13 research outputs found
User quality of experience of mulsemedia applications
User Quality of Experience (QoE) is of fundamental importance in multimedia applications and has been extensively studied for decades. However, user QoE in the context of the emerging multiple-sensorial media (mulsemedia) services, which involve different media components than the traditional multimedia applications, have not been comprehensively studied. This article presents the results of subjective tests which have investigated user perception of mulsemedia content. In particular, the impact of intensity of certain mulsemedia components including haptic and airflow on user-perceived experience are studied. Results demonstrate that by making use of mulsemedia the overall user enjoyment levels increased by up to 77%
Shybo. An open-source low-anthropomorphic robot for children
This article presents Shybo: a novel low-anthropomorphic robot for children. The robot, resulted from the combination of open-source hardware and software, is able to perceive sounds and to react through two non-verbal behaviors: hat’s movement and lighting. By taking advantage of an open- source machine-learning software, the robot can be easily trained by children. This robot can be employed in research to support human-robot interaction studies with children, for investigating perceptual aspects of robot’s features or for investigating children’ cognitive abilities. It can also be used for applications in educational context to support playful learning experiences
The power of affective touch within social robotics
There have been many leaps and bounds within social robotics, especially within human-robot interaction and how to make it a more meaningful relationship. This is traditionally accomplished through communicating via vision and sound. It has been shown that humans naturally seek interaction through touch yet the implications on emotions is unknown both in human-human interaction and social human-robot interaction. This thesis unpacks the social robotics community and the research undertaken to show a significant gap in the use of touch as a form of communication. The meaning behind touch will be investigated and what implication it has on emotions. A simplistic prototype was developed focusing on texture and breathing. This was used to carry out experiments to find out which combination of texture and movement felt natural. This proved to be a combination of synthetic fur and 14 breaths per minute. For human’s touch is said to be the most natural way of communicating emotions, this is the first step in achieving successful human-robot interaction in a more natural human-like way
The Dreamcast, Console of the Avant-Garde
We argue that the Dreamcast hosted a remarkable amount of videogame development that went beyond the odd and unusual and is interesting considerd as avant-garde. After characterizing the avant-garde, we investigate reasons that Sega's position within the industry and their policies may have facilitated development that expressed itself in this way and was recieved by gamers using terms that are associated with avant-garde work. We describe five Dreamcast games (Jet Grind Radio, Space Channel 5, Rez, Seaman, and SGGG) and explain how the advances made by these industrially productions are related to the 20th century avant-garde's less advances in the arts. We conclude by considering the contributions to gaming that were made on the Dreamcast and the areas of inquiry that remain to be explored by console videogame developers today
Material Visualisation for Virtual Reality: The Perceptual Investigations
Material representation plays a significant role in design visualisation and evaluation. On one hand, the simulated material properties determine the appearance of product prototypes in digitally rendered scenes. On the other hand, those properties are perceived by the viewers in order to make important design decisions. As an approach to simulate a more realistic environment, Virtual Reality (VR) provides users a vivid impression of depth and embodies them into an immersive environment. However, the scientific understanding of material perception and its applications in VR is still fairly limited. This leads to this thesis’s research question on whether the material perception in VR is different from that in traditional 2D displays, as well as the potential of using VR as a design tool to facilitate material evaluation.
      This thesis is initiated from studying the perceptual difference of rendered materials between VR and traditional 2D viewing modes. Firstly, through a pilot study, it is confirmed that users have different perceptual experiences of the same material in the two viewing modes. Following that initial finding, the research investigates in more details the perceptual difference with psychophysics methods, which help in quantifying the users’ perceptual responses. Using the perceptual scale as a measuring means, the research analyses the users’ judgment and recognition of the material properties under VR and traditional 2D display environments. In addition, the research also elicits the perceptual evaluation criteria to analyse the emotional aspects of materials. The six perceptual criteria are in semantic forms, including rigidity, formality, fineness, softness, modernity, and irregularity.
      The results showed that VR could support users in making a more refined judgment of material properties. That is to say, the users perceive better the minute changes of material properties under immersive viewing conditions. In terms of emotional aspects, VR is advantageous in signifying the effects induced by visual textures, while the 2D viewing mode is more effective for expressing the characteristics of plain surfaces. This thesis has contributed to the deeper understanding of users’ perception of material appearances in Virtual Reality, which is critical in achieving an effective design visualisation using such a display medium
Dynamic physicality as a dimension of the design process
Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2009.Includes bibliographical references (p. 161-167).At its core, the concept of Tangible Interfaces leverages the idea of using the movement of the body as an inherent part of the human side of a human-computer interaction, assuming that bodily engagement and tactile manipulation can facilitate deeper understanding and more intuitive experiences. However, as an interaction principle in our era of digital design, motion construction and control has been underutilized and little examined as a design tool, leaving open the possibilities of motion's natural ability to draw our attention, provide physical feedback, and convey information through physical change. This dissertation postulates that the ability to experiment, prototype, and model with programmable kinetic forms is becoming increasingly important as digital technology becomes more readily embedded in our objects and environments and need for tools and systems with which to create, manipulate and finesse motion in response to computational and material input remains an under-developed design area. This thesis aims to establish principles of kinetic design through the exploration of two approaches to motion construction and manipulation: motion prototyping as a methodology for design thinking, learning and communication and physically dynamic state memory as a methodology for organic form finding and transformation in the design process.(cont.) To demonstrate these aims, I present three interface systems: Topobo, a system for motion construction and dynamics physics education with children; Kinetic Sketchup, a system for motion construction and prototyping in architecture and product design; and Bosu, an augmented textile interface offering an experimental approach to digitally augmented organic form finding in fashion and product design.Amanda Jane Parkes.Ph.D
Project knole: an autocosmic approach to authoring resonant computational characters
Project knole, consisting of this thesis and a mixed reality installation artwork centred around a computational simulation, is a practice-based response to the question of how a character in a work of computational narrative art might maintain their defining quality of dynamic agency
within a system (arguably one of the key potentials of the form), while achieving the ‘resonant’ qualities of characters in more materially-static artforms. In all aspects of this project, I explore a new design philosophy for achieving this balance; between the authorship of a procedural computational system, and the ability of that system to ‘resonate’ with the imagination of an audience. This philosophy, which I term the ‘autocosmic’, seeks inspiration for the curation of audience response outside the obvious boundaries of artistic discipline, across the wider spectrum of human imaginative engagement; examples often drawn from mostly non-aesthetic domains. As well as defining the terms ‘resonance’ and ‘autocosmic’, and delineating my methodology more generally, this thesis demonstrates how the ‘autocosmic’ was employed within my creative work. In particular, it shows how some of the perennial problems of computational character development might be mediated by exploring other non-aesthetic examples of imaginative, narrative engagement with personified systems. In the context of this project, such examples come
from the historio-cultural relationship between human beings and the environments they inhabit, outside of formal artistic practice. From this ‘autocosmic’ launchpad, I have developed an artwork that starts to explore how this rich cultural and biological lineage of human social engagement with systemic place can be applied fruitfully to the
development of a ‘resonant’ computational character
The Body and Japanese Cinema
The dissertation The Body and Japanese Cinema examines the notion of body in context of Japanese culture, specifically in a film domain. Throughout this study converging the cultural and philosophical models of both East and West, the focus is on various aspects of the body perception generated and mediated in Japan.
This dissertation is the first attempt in Serbian scholarship, on Japanese cinema, to explore the corporeal perspective of Japanese identity. The first part of the dissertation features an extended analysis of the Japanese cultural outlook dealing with the questions of body and language, silence and visual space. Even though this is a study on nationally determined culture, it opposes to drawing the conclusions on the Japanese uniqueness following the Nihonjinron discourses of homogeneity. Rather, the focus is on the issues of heterogeneous taxonomy that could provide a platform for better understanding of Japanese culture as well as to offer a standpoint from which it is possible to indicate the similarities and differences of other, not necessarily national, identities. Without any intention of cultural essentialism, I argue that due to distinctive attributes and specificity of Japanese language and in addition, firmly established communicative practices that indicate intuitive understanding that goes beyond spoken words, the visceral perception is the crucial point of the Japanese film viewing.
Second part of this study is a close analysis of selected movies from the filmographies of well-known Japanese cineastes. In particularly, this work proposes the taxonomy that deals with invisible aspects of the body in Japanese cinema. Chosen filmmakers whose opuses have been here reinterpreted are familiar to the audience outside Japan but their work is located on the furthest edges of mainstream, rendering them a somewhat outsider position. Here, the prominence is found in perspective that these filmmakers' attitudes resist the "official" Japan imagology which fixates the corpus of what is intended for foreigners to understand. Their body of work contrives effective communicative strategies that allow kaleidoscopic and more diverse insights of Japan
Ecology, culture and cognition: a text book on the principles of environmental design
[This] study aims to explore the notion that human
achievements, i.e., cultural, technological, architectural, etc.,
are an outcome of the interaction between ecology, culture and
cognitive structure. Such interaction is thought to set out a condition of stability, compatibility and fitness which characterises various vernacular cultures. These notions ought to be investigated and hence utilised in design ideas and design processes.
To illustrate the various aspects of this interaction, the thesis
has adopted a holistic view which incorporates many elements that
underly the environmental phenomena; its structure, its laws
of evolution and its adaptive processes. The following is a
brief summary of each chapter of the thesis.Chapter One: In any design research it is more important
to arrive at appropriate identification of a problem before being
preoccupied with 'assumptions' to solve that problem on the basis
of its 'external' appearance. Each environment has a specific
structure which accommodates in a certain pattern its various
components such as the social boundaries of interaction, the particular physical structure, building patterns, behaviour, mode of
thought, economic system and so on. It is only by tracing the
history of development of each of these components within this
structure that a solution can be fitting and relevant.The chapter reviews some problems and controversies raised by
adopting a misfit technology and its implication on various cultures
as well as on Architecture.Chapter Two: This chapter suggests a general theoretical
framework which rejects the harmful and unifying effects of those
'fragmented' approaches within design disciplines. In fact they
came as an outcome of the passion for misfit technologies, the non - environmental views of culture and ideologies normally associated
with them. It is hence the interplay of the three elements of
Ecology, Culture and Cognition that result in architectural quality
most fit to its context. The objectives of such a framework are: the protection of the natural ecosystems and their manifestations
in design; the establishment of a self - sustaining way of life;
and finally, setting policies that give priority to bettering the
ecological qualities as a basis for improving other aspects.Chapter Three: In this chapter a broadening perspective is
introduced to define ecology according to its concerns for the
conditions and interactions that determine the distribution and
abundance of organism in a certain setting. The perspective includes culture as well as the other biological and physical factors
on the basis of considering culture as a manifestation of man's
adaptation to that setting. It is very important to consider the
role of ecology in differentiating various societies; their cultures
and architectural forms.Chapter Four: The second element, culture, according to the
school of cultural- ecology, is made up of the modes of thought, the
ideologies, energy systems, artifacts, the organisation of social
relations, norms and beliefs and the total range of customary behaviour, all of which have been influenced by the physical setting.
The concept of 'cultural core', introduced by J. Steward, is adopted
for its importance in distinguishing cultural features in terms of
their physical belonging. It helps, hence, to advocate solutions
more fitting to their 'authentic context' in the face of the
bustling, overlapping and usually more abstract cultural features
of the external phase (secondary features).Chapter Five: Knowledge is the central element in design, and
cognition has been defined as the activity of knowing: the acquisition, organisation, and use of knowledge. The human cognitive
structure selects and interprets environmental information in the
construction of its own knowledge, rather than passively copying
the information. The mind does this to make the environment 'then'
fit in with its own existing mental framework.Chapter Six: Because man and nature form two elements in
one system, man has accumulated a profound knowledge of the various
elements in nature including natural materials. This knowledge is x
embeded so deeply in his psychological structure that his innate
disposition towards natural elements has been extended to include
all interactional modes, subsystems and visual structures which
they initiate.The concept of schemata was introduced within cognitive psychology to explain some controversial issues in the field of
accepting, restoring and processing information. Schema is defined
generally as a data structure for representing the generic concepts
stored in memory. There are schemata representing our knowledge
about events, actions, objects, etc. They also contain the network
of interrelations between these concepts. It has been suggested
that the source of this knowledge which schema represents comes from
one of two resources; 1) immediate information of the physical
objects, 2) the innate and stored knowledge in the human mind.
Both resources, however, can provide information to what the study
calls experiential schemata.The important contribution the study offers is the concept of
the cosmocognitive schemata. They are the schemata that represent
the point where both organism and the universe meet and represent,
man's extension in space and time. With these schemata we can explain many phenomena in which people of totally different cultures,
different experiential schemata, respond and react similarly.
In other words, the various authentic capacities of objects, their
various properties and potential dispositions towards interactions
are all taking precedence in the organism's neural system.The concluding notion of this important chapter is that man
has been vividly and maybe unself- consciously utilising the 'cosmocognitive' knowledge in the adaptational processes, blended with
activities of the experiential knowledge, in the elaboration of
the various architectural forms and patterns. Therefore, it is
suggested that it is extremely important to establish a theory of
environmental quality based on cognitive knowledge.Chapter Seven and Chapter Eight: In these two chapters, the
study introduces the most influential factors which define the
ecological setting in general. These factors are considered as being the permanent constructs of human cognitive knowledge and
hence have to be well studied before making any decision concerning
the nature of the design solution proposed to any society.Chapter Nine: It is suggested that the influence of ecology
and nature on human beings takes place and is utilised over long
processes of adaptation. The mechanism and other elements of these
processes are explicitly demonstrated through a model that the study
elaborates. The main idea this model presents is that man, during
the emergence of his settlement, initially responds to nature and
the physical properties of that setting. He first develops prototypical patterns to embody their impact, according to which he then
develops his social and behavioural patterns. Out of the interaction
of these components and their various elements, and by reference
to his experiential and innate knowledge, he then establishes his
traditional culture of which architectural phenomena is the most conspicuous feature.Chapter Ten: Beyond the aesthetic values of architecture:
decorative form and ornaments, and beyond the persistance of
architectural pattern and activity types lie empirical, structural,
functional and practical principles. The basic aim of arriving
at a concrete understanding of what underlies the aesthetic characteristics is that once such an understanding becomes possible,
designers would be able to manipulate their design ideas following
the same principles of authenticity and purposefulness rather than
attempting further implication or inventing more fantasies.The title implies that material's authentic properties, architectural and structural elements and activities have cognitive
values which are represented in certain characteristics. And it
is these values that a designer whould, in fact, search for, if
satisfying people's real preferences is one of his interests.Chapter Eleven: The outcome of the interaction between
ecological /cultural variables and cognitive structure consists of
several components. These have to be carefully matched in setting
design criteria within any context: They can be referred to in any
judgement over the fitness and appropriateness of any design idea
in hand