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Sep 8

Understanding the Dynamics of Engaging Interactions in Public Spaces

These days I’m in Lisbon for the Interact conference. In addition to listening to interesting talks, partaking in discussions about designing for the city and the intersections of participatory design and critical design, and of course enjoying the local cuisine, I’m here to give a talk based on the paper Understanding the Dynamics of Engaging Interactions in Public Spaces, co-authored with Christian Dindler and Kim Halskov. You can download a preliminary version of the paper [.pdf] and/or enjoy the slides below.

In the paper, we look at some of the interactive installations we have developed for public spaces, ranging from a tangible tabletop installation for product presentation in a department store (the Lego Table) over a room-sized assembly of installations for an aquarium (the Hydroscopes [.pdf]) to a large-scale media façade installation (Aarhus by Light). In each case, we have explored particular façets of engagement, but when we compare the three cases it seems clear that we cannot adequately understand and explain what is going on if we focus on the system that we design and the immediate relations between user(s) and that system. In short, we need to adopt a more systemic perspective. On this basis, we propose that such perspective has to encompass physical, social, cultural and content-oriented dimensions of engagement. In the paper, we analyse specific situations of how the installations were used in practice by utilising the four aspects. What becomes very clear when we take these different aspects into use in our analyses is that engagement is very dynamic phenomenon. There are numerous transitions and shifts in how intensely people are engaged and which of the four aspects play a role at different points in time. In the paper, we use three concepts to describe these developments, namely emergence, relations and transformations. In combination, the dimensions of engagement and the terms to describe how they unfold in practice offer a first take on a framework for understanding the dynamics of engaging interactions in public spaces.

Sep 8

Cinématique: 3D Dance Scenography

Fascinating use of 3D scenography in this dance performance, Cinématique, developed by Compagnie Adrien M. 3D projection seems to be taking off (we have worked on a number of such projects in my research group 1, 2, 3), and this is an impressive example of what can be accomplshed with seemingly simple geometrical shapes projected onto an empty stage. What really makes the scenography come to life in this case is the performance of the dancers and the ways in which they respond to and at time influence the visuals.

Jul 24

Urbanflow: A coherent scenario for urban screens

As ever more displays find their way into urban spaces, it becomes clear that there ought to be better ways of putting urban displays to use than just replicating content and interaction forms from past interfaces. These displays – which go under headings such as urban screens, media façades, media architecture, etc. – can be said to form a new medium, and as such they prompt interaction designers, content providers, and even decision makers to reconsider their practices and preconceptions.

In addition to exploring how individual digital displays function in the city, one of the major challenges is to consider how such displays can be part of a larger assembly of interweaving technologies. A few weeks ago, Nordkapp and Urbanscale presented Urbanflow, a so-called operating system for cities. In brief, Urbanflow envisions how interconnected urban displays may be put to use so that they may be more meaningful and valuable to inhabitants and visitors. The core functions of the system are journey planning and wayfinding, service discovery, ambient data, and citizen feedback.

Urbanscale has an extensive post outlining the underlying principles of the scenario, which to me stands as the most coherent vision of situated urban displays so far. For the past four years, we have been carrying out a number of experiments in the same vein in the Center for Digital Urban Living, e.g. Climate on the Wall, in which we explored public discussions in public spaces, Aarhus by Light, in which we explored the transformation of social behaviour in a transitional space, and the Danish Pavilion at Expo 2010 in Shanghai, which explored the entire façade as display. However, these installations can all be seen as stand-alone experiments to the extent that they are installations with individual modes of interaction drawing on more or less prefixed content.

Looking at Urbanflow, I am particularly fascinated with how the scenario considers a) how displays may actually be useful and meaningful in their context (which is sadly not always the case with urban displays), and b) how the displays are integrated into the larger ecology of digital technologies and services in the city. In my experiences this integration is probably also the most complex challenge to address in practice. It remains to be seen if and how the vision can be realized, but the conceptual groundwork is certainly there.

Mar 31

Emerging trends in information visualization

This morning I held a presentation about information visualization at the Headstart social media community. The slides of the presentation are embedded above and present an overview of current trends in information visualization. In particular, I focus on how information visualization expands beyond personal devices and displays (e.g. phones and laptops) into objects, rooms, architecture and public spaces.

Starting out from traditional screen-based visualizations such as newsmap.jp, Gareth Lloyd’s A history of the world in 100 seconds, and Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar’s brilliant we feel fine, i move on to discuss how visualizations are increasingly distributed into physical spaces, e.g. the Maeve installation for the Venice Biennale, into objects, e.g. the Ambient Orb, onto objects, e.g. the Mejlby Stone, and finally integrated into or projected onto architecture, such as the Danish Pavilion for the 2010 Expo in Shanghai and the participative Climate Wall installation.

The talk was recorded and you can view it below. Be warned, although the slides are in English, the talk is in Danish.

Mar 28

Information visualization and data journalism

This Thursday I am giving a talk on the topic of information visualization at the Headstart Network, a new and social media community. As I’m browsing through old presentations and looking at web resources, the video Journalism in the Age of Data really stands out. I’ve embedded the video below, but if you’re interested in this topic, do yourself the favour of visiting Stanford’s dedicated website. It provides heaps of additional information – links, bios, background data etc. – that supplements the video perfectly.

Mar 23

Teaching urban design

From Urban Omnibus comes this interview with Victoria Marshall, assistant professor at Parsons New School for Design, on the topic of urban design. The interview caught my eye because it focuses on an ecological approach that emphasizes “’how to see the city as a designer’ rather than, say, how to design the city or its spaces”. Of particular interest to me as an interaction design researcher is the fact that several of the classes are based on hacking experiments, e.g. when students are prompted to create satellite balloons that can monitor the city. If you feel like exploring through doing, the kind people of Grassroots Mapping have put out a guide for mapping with balloons.

Here are a couple of snippets from the interview to whet your appetite:

“I think of urban design in terms of comfort with multi-scalar thinking, the ability to link the big and the small, from large landscapes to small urban interventions. I’ve done a lot of research with ecologists, working a lot to translate ecology theory into urban theory: how do we read cities as ecosystems?”

“There’s also a class called “Sensing,” in which students build sensors, collect environmental data, do mapping and create their own aerial photography using balloons. They launch their own satellites and collect infrared data.”

The launch of our research center, Digital Urban Living, three years ago seems to have coincided with an explosive interest in urban informatics and the changing experiences and practices of and in the city brought about by digital technologies. Since I’ve brought many topics from this research into my teaching, it’s good to get some insights into how colleagues around the world go about teaching their students the proper skills to address the changing urban landscape in the face of emerging technologies.

Dec 1

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Challenges of Participation in Large-Scale Public Projects

Being able to travel the world and meet like-minded peers is one of the great benefits of working as a researcher. At the moment, I’m in Australia to present my work at two conferences, the Participatory Design Conference (PDC) in Sydney and the OZCHI Conference in Brisbane.

Today, I am presenting my research on the challenges of working with participation as a central driver in large-scale public projects. I take my offset in the ongoing Mediaspace project in Aarhus, which is the development of a new shared building for the municipal library and citizens service department. The field of participatory design has traditionally addressed the development of interactive systems on a relatively small scale, so the Mediaspace project holds a number of interesting findings for this research field. This concerns both the variety of stakeholders in the project, the new methods and technologies that have been developed in the project in order to involve and engage people in the development of the new library, and the ways in which new technologies transforms the role of the library in society.

I’ve made my work on this project available in three ways: you can download the preliminary version of the paper; you can download the manuscript for my presentation, or you can view the slideshow below.

Nov 7

Media surfaces in everyday life

A couple of videos from Dentsu London and BERG that explore a variety of ways in which information could be embedded into our physical environment. I like the way in which the videos envision these systems as everyday phenomena rather than something spectacular, which is often the case in this type of presentation. After all, as these systems and displays become ubiquitous, they will inevitably become mundane occurences.

Media surfaces: Incidental Media.

Media surfaces: The Journey.

Aug 20

Kinetic and augmented sculptures

A couple of intriguing sculptural projects that I have stumbled upon recently:

Kinetic Sculpture is designed by Art+Com for the BMW Museum and is intended as “… a metaphorical translation of the process of form-finding in art and design. 714 metal spheres, hanging from thin steel wires attached to individually-controlled stepper motors and covering the area of six square meters, animate a seven minute long mechatronic narrative. In the beginning, moving chaotically, then evolving to several competing forms that eventually resolve to the finished object, the kinetic sculpture creates an artistic visualisation of the process of form-finding in different variations.”

“Augmented Sculpture” by design agencies Grosse8 and Lichtfront. The installation is a 2,5m tall wooden sculpture augmented with projections in sync with an audio track.

Feb 5

The tablet as book, magazine and notebook

The iPad relies heavily on the metaphors of books and bookshelves when users organize and read novels. Books are displayed on shelves, and you turn pages by dragging them as you would a physical page. Although the implementation is very smooth (and really, who would expect anything less from Apple), I am at a loss to understand why the iPad, intended to carve out a brand new category of interactive devices, should employ such anachronistic forms of interaction. Imagine having to navigate your tunes by first leafing through animated stacks of vinyl records, dragging them to a turn-table, putting down the stylus on the first track to start playback and then subsequently dragging the stylus with your finger to wide grooves in the rendered vinyl to change tracks; b-sides would require you to start over. I’m sure that it could be implemented with silky-smooth visual effects (especially by Apple), but would you want this to be the default mode of interaction? With the caveat that I have not handled the iPad myself, I am quite certain that I would quickly opt for alternative ways of browsing and consuming e-books than the one presented at the iPad launch event. Perhaps the functions are implemented primarily in order to demonstrate to the masses that the iPad is also an e-reader? Lessening the shock of the new by applying a varnish of something familar?
Anyways, I find the two concepts outlined below – Mag+ and Courier – much more interesting when it comes to taking the opportunity to rethink how one might use a tablet in lieu of a magazine and notebook, given the capabilities the platform offers. It is not hard to imagine apps designed for the iPad that ‘borrow’ traits from these concepts in the near future, of course, but it is curious that Apple’s own proposal for reading books is so grounded in the shelves-books-pages metaphor.

The Bonnier Mag+ – a well-conceived take on how and why magazine content can be presented and consumed by use of tablets. Emphasizes not only the immediate interaction with the device, but also the way in which magazines have a place in our surroundings.

The Microsoft Courier – an endless notebook. Captures salient aspects of browsing, collecting and remixing snippets of information as an ongoing process.

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