Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Ambient displays








This artwork by Susanna Hertrich works well on two levels.

Firstly I like the idea of something embedded into a mirror,  especially in a domestic situation.  A mirror is definitely something you look at or rather glance at something you  might want to consider as you move in and out of the building - this is something the art work side aludes to.

As I think Kay said I think that you need something you don't touch directly. So I like the interface at the bottom of the screen and clearly making a one action interface makes it very approachable.

Secondly as  a very personal interface - you see things about you ( again the art work does well on this). Quite easy to think of a number of less exciting interfaces here - (calendar, appointments). it might be a good time to remind you about you permit the user to do things in a persuasive computing sense. It would also work well as a dwelling interface - you could see a graph of energy use but have that compared to other people you know or are families like yours.

I also liked the animated interface - reminds you how poorly structured most user interfaces are for animation/movement.

Both we and IET have a number of half silvered mirrors - so one could prototype some kind of interface quite simply. As for a shareable I like the notion of a mirror that 'captures' previous glances. You might see pictures of people entering and leaving recently or pictures of your self a year ago.I guess its obvious and it must have been done. Perhaps some combination with that skin colour tracking you could make an nice interface. I have some good face tracking code that might work well for something.

I think i like the more physical waste of time interface.

http://www.susannahertrich.com


Conversation with jeff - use pinch as a 'selection' mechanism. 
Conversation with Kay  - she tried arm waving (not working) but holding hand near and still until it 'warms' up (visual indicator changed) did work.

No comments: