Tangible/Intangible

A breath-based controller?

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I am struggling to find an example of a breath-based controller to be used in video games or any computer application. This breath-based MIDI controller could certainly be hacked: The music industry (mostly electronic) has brought a lot of things from the video game world (like blip music, chip music...for instance) but what about the contrary? I am pretty sure it would be funny to:

  1. hack existing MIDI controller to play video games: like using a piano or a bass guitar to play Super Mario. Using knobs or weird buttons.
  2. produce/design relevant game controller based on a MIDI protocol taking the advantage of innnovative interactions modes. For instance a breath-based interface.

any known hacks here? If there are Hamster-powered MIDI sequencer there must be someone on earth who did a crazy MIDI game controller.

Human-to-pet interaction improvements

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(via), Poultry Internet, a novel cybernetics system to use mobile and Internet technology to improve human-to-pet interaction. It can also be used for people who are allergic to touching animals and thus cannot stroke them directly. This interaction encompasses both visualization and tactile sensation of real objects.">Poultry Internet developed at the University of Singapore:

a novel cybernetics system to use mobile and Internet technology to improve human-to-pet interaction. It can also be used for people who are allergic to touching animals and thus cannot stroke them directly. This interaction encompasses both visualization and tactile sensation of real objects.

Figure 1 shows in the Office System, where the pet owner touches the doll, and at the same time feels the movement of the doll as driven by a positioning mechanism table. Figure 2 shows the pet (we use a rooster) with a "pet dress" worn on its body. The pet dress consists of electronics that simulates touch (or haptic) sensation. It feels it when the pet owner fondles with the doll in the Office System.

The advantage of this system is to bring the sense of physical and emotional presence between man and animal. It thus attempts to recapture our sense of togetherness with our animal friends, just like times gone by on the prairie, village, or jungle. It can be used also for people who are allergic in touching animals and can not fondle them directly. This interaction encompasses both visualization and tactile sensation of real objects.

Then they provide plent of rendering of this system:

Mediating social relationship through mobile communication within groups of teenage girls

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Ruth Kikkin-Gil's masters thesis seems nice. It's about "mediating social relationship through mobile communication within groups of teenage girls".

The extremity in teenagers’ attitudes and actions coupled with the opportunities of mobile communication, creates new behaviors and re-shapes existing ones. But however meaningful the phone is in teenagers’ lives, it is not designed to support their need for emotional communication and group identity.

The BuddyBeads project suggests alternative ways for communication among teenagers, ways which emphasize their social structures, behaviors and needs. BuddyBeads are techno-jewelry items that facilitate non-verbal and emotional communication among group members, through codes and signals which the group decided upon together. Each group member has a matching jewelry piece and can use it to communicate her emotional state to the other group members. messages are decided by the group in advance and construct a secret private code among its members.

I would be interested to see the results of the user-testing, like how could private codes emerge, how they are used or made of. In addition, I am curious to know how external persons perceive this or how they get what is happening. The disruptions created by tangible/ubiquitous computing is important and some people does not even notice that some stuff (like non verbal communication in this case) is happening.

Visklek: exploration of the Chinese Whispers concept

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Visklek is a project carried ou by the Interactive Institute in Sweden.

The Chinese Whispers (visklek in Swedish) is a game that you might have played as a child. At [visklek.se] the game takes a new form - instead of sitting in a circle and whispering a word to someone sitting next to you, we have used answering machines, a web page and occasional actions in public spaces to create a game between different places and people. By one single phone call the participants can play the Chinese Whispers. They can also create a new game by calling another phone number and adding a story of their own for others to play with.

We have created a platform for the exchange of personal stories which, as they meet other participants, are reinterpreted, misunderstood, laughed at or create disturbance. These chains of whispers between people and places are available at [visklek.se]. At the site anyone can follow your own or other people’s stories change with time, by browsing through old messages or by listening to the game in real time.

A virtual reality chair

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A virtual reality chair to explore frontier of 'telepresence' a project led by Pierre Boulanger:

Computer scientists at the U of A have already created technology allowing people to sit across from three-dimensional recreations of each other, even though in reality they may be thousands of miles apart.

I like that statement:

"From my perspective, an absolutely essential part of Pierre's work on the collaborative virtual environment is described by the word collaborative," said dean of science Gregory Taylor. "It's at the very forefront of what I like to call the new science, interdisciplinary science where the collaborative team becomes the vehicle for discovery."

Physiological computing

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So now, the next trend is not tangible! It's intangible instead! According to jennifer Allanson and Stephen H. Fairclough, physiological computing

involves the direct interfacing of human physiology and computer technology, i.e. brain–computer interaction (BCI). The goal of physiological computing is to transform bioelectrical signals from the human nervous system into real-time computer input in order to enhance and enrich the interactive experience. Physiological computing has tremendous potential for interactive innovation but research activities are often disparate and uneven, and fail to reflect the multidisciplinary nature of the topic.

More in this special issue of Interacting with computers. Of course there are already mind games applications like MindBalls released last year. It's a mind-controlled version of Pong. The more relaxed and calm a player's mind, the more the ball moves away from them. Mindball measures EEG or electrical activity in the brain.

Vertical or Horizontal shared displays?

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Collaborating around vertical and horizontal large interactive displays: which way is best? by Yvonne Rogers and Siân Lindley in Interacting with Computers, Volume 16, Issue 6 , December 2004, Pages 1133-1152.

Large interactive displays are increasingly being placed in work and public settings. An assumption is that the shared surface they provide can facilitate collaboration among co-located groups. An exploratory study was carried out to investigate this claim, and, in particular, to examine the effects of the physical orientation of a display on group working. Two conditions were compared: vertical versus horizontal. A number of differences were found. In the horizontal condition group members switched more between roles, explored more ideas and had a greater awareness of what each other was doing. In the vertical condition groups found it more difficult to collaborate around the display. A follow-up study explored how participants, who had previous experience of using both displays, determined how to work together when provided with both kinds of display. The groups exhibited a more efficient and coordinated way of working but less collaboration in terms of the sharing and discussion of ideas.

Why do I blog this? I was wondering about conducting similar investigations with tabletop displays...

A list of interactive tables

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THIS LIST OF INTERACTIVE TABLE HAS NOT BEEN UPDATED FOR AGES, it was collected for a project that I've done few years ago that is now completed A list of interactive tables that may support collaboration (for students projects in our cscw course:

basic meeting tables:

  1. della rovere
  2. gestarr

interactive tables:

  1. scoop
  2. chatter
  3. the drift table
  4. future office table
  5. dialogtable
  6. lumisight table
  7. hitachi tabletop
  8. Habitat
  9. Interactable
  10. Philips café table (my favorite)
  11. the little table
  12. sensetable (via regine)
  13. tableportation (via regine)
  14. The Storytelling Table
  15. MultiAudable (.pdf)
  16. MapNews Table (.pdf).
  17. floating number

    18. (via regine)

  18. The Table Childhood (via regine)
  19. The Rogue ambience table
  20. Planar Modular Display (thanks jeff)
  21. froggies
  22. Individual fancies
  23. Lo-Tek (via Long Live the Network)
  24. DissemiNET Table (via Long Live the Network)
  25. onomy tilty table
  26. Pond
  27. Le signal
  28. Audiopad
  29. The Message Table
  30. Natural Interactions
  31. MayDay Bar
  32. Light Tables
  33. The Key Table
  34. Music Tables
  35. Turn Table
  36. Intelligent vibrations
  37. tviews
  38. iTable
  39. Counteractive (interactive cookbook)
  40. Lazy Susan Interactive Table
  41. smart table
  42. reac table
  43. the Echoes table (.pdf)
  44. various tables at interact lab
  45. reactive table
  46. Smartskin
  47. The drumming table
  48. MouseHaus
  49. Tonetable
  50. Living Jukeboy
  51. magic board
  52. coeno
  53. MUSICtable
  54. Philips' Entertaible
  55. Tequila Sunset
  56. Beat Jigsaw
  57. Gullivers Welt
  58. Conversation table
  59. Misto Table (HP)
  60. The sunlight table
  61. Gispen XS
  62. Weight table
  63. Proactive Desk
  64. TabulaTouch
  65. hap hep hip hop
  66. Concerto table
  67. Touchtable
  68. Symbolic table
  69. Amebeats
  70. tangible table
  71. microsoft surface
  72. sandspuren
  73. Taito Tabletop Game
  74. Update! GranulatSynthese

Thank you regine for some pointers!