Designing Interfaces for Playful Public Performances

Steve BenfordThe Mixed Reality LaboratoryThe University of Nottingham

sdb@cs.nott.ac.uk

Introduction

Focus on artistic, cultural and entertainment applications as an important, distinctive and challenging design space for HCI

Studying performances ‘in the wild’

Address two key themes: Uncertainty, ambiguity and seams Designing with spectators in mind

Can You See Me Now?

A performance in which online players are chased through a virtual city by three runners on the city streets

Uncertainty and CYSMN

Studies of CYSMN reveal the impact of the uncertainties inherent in WiFi and GPS on online players and runners

Five Strategies for Dealing with Uncertainty

Remove – improve the technologies or carefully chose time and location

Hide – structures that hide its worst effects

Manage – carefully orchestrate experiences

Reveal – its presence and likely impact

Exploit – seamful design and ambiguity

Feeding Yoshii - Exploiting Uncertainty in Seamful Games

The map screen. Yoshis and plantations are shown as icons and navigation controls are on the right. Near the bottom is a row containing (from left to right) a button for selecting icons, pinning an icon onto the map, initiating a swap with another player (greyed out), and the basket of up to five fruit: in this case two melons.

The Yoshi screen shows the Yoshi himself, as well as the five fruits he currently desires (top right) and a seed of his favourite fruit (top left). After selecting one or more of the fruit in the basket (bottom right), the Feed button is used to feed the Yoshi and gain points. The left arrow returns to the map.

Designing for Spectators

Consider the relationships between Performers Interfaces Spectators

In terms of manipulations of the interface and their corresponding effects

Manipulations

The performer manipulates the interface, the spectator experiences these manipulations

Manipulations Include Gestures

Gestures ‘around’ the interface are important for timing, rest and repositioning and expressivity

Effects

The performer's manipulations produce effects, the spectator experiences these effects

Revealing manipulations and effects

Populating the Taxonomy

Populating the Taxonomy

Populating the Taxonomy

Populating the Taxonomy

Populating the Taxonomy

High-Level Design Strategies

Uncle Roy All Around You

A performance in which street players search the city for Uncle Roy guided by online players

Design Tactics in Uncle RoyRitual briefing: “The bit of anxiety that accrued during the hour-long wait for my turn was minor compared to the state I found myself in next: stripped of all belongings, on my own in central London, with 45 minutes and counting to complete a task whose magnitude I could only imagine.”

Implicating passers by: “Not knowing who at first was a performer and who was not a performer – everyone is a performer”

Crossing boundaries: “At one point near the end you were directed to get into a car. I felt uneasy about this because you ‘never get in a car with a stranger’ but you assume it must be part of the game because of the sequence of events that lead you to that point”

Blurring the Performance Frame

Strategy 2: shrink the apparent frame of the performance inside the actual frame by:

- implying that actors are bystanders- implying props and controlled spaces are in fact external objects and spaces

performer

audience

Bystander (implied

performer)

interface

actual frame

apparent frameactual frame

performer

audience

Performer (implied

bystander)

interface

apparent frame

Strategy 1: extend the apparent frame of the performance beyond the actual frame by:- drawing on bystanders as content- implying that bystanders are involved- heightening the perceived or actual exposure of performers and audience to the scrutiny of bystanders

Balancing opportunities and risksUncle Roy Requires extensive orchestration

Ambiguity as a Resource for Interface Design

Ambiguity is traditionally seen a problem for interface designHowever, artists routine exploit ambiguity to invite interpretation and provoke reflectionThere are various kinds of ambiguity that can be exploited in interface design:

Ambiguity of information Ambiguity of context Ambiguity of relationship

Summary

Playful Public Performances as a new territory for CHI, revealing issues such as:

Uncertainty Ambiguity and seamful design Designing with spectators (audience and

bystanders) in mind

The approach of deploying and studying experiences ‘in the wild’

More information

www.equator.ac.uk

Papers: Uncertainty and CYSMN – CHI 03 and CHI 04 Uncle Roy All Around You – Ubicomp 04 Savannah – CHI 05 Ambiguity as a resource for interface design – CHI 03 Five strategies – ACM ToCHI (forthcoming) Sensed, Expected, Desired – ACM ToCHI (March 05) Designing the spectator experience – CHI 05 Seamful Design – DIS 05, Ubicomp 05 (Chalmers et al)