Design for Tangible, Embedded and Networked Technologies

       

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Designing Information Feedback within Hybrid Physical/Digital Interactions 

David Gullick, Paul Coulton 

Lancaster University (2)

d.gullick@lancaster.ac.uk

Keywords: Interaction, Feedback, Information Bandwidth, Prototyping

Abstract

Whilst digital and physical interactions were once treated as separate design challenges, there is a growing need for them to be considered together to allow the creation of hybrid digital/physical experiences. For example, digital games can now include physical objects (with digital properties) or digital objects (with physical properties), both of which may be used to provide input, output, or in-game information in various combinations. In this paper we consider how users perceive and understand interactions that include physical/digital objects through the design of a novel game which allows us to consider: i) the character of the space/spaces in which we interact; ii) how users perceive their operation; and iii) how we can design such objects to extend the bandwidth of information we provide to the user/player. The prototype is used as the focus of a participatory design workshop in which players experimented with, and discussed physical ways of representing the virtual in-game information. The results have been used to provide a framing for designers approaching information feedback in this domain, and highlight the requirement for further design research. 

This paper is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International licence.

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Cite this paper: Gullick, D., Coulton, P. (2016). Designing Information Feedback within Hybrid Physical/Digital Interactions. Proceedings of DRS 2016, Design Research Society 50th Anniversary Conference. Brighton, UK, 27–30 June 2016.

This paper will be presented at DRS2016, find it in the conference programme


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