Lian Loke

Understanding movement for interaction design: frameworks and approaches

The results of a study of two computer games, that use human movement as direct input, were analysed using four existing frameworks and approaches, drawn from different disciplines that relate to interaction and movement. This enabled the exploration of the relationships between bodily actions and the corresponding responses from technology. Interaction analysis, two design frameworks and Laban movement analysis were chosen for their ability to provide different perspectives on human movement in interaction design. Each framework and approach provided a different, yet still useful, perspective to inform the design of movement-based interaction. Each allowed us to examine the interaction between the player and the game technology in quite distinctive ways. Each contributed insights that the others did not.

Moving and making strange: An embodied approach to movement-based interaction design

There is growing interest in designing for movement-based interactions with technology, now that various sensing technologies are available enabling a range of movement possibilities from gestural to whole-body interactions. We present a design methodology of Moving and Making Strange, an approach to movement-based interaction design that recognizes the central role of the body and movement in lived cognition. The methodology was developed through a series of empirical projects, each focusing on different conceptions of movement available within motion-sensing interactive, immersive spaces. The methodology offers designers a set of principles, perspectives, methods, and tools for exploring and testing movement-related design concepts. It is innovative for the inclusion of the perspective of the mover, together with the traditional perspectives of the observer and the machine. Making strange is put forward as an important tactic for rethinking how to approach the design of movement-based interaction.

Designing an immersive environment for public use

Bystander is a multi-user, immersive, interactive environment intended for public display in a museum or art gallery. It is designed to make available heritage collections in novel and culturally responsible ways. We use its development as a case study to examine the role played in that process by a range of tools and techniques from participatory design traditions. We describe how different tools were used within the design process, specifically: the ways in which the potential audience members were both included and represented; the prototypes that have been constructed as a way of envisioning how the final work might be experienced; and how these tools have been brought together in ongoing designing and evaluation. We close the paper with some reflections on the extension of participatory commitments into still-emerging areas of technology design that prioritise the design of spaces for human experience and reflective interaction.

Introduction to the special issue on movement-based interaction

We are pleased to present this special issue of the Journal of Personal and Ubiquitous Computing on movement-based interaction. In this special issue we aim to bring together work on human-centred approaches to understanding movement-based interaction and the design of technology to support this form of interaction. Many terms have been used to describe this area, to mention just a few—physical interaction, embodied interaction, graspable interfaces, tangible interfaces, embodied interfaces, physical computing and interactive spaces. Each area has a somewhat different orientation, but is covering closely related areas. Related research is also taking place in areas such as product design, fashion design, and interactive art, and under the umbrellas of ubiquitous computing, and mixed, virtual and augmented reality. For this introduction and this special issue, we use the term movement-based interaction, as it focuses more explicitly on the interaction rather than the interface. We also wanted to stretch the field of inquiry by focusing on the moving body in the interaction, an integral part in any interaction, but even more so in the extended design space which these new interactions enable. Research effort in this area of human–computer interaction (HCI) is also seeing a growing number of conferences, workshops and publications dedicated to its topics. We hope this special issue will encourage researchers and practitioners in the field to think further about the role of the body, and how bodily movement can and should be used in real use contexts; the body has yet to receive this type of dedicated attention in HCI. Some of the papers in this special issue were presented during the workshop Approaches to movementbased interaction held at Critical Computing 2005—Between Sense and Sensibility, The Fourth Aarhus Conference, in Denmark, August 2005. This workshop brought together researchers and practitioners from architecture, computer science, dance, design, engineering, fashion design, psychology and work practice, all areas involved in studying, researching and developing concepts, prototypes and applications that use human movement as input in some form. The authors of the workshop papers were invited to resubmit them for inclusion in this special issue, in addition the call for participation was distributed to the larger HCI community. We had a difficult time selecting the papers from the submissions we received. There were a number of high quality submission; even the papers we had to reject contained interesting contributions that we hope to see again in other forums. Each paper received two reviews, with an additional metareview by one of the special issue editors. We have aimed to present a balanced mix of submissions and to provide an overview of the type of work taking place in the area of movement-based interaction. We hope the result of this process will be useful both as a snapshot of the field, and a jumping off point for new research. The seven papers presented here can be categorised in different ways—we have chosen to see them in terms of their contribution to theoretical, methodological and design oriented aspects of movement-based interaction. We start the issue with three papers that present lessons learned and perspectives gained from the deA. T. Larssen (&) T. Robertson L. Loke J. Edwards Faculty of Information Technology, University of Technology, Sydney, P.O.Box 123, Broadway, NSW 2007, Sydney, Australia e-mail: atalarss@it.uts.edu.au

The lived body in design: mapping the terrain

We briefly sketch an overview of emerging design research and practice, which values the lived body as a central theoretical foundation in the design of interactive technologies. Three main areas of research activity are presented: theoretical and philosophical perspectives on bodies and embodiment; concepts of the body; and design approaches and methods for working with the body and bodily literacy.

The slow floor: increasing creative agency while walking on an interactive surface

Walking is a physical activity that most people do on a daily basis. It is often characterized as a utilitarian means of locomotion; our basic, habitual mode of getting around from place to place. Walking can also be considered a creative and expressive act, with the potential for inspiring the design of interactive surfaces to support and mediate these aesthetic aspects. We draw on understandings of walking from a range of perspectives including biomechanics, ecological perception, anthropology and dance to inform the design and evaluation of an interactive surface. This surface, the Slow Floor, is intended to encourage a reflective engagement with the act of walking. We present the design and initial user evaluation of the Slow Floor, a pressure sensitive sound-generating surface, with a group of Butoh dancers performing a slow walk. The evaluation reveals a unique creative agency when walking on the Slow Floor compared to the internal focus on awareness when slow walking without the interactive surface. This creative agency provides new knowledge on the role interactive surfaces can play in developing awareness of movement and internal felt experience contributing to the discussion around somatics and HCI.

Inventing and devising movement in the design of movement-based interactive systems

This paper reports on a study that explored ways of inventing and devising movement for use in the design of movement-based interaction with video-based, motion-sensing technologies. Methods that dancers, trained in movement improvisation and performance-making, used to choreograph movement were examined as sources of potential methods for technology designers. The findings enabled us to develop methods and tools for creating and structuring new movements, based on felt experience and the creative potential of the moving body. These methods and tools contribute to the ongoing development of a design methodology underpinned by the principle of making strange. By making strange, we mean ways of unsettling habitual perceptions and conceptions of the moving body to arrive at fresh appreciations and perspectives for design that are anchored in the sensing, feeling and moving body.

Intimate Aesthetics and Facilitated Interaction

With the recent emergence of intimate Live Art and performance practices in the past decades, involving artists and audiences interacting in close physical proximity and one-to-one communication, the body is brought centre stage as the site and material of aesthetic experience. Artists working with these modes of address aim to heighten and intensify the experience of the artwork, through the charged energy of face-to-face confrontation, exchange and close bodily proximity. Our particular interest as artistic practitioners is in intimate body-focused aesthetic experiences, mediated by digital technologies that explore the interactions between physiological processes, bodily sensation and subjectivity. In contrast to autonomous art objects that can be experienced by an individual without any assistance by others, we propose a model of aesthetic experience in which facilitation by artists and witnessing by others are integral components. The guidance and facilitation by artists through an experience is intended to provide safe structures and pathways within which a participant can surrender to the potentially immersive and reflective states of consciousness offered by the artwork. Our framework describes four stages of audience experience and participation that can be used to develop and evaluate body-based Live Art encounters: (1) Welcoming, (2) Fitting and Induction, (3) The Ride, and (4) Debriefing and Documentation. We show the application of our model through two case studies from our artistic practices, illustrating our particular perspective on evaluation as a form of facilitated critique and reflection for audience, as well as artists.

Crafting the body-tool: a body-centred perspective on wearable technology

Wearable technology brings computation in intimate proximity to the body, raising questions about the role of the body in interacting with tools. The disappearance of self and technology in achieving transparent and skilful action -- the ideal aspiration of ubiquitous and context-aware computing -- overlooks the potential of self-awareness as a critical resource for interactive experiences grounded in the body. We propose a body-centred perspective on wearable technology informed by phenomenological theories on the body-tool relationship and pragmatist Somaesthetics prioritising the cultivation of the self through somatic awareness for improved life quality. We extend Heideggers concept of present-at-hand with a new concept of present-at-body, defined as the reflective use of tools for developing bodily self-awareness. In our body-centred approach to wearable technology, we emphasise the dynamic interplay between visibility and transparency of body and tool as a fundamental resource for learning and self-development.

Bodily experience and imagination: designing ritual interactions for participatory live-art contexts

We are exploring new possibilities for bodily-focused aesthetic experiences within participatory live-art contexts. As artist-researchers, we are interested in how we can understand and shape bodily experience and imagination as primary components of an interactive aesthetic experience, sonically mediated by digital biofeedback technologies. Through the making of a participatory live-art installation, we illustrate how we used the Bodyweather performance methodology to inform the design of ritual interactions intended to reframe the audience experience of self, body and the world through imaginative processes of scaling and metaphor. We report on the insights into the varieties of audience experience gathered from audience testing of the prototype artwork, with a particular focus on the relationship between the embodied imagination and felt sensation; the influence of objects and costume; and the sonically mediated experience of physiological processes of breathing and heartbeat. We offer some reflections on the use of ritual and scripted interactions as a strategy for facilitating coherent forms of bodily experience.