Work Done

The second week was centred around the Project Inspiration presentations, and the majority of the contact hours were spent discussing and critiquing the concepts.

In the Tuesday contact, I spent the first half of the session critiquing the concepts on the sheets provided to us. I found it useful to provide feedback during the pitches, as I found myself easily distracted after the first half an hour. It was quite challenging to remain focused for such a long period of time, and so it was good to have an activity to complete rather than merely listening to the presentations. Furthermore, providing feedback and listening to questions asked by the teaching staff helped me evaluate and consider iterations to my own concept. I felt that I was able to provide valuable feedback, although I struggled to fully understand some of the concepts. Reflecting on the Tuesday sessions, I found that it was easier to provide constructive and actionable feedback in the morning in comparison to the afternoon. At some point, the feedback felt slightly repetitive and redundant which made them shorter in length and less detailed. I believe this was also due to some of the concepts having many similarities, making it hard to stay concentrated and inspired.

During the second half of the session, I completed the area induction. This induction was mainly focused on identifying any safety hazards and being cautious when using tools in the workshop. I found the session informative and safety-oriented, and I think it will be useful for the project later in the semester. Earlier in the semester I had a few concerns related to building components in our projects related to safety, and so it was assuring to have the induction as a mandatory component of the course for all students.

In the Wednesday contact, the first half of the session revolved around completing the presentations. Early in this session I presented my idea, which was outlined in an earlier blog post. I believe I presented my idea to the extent that the audience could understand the overall interaction, however I feel there was a lack of detail in how the system would respond to user input. I did not sufficiently explain that when the user succeeded in mixing the correct colour, the butterfly would fly away as an animation and move around the screen. The idea was that this would give the user a sense of achievement and reward through seeing the screen fill up with colours. Although I could have explained this aspect better, I am happy with my presentation as a whole. I am normally somewhat comfortable with speaking in front of people, however I tend to get nervous when I need to present or when I am getting assessed. This happened during my presentation, meaning I got nervous and forgot to include parts of my planned script. Considering this, I think I managed to communicate my concept in a good way in spite of my nerves. For the remainder of the presentations, I tried to provide the presenters with constructive feedback.

After everyone had presented in class, some concepts stood out to me as more memorable than others. I really liked some of the concepts presented, in particular mort. and Percussion Glove.

mort.

This concept interested me as it seemed like a very playful tool to learn language. The interaction mode was easy to integrate into everyday life whilst remaining playful and novel. I liked the use of familiar objects such as a toy for the physical interaction as this is an interesting twist on something the users would have a relationship to. This aspect of the concept inspired me to explore familiar objects and how I may include them in my concept to encourage interaction.

Percussion Glove

Percussion Glove stood out to me due to the novelty and variety in interaction. The concept could either be interacted with as an individual or with others. This inspired me to add multiple interaction forms or change my concept to add more collaboration and social interaction between users. I will look into changing my concept to facilitate multiple users simultaneously as it would be interesting how this could impact the interaction and overall experience.

During the second half of the session, we tried to identify themes among the concepts. Initially, we wrote down suggestions for themes and the associated concepts individually on post-it notes. There seemed to be some overarching themes such as mental health, musical instruments, physical exercise and behavioural change. We then attached these to butcher’s paper in order to share ideas and discuss emerging themes. Once this step was completed, we used the previous steps to ideate specific themes. Many of the themes noted on the post-it notes seemed fairly broad, and so in discussion we tried to narrow them down to be more specific. Some of the themes to emerge were ‘Creating Music Through Movement’, ‘Creating Music Visually’, ‘Individual Action for Sustainability’, ‘Negative Reinforcement for Behaviour Change’ and ‘Emotion as Input’. We found these themes to accurately describe and include a limited group of concepts whilst being specific enough to exclude the majority of concepts. I found this activity a good way to share ideas and generate themes. When completing the first steps individually, I found it quite hard to create themes which were narrow enough to only include a smaller subset of concepts. However, when we moved into a group discussion it was easier to separate these as there were more opinions and perspectives.

How it Relates

The work completed prior to and in studio has helped us ideate and come up with interesting concepts. Furthermore, the activities in class have helped us consider different aspects of our proposed ideas and inspired iterations for them. Perhaps one of the most helpful activities in the process has been providing and receiving feedback. I found this to be a good way to explore possible alterations to or variations of the project I had not previously considered without input.

Work to Do

Once the themes have been defined, I will try to explore the ones which interest me the most. Additionally, I will try and do further research on existing technology within these themes. Furthermore, I will look into the feedback from my peers and teaching staff to iterate on and refine my concept.

Work that Inspired/Interested Me

I am very interested in the domains of responsive art and immersive museums/installations, and so whilst looking for inspiration for my concept I found an immersive room filled with jellyfish projections. The installation is created by Takahiro Matsuo, and can be described as a simulation of being underwater surrounded by sea creatures. Visitors of the installations may extend their hands or move their bodies to elicit a response, e.g. pale blue jellyfish glow in pale blue. What inspired me about this installation was the calming effect it had on me and the imitation/interpretation of sea life.

https://mymodernmet.com/takahiro-matsuo-aquatic-colors/

Ideation Process

Over the course of the last two weeks, I spent many hours trying to come up with a good idea.

Mass/weight childrens game

An initial idea was to use sensors/scales to have an interactive game where children had to use different items with differing weight and mass to match the game prompt, i.e. put 5 kg on the scales to make sure the animal can reach the top of the cliff. This would require the user to utilise math and physics to accurately problem solve, e.g. one item would be small and weigh 3 kg whereas another would be big and only weigh 2 kg. The purpose/rationale of this interaction would be to teach children problem solving whilst exploring math and physics.

I found this idea was lacking in novel interactivity, and so I wanted to have more instant system feedback/visual response. I also felt that the concept might not appeal to children as it would be too monotonous of a task flow.

Responsive shopping bags

This idea revolved around having shopping bags that would respond to what the user would put in the bag. For instance, it could sensor the temperature of the products/produce as it was added to the shopping bag and adjust the temperature accordingly to reduce temperature fluctuation from e.g. the store to the fridge. Furthermore, the shopping bags could change colour in response to how healthy the food or quantity is if the user wanted to become more aware of their food habits/intake.

I found this idea to be lacking in interactivity and playfulness, and hence I stopped iterating on this. As I came up with this idea, I found myself too restricted to come up with playful interactions. My scope was limited to what I have already seen exist as I was concerned with the idea of possibly having to deploy and create the concept. To expand my scope, I tried to look at online resources to find unconventional interactions.

Solar panel wearable

This idea revolved around behaviour change through positive/negative reinforcement. The concept was to have some solar panel wearable that would reward sun safety and punish irresponsible sun exposure. The solar panel could be embedded into a wearable item, e.g. a sun hat, and have a practical use as reward such as for instance charging devices or powering a music speaker. When the user had spent too much time in the sun or needed to reapply sunscreen (around 2 hours) they would be punished by disrupting the reward and possibly vibrating as a notification. The rationale of the idea was to raise awareness around sun safety and initiate behaviour change/nudge using technology.

As with the other ideas, I did not find the concept sufficiently playful. Additionally, I was unsure of the effect the positive/negative reinforcement would have as the lack of functionality when the user had exceeded the recommended time of sun exposure. I believe most users would find the negative reinforcement as more than a slight annoyance but rather a motive to discontinue using the device.

Butterfly colour game

This idea was inspired by the teamLab Borderless museum I visited in Tokyo as previously outlined in my journal. The concept was to have users creating different colours by applying pressure to pressure pads in the three primary colours. The system would prompt the users and/or display the colour to mix, and the user would then have to use their hands to apply the correct pressure to the pad(s) to correctly mix the colour. The pressure would correlate to how intense/dark the colour is displayed, e.g. light pressure would be a lighter colour and more pressure would be a more vibrant or darker colour. To add an element of playfulness and achievement, I wanted the colour mixed to be displayed on still butterflies which would ‘come alive’ through animation once the user satisfactorily mixed the colour. The rationale of the idea was to teach children/adults colour theory whilst training fine motor skills. Alternatively, it could simply be used as a creative outlet where users could play with colour.

Out of the ideas I had in the ideation stage, I found this to be the most fitting response to the brief. Furthermore, I found this to be the concept I was the most motivated to work on and further develop/iterate. I think the idea of seeing immediate visual responses to the physical interaction would be an open-ended, playful interaction that would be interesting to see created. I ended up favouring and presenting this idea, and I am eager to read and reflect on given feedback to further iterate on the idea.

Work Done

The first week of content was centred around course expectations and project ideation.

For the Tuesday session, we focused mainly on course structure and expectations. In smaller groups at each table we discussed and wrote down some of our expectations to be discussed as a class. This included what we thought we would learn, what our aspirations and fears were, what rumours we had heard and any remaining questions. This was a great opportunity to reflect on the course, and have any questions answered from the course coordinator and teaching staff.

At our table, everyone engaged in the discussion and had formed their own opinions.

We were excited to learn:

• Connecting physical and digital
• Building stuff with teams
• Using new equipment

We aspired to:

• Showcase our work at the exhibition
• Build stuff
• Be creative

We feared:

• Building desired functionality within given time frame
• Workload
• Dangerous equipment
• Not having enough skills
• Working in an unfamiliar team for a double weighted course
• Coding in unfamiliar environments
• Uneven splits of designers and developers

We had heard rumours that:

• The course required a lot of work
• We would lose our minds in the lead up to the exhibition
• We would have to do all nighters in the labs

We had questions about:

• How do I know what material to use when?
• What are we allowed to make? And how do we know when we are being unreasonable?
• How to split the workload?

These aspirations and concerns were all addressed when we discussed them collectively after combining the tables' ideas on the whiteboards. It seemed that our expectations seemed fairly consistent with what Lorna said to expect from the course. Although we had more fears than anything else on our poster, I am excited to engage with the course. I expect to be challenged and struggle, but I am ready to face these head on and will hopefully be a better designer and developer as a result of this. Overall, what I hope to achieve with this course is learning by trying.

The rest of the Tuesday session was spent seeking inspiration for the final project as some students attended induction sessions. Our table came across some very interesting examples such as a piece of cloth that conjures light and audio based on movement. (https://www.fastcompany.com/1671684/a-piece-of-cloth-that-conjures-light-and-sound). I also explored the other examples as discussed in the previous blog post regarding initial inspirations. What I found the most interesting as examples of novel interactions were the ones involving visual and audible system feedback in response to body movement and other forms of human interaction. Another example of my favourite examples was the interactive sound table using electric paint (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhOd2UIQjkc). This example also had an element of collaboration and and interaction between users, which I found very interesting. The social aspect would be fascinating to explore, to see how users would interact. Considering this, I would like to include some form of interaction between users in my project idea.

At the Wednesday session, the activities revolved around Seven HCI Grand Challenges and idea generation. I was assigned to the section of 'Human Technology Symbiosis', which discussed the challenges of ensuring technology which supports humans without compromising human control and safety.

When reading my assigned section, I found some aspects intriguing as highlighted in the text. In the part of meaningful human control, I found it the most interesting to read about how transparency, understandability and accountability contribute to establish trust between humans and computer systems. More specifically, it was focused on how humans have an obligation to understand the system to be morally responsible for its actions - mentioning AI which may be unpredictable and opaque in its behaviour both to users and its developers. The idea of moral responsibility in technology, is a relevant theme with the emergence of new technology which have critical consequences, e.g. autonomous cars.

Furthermore, it was enriching to explore how computer systems can support humans through extending cognitive abilities and "nudging" humans to change behaviour in favour of their own or humanity's benefit. Finally, it was discussed how the issue is complex and how technology needs to encompass human values in design choices.

Those of us who had been assigned this section discussed the issues and its components collectively at our table. We found that implications with privacy could mean that the relationship was not symbiotic, yet rather slightly parasitic. Furthermore, as a definition we found symbiosis troublesome as it implies that humans are benefiting technology in a way. As a group, we felt that humans do not contribute positively to or necessarily benefit technology. On the other hand, we felt that technology has the potential to make us "better" humans in some ways. By nudging us to create better habits for our physical health such as engaging in physical exercise, reminding us to stay hydrated or suggesting better sleeping habits we felt that technology may benefit us to some extent. Yet this may come at the price of providing personal data through trackers for the technology to adapt and improve to personal habits or overall accuracy.

As a description, we wrote:

Symbiotic tech means you and the technology are indistinguishable, they are integrated in a way such that they provide benefits without serving an external entity.

After summarising the Seven HCI Grand Challenges, we started an activity using playing cards to ideate.

At our table we slightly misunderstood the task initially, so we spent the first few minutes trying to interpret the generated sentence in multiple ways. After understanding the activity, we started coming up with actual ideas. As a group we presented the idea of an interactive rubber duck which promoted mindfulness and stress management whilst simultaneously facilitating and motivating physical exercise. The idea was derived from the sentence "Design to rest in a swimming pool with natural jump.". As a group we interpreted the swimming pool as any body of water, the resting as laying still and jumping as any form of physical exercise. Our idea was to have an object which would detect physical movement in the water and then respond accordingly to the predicted emotional needs of the user. If there was little water movement detected in the currents, the rubber duck would show soothing colours and play calming audio in conjunction with this. Furthermore it could pulsate to e.g. a calm heartbeat or breathing exercises. This would apply to the resting aspect of the generated sentence. On the other hand to accommodate the jumping, we aspired to have the rubber duck show vibrant colours and play upbeat music to motivate physical activity.

Once the group activity had been completed, we were to generate ideas individually. My generated sentence was "Design for empathising in a monument with skip and the quality of aggressive.". I found this quite challenging as empathising and aggression are quite contradictory. I interpreted it as a lack of restriction - meaning the interaction would not be moderated and hence could be aggressive in nature.

Some of my ideas included:

* Floor tiles where an empathising message can be written, and they are spread out so the user can skip between them.

* Placing small buttons on a board where the placement decides the shape, e.g. can be a heart.

* Mood boards where every person places a pin of their preferred colour.

* Connect bracelet for all visitors where it vibrates in compassion. Each visitor can choose if they want to receive or give comfort. Stroking the 'giving comfort' bracelets would make the 'receiving comfort' bracelets vibrate gently.

* Drawings by visitors are scanned and displayed on the monument.

* Each visitor chooses a colour and the joint colour of all visitors is the displayed colour of the monument through LED lights.

# How it Relates

The in-class activities have been helpful to start the ideating process, especially the playing card-based activity. I found it easier to think of an idea when we had a purpose and more restricted space to design for. Furthermore it was enriching to explore the Seven HCI Grand Challenges prior to the ideation stage as this helped me try to encompass and consider human values in my design. Furthermore, it has been inspirational to look at examples of innovative and novel technology.

# Work to Do

At this stage in the semester I need to ideate and iterate on ideas related to the final project. To do so, I will research existing technology and explore the domains I am the most interested in such as playing with colour and music to create a creative outlet or cognitive learning tool.

Once I have settled on an idea and the ideation stage has been completed I need to complete my poster and refine my pitch. When completing this task I have to carefully consider how to best 'sell' my idea and communicate the technicalities clearly.

# Work that Inspired/Interested Me

In my ideation process, I found it helpful to read this article regarding unrealistic and innovative ideas that have not yet become a reality. The lack of restriction of the ideas helped me expand my scope and be more novel in my proposed interactions. I found that in the start of the ideation process I struggled to be creative and sufficiently innovative, and so this material somewhat helped me combat these restrictions.

https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/06/03/magazine/innovations-issue.html

General Inspirations

Before taking the course, I visited an interactive museum in Tokyo called teamLab Borderless which strongly inspired me for the direction I wanted to go in for the final project. The museum uses technology to elicit emotional responses and encourages their visitors to immerse themselves and take part in the artworks. Personally, I found the artworks to be the most interesting and joyful interactions I have experienced with technology and I have a gained a strong admiration for the domain.

From their website:

https://borderless.teamlab.art/

teamLab Borderless is a group of artworks that form one borderless world. Artworks move out of rooms, communicate with other works, influence, and sometimes intermingle with each other with no boundaries.

Immerse your body in borderless art in this vast, complex, three-dimensional 10,000 square meter world. Wander, explore with intention, discover, and create a new world with others.

What stood out to me with the artworks was the use of colour and sound to stimulate multiple senses. The combination visual and audible elements which complemented each other made me more aware of my surroundings and gave me a sense of relaxation and inner calmness. For me, this was the first time technology had made me feel these emotions in such an immersive manner. These feelings inspired me to create a similar experience, and so I would like to explore this domain further in the following weeks.

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### Forest of Resonating Lamps

Furthermore, it was very interesting to explore the concept of participating in an artwork with a community of people, especially strangers. One installation, named Forest of Resonating Lamps uses the visitors presence to form a single connecting light between all lamps.

From their website:

https://borderless.teamlab.art/ew/forestofresonatinglampsfireonice/

When a person stands still close to a lamp, it shines brightly and emits a color that resonates out. The light becomes the starting point, and it spreads to the two nearest lamps. The light from the two nearest lamps transmits the same color to other lamps, spreading out continuously. The light transmitted always resonates out as a bright light once, passing to close lamps, until all lamps have shone brightly once, and then returns to the first lamp. The light of the lamp in response to human interaction, divides in two, becomes one optical line through all lamps respectively, finally, meeting at the first lamp that became the starting point.

Forest of Resonating Lamps was a room of which you entered for a few minutes with a group of strangers. We were spread out across the room, and the lamps started alternating between colours in a pattern across the room. It was very interesting to be in the space, and I felt a sense of community by observing the lamps change from person to person. Reflecting on this, it was interesting how lamps changing in colour evoked this feeling.

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### Inverted Globe Graffiti Nature, Red List

The installation called Inverted Globe Graffiti Nature, Red List challenged me to be playful and creative. These skills are not regularly employed or exercised in my daily life, and so it was enriching to engage with the activity. The activity mainly revolved around colouring an outline of a red-listed animal which was subsequently scanned and displayed in the premises.

From their website:

https://www.teamlab.art/ew/graffitinatureinverted_macao

Various creatures drawn by everyone live in the inverted globe. Color in a creature on the paper provided. See the picture you have drawn come to life and move in front of you.

Living things eat each other and are eaten by each other to create one shared ecosystem. If the creature you drew eats other living things, its numbers will increase. On the other hand, if it does not eat enough, it will die. And if it is eaten by other creatures, it will disappear.

Flowers will bloom if you stand still, but will disperse if you walk around. And the salamanders will die if you step on them too much. This work is based on the Red List and depicts local endangered wildlife.

I found this activity to be the most memorable and unique experience of the museum. Although the concept was likely more aimed towards children, I felt pleased and happy interacting with it. It was nice to simply sit down with a creative outlet and experiment with colour, and I could imagine using it as a form of stress relief. Upon scanning my drawing, it started appearing on the floor. I followed it around for a few minutes, and saw it interact with the other animals created by other visitors. It was an exceptional experience to see the drawing come alive with animations, and it filled me with a sense of joy and pride. This ended up being my main inspiration for the idea I presented during the week 2 presentations, as the experience of creation and creativity is something I would love to explore further.

Concept

Chroma is a tangible tool that encourages playful interaction with colour based on colour theory. The system prompts the user to create a specific colour using the three primary colours; red, blue and yellow. The user may complete the task by applying pressure to one or multiple pressure pads of the colour(s) they decide to mix. These pressure pads are equipped sensors which register user input. The amount of pressure corresponds to the hue of the colour, i.e. a soft touch will generate a lighter colour whereas applying more pressure will generate a darker colour. If the user struggles to find the correct combination, the system will generate hints to assist overall understanding.

The concept can be altered to fit a variety of purposes and target audiences:

• Testing colour perception and fine motoring skills through an interactive game, i.e. use the three colours to match generated colours with varying accuracy within a given time frame.
• Teaching children and adults colour theory by mixing colours to give butterflies a specified colour. These butterflies come alive as animations across the screen for each correct response.
• Creating a mood board in a public space.

How to Interact

1. Put hands on pressure boards

The user uses their hands to apply pressure to one or multiple sensor pads simultaneously.

1. Apply pressure

The amount of pressure corresponds to the darkness of the colour output, i.e. less pressure for brighter colours and more pressure for darker colours.

1. Observe colour output

The pressure applied to the pressure sensors will output a colour on the screen which is responsive to the user input.

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Inspiration

The concept and interaction mode is inspired by playful interactions using colour and responsive art such as the Sketch Aquarium in teamLab Borderless museum in Tokyo, Japan. Furthermore, the concept aims to explore colour perception and neuroscience related to visual stimuli.

Gegenfurtner, K. (2003). Cortical mechanisms of colour vision. Retrieved 2 March 2020, from https://www.nature.com/articles/nrn1138

Sketch Aquarium | teamLab / チームラボ. (2020). Retrieved 2 March 2020, from https://www.teamlab.art/w/aquarium

My name is Rine and I am an international student from Norway. I am in my third year of a Bachelor of Information Technology currently majoring in Software Design. I have completed most of the courses for the UX major prior to enrolling in this course with the exception of DECO3500 - Social and Mobile Computing. I am hoping to pursue two single majors if possible - Software Design and User Experience, as I am very interested in both of these areas. Throughout my studies I have enjoyed engaging in user-centred design, hence I am looking forward to further work on this in the following semester.

Starting the course I feel confident in my graphic design skills, and somewhat confident in my programming skills. I have worked with Adobe applications in completed courses and I am looking forward to further improve and use my gained skills in this course. In terms of programming I am confident in my Python and Java skills, however I am slightly less familiar with coding for Arduino or hardware in general. In DECO2300 I got partly familiar with Arduino, and so I feel like I have a good starting point. In relation to this, I do not have much experience with assembling physical components or general construction. This is something I have been keen to work on, and I am beyond excited to be exposed to new construction techniques such as woodworking, laser cutting and soldering. Overall, I think this course will be an exciting opportunity to expand on my current skills and gain new skills.

My expectations for the course is to learn a lot through hard work and dedication. I have heard from other students that there is a lot of effort required and expected when enrolled in the course. The same students said the effort put in reflected their final project and paid off. The effort required is something I am prepared to put in, as I want to have a good experience of the course as well as be proud of the work produced at the end of the semester. For me, I think a highlight of the course will be to learn new ideation techniques, physical construction and novel interaction modes. Although the course will be challenging, I think it will be a great learning experience and a useful course for my future studies and career.