Week 8: Physical interactions

This week in class we looked at three existing digital experiences (email, Twitter and Super Mario Brothers) and had to come up with 5 new ways of physically interacting with them.

 

  

Email

Core interactions

• new message
• write message
• send message
• view inbox
• move or delete message

Ideas

1. Sandbox
   movements in sand associated with specific actions
2. Physical drawers
   drawers on a desk with actions associated with drawers; interactive elements (block) do something when you transfer between drawers
3. Coloured balls
   similar to drawers but colour indicates action; when viewing an email, the colour you choose decides action (red for delete)
4. Physical box with coloured lights
   box is scrollable and has digital display
5. Physical letter
   uses the tactile sensation of writing a letter that then scans image-to-text and shreds original (like a fax/shredder)

Twitter

Core interactions

• scroll newsfeed
• compose tweet
• send tweet
• quote or retweet
• follow someone

Ideas

1. Floor mat
   uses a floor mat that you would stand on/tap to compose tweet; layout would be like old mobile phone keypad
2. Rollerdex
   scroll through to scroll through newsfeed; can scroll forward and backward; touch sensors on 'cards' would perform simple actions like retweet
3. Deck of cards
   to promote slow, deliberate reading; hold card up to sensor to load next tweet in feed
4. Chips/box
5. Morse code
   morse code tapper, switches for actions

Super Mario Brothers

Core interaction

• move forward and back
• jump

Ideas

• Bike
  pedal forward and back; get off saddle to jump
• Semaphore flags
  different combinations for different moves
• Box of water
  sensors on box, splash to indicate action
• Foot pads
  two foot sensors (left and right) to simulate movement; handrail touch to move backwards; jump to jump
• Row boat
  left row for back, right row for forward, row both to jump

Summary

This was a really interesting exercise, I was definitely running out of idea steam by the time I got to 5.  I also felt like I was repeating elements of my ideas, it was hard to think outside the box.  Super Mario was much easier as the interactions were simpler, email and twitter had so many behaviours that I found my ideas centered towards one or two interactions and not the full interaction of these applications.