested Me:

I found the WIM interactive stroke therapy ball quite interesting as it was a piece of UX/UI technology used to help people with health and wellbeing. Almost like gamified therapy which allows rehabilitation to be a little more pleasant and fun for patients. I would like to incorporate a bit of human reality into my design as I feel technology should be designed to help people and make their lives a little more interesting.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bgzo_NjAkmg/