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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
video link https://docs.google.com/folderview?id=0B_eEZjjG1T1JWmRsekY1YVVHSFU&usp=docslist_api
Wearable R.I.P: Relax like a dead on the street First Author
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Abstract
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This paper presents a wearer-object-spectator ethnographic exploration for opening up a discourse on wearable design. We seek to understand interactions induced by the variety of a wearer’s characters. Using the design project, Wearable R.I.P [8], as a diegetic prototype, we explored how a wearer’s three different roles (performer, operator, and spectator) changed and influenced how meanings emerged from experiencing the artifact. All in all, we come up with four speculative characters to leverage future wearable design.
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Authors Keywords Speculative design, wearable, interaction design, intervention
ACM Classification Keywords H.5.m. Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI): Miscellaneous. Paste the appropriate copyright/license statement here. ACM now supports three different publication options: • ACM copyright: ACM holds the copyright on the work. This is the historical approach. • License: The author(s) retain copyright, but ACM receives an exclusive publication license. • Open Access: The author(s) wish to pay for the work to be open access. The additional fee must be paid to ACM. This text field is large enough to hold the appropriate release statement assuming it is single-spaced in Verdana 7 point font. Please do not change the size of this text box. Each submission will be assigned a unique DOI string to be included here.
Introduction Stress and fear from the reality would make even the most active people want to run away to find their own peace in mind. We are often educated to do our best to get connected with others, but the truth is, that we might not always want to be socially active. In the public space, it is very often that people use their smartphones or headphones to avoid awkward, embarrassing and boring situations in front of strangers. With these technological solutions, we can easily submerge ourselves into our
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
own comfort zone, and people can perceive that we decline to be active in physical communication for the moment. Wearable R.I.P [8] is a wearable project starting from a simple question, “What is an ideal solution that can help those who want to escape from the physical world and bury themselves into their own world whenever they choose to?” Wearable R.I.P is designed as something you can wear and rest in peace in any place at any time. The coffin-shaped artifact intends to remind the passing of moments of life. When a user wears this artifact, he/she can remain physically active, but can also escape into his/ her own inner world. Whenever the wearer leans back, the Wearable R.I.P will play natural sounds: fire, ocean, bugs in the soil, etc., just as what might be heard in the final resting place at the end of people’s life, in the Mother Nature’s hug.
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
Why Coffin ?- Semantics Exploration Designing to be an “ideal� object for those who wish to run away from everything, Wearable R.I.P. also intends to keep everyone else away from the wearer. The shape of a coffin is an obvious symbol of the death, but also could be a Taboo for everyday life. When wearing the artifact, the wearer cannot actually see oneself enclosed in the shape of coffins, but can only feel the comfortable inner lining and listen to the soft and peaceful sound. In contrast, spectators could become uncanny, when seeing the coffin symbol. These effects are exactly what the artifact wants to invoke: comfortable for the wearer but slightly uncomfortable for the others.
How to make ? - Material Exploration In order to make coffin-shape wearables, the ratio of the coffin was printed out and evaluated to scale down. The first step is to use cardboards to make mock-ups to find the suitable size and then construct the shape. Second, there are two layers: leather and a plastic sheet, making the shell visually hard but physically light when being worn on. What Coffin? - Function Exploration Playing music is a way to create aura of another world for a wearer. Therefore, what kind of sound should it play? For being peaceful, some light and religious music comes first. However, it is can be too personal that not everyone enjoys it. The natural sound seems to be the perfect one. It is acceptable for most people, but also can be described as a symbol of an afterlife: people will eventually go back to the hugs of Mother Nature.
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
What I feel & What they see Wearable R.I.P is a speculative design that intends to provide two very different experiences between the wearer and the spectator. The coffin-shape is designed for the spectator; it is a death symbol and a taboo, to invoke uncomfortable feeling; however, soft and peaceful music are provided for the wearer, to create relaxing moments. Translating the framework from a trichotomy of spectator, user and system [1] into wearer, object and spectator, wearable design could be analyzed with three pivot elements.
Geographic distance
Interaction distance
“Wearer - Object - Spectator” Trichotomy Exploration The exploration in this paper will be fitted into the trichotomy of wearables. The green arrow is the interaction distance: What kind of behaviors will the spectators do? How will they react? The black line is the geographic distance, according to the Edward T. Hall’s social distance [2], there are four zones of distance between the wearer and the spectator in the public space: 1. intimate distance (0-45cm), 2. personal distance (45cm-1.2m), 3. social distance (1.2m-3.7m), 4. public distance (3.7m-7.5m). We explore what kind of interaction will happen in different distances.
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Stage 1 : Walk on the Street We invited people to wear the Wearable R.I.P to walk on the street. Research teams included five people: one wearer, one researcher + interviewer, and three recorders who carried cameras to record the interaction between pedestrians and the wearer. There are four different factors for the action: the density of the public in a location, the interaction between a wearer and the object, the performance we ask the wearer to make, and the dress code. We took action on weekend afternoons. According to the four social distances, we chose Shuanglian and Zhongshan parks in Taipei, for the public and social distances. Located between a modern department store and a traditional market, there were gradient-aged people ranging from young people to elders, also from visitors to citizens. Additionally, we chose the MRT between Yuanshan and the main stations in Taipei for the personal and intimate distances.
DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
A.Location 1.Zhongshan park 2.Shuanglian Area 3.Zhongshan street 4.Taipei MRT station
B.Interaction 1.object 2.object+smartphone
C.Performance 1.sit down 2.walk 3.lean back 4.lay down.
D.Dress Code 1.casual clothes 2.casual clothes in all black 3.suit in all black
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
Stage 1 : The exploration between the spectator and the wearer+object The spectator usually saw the performance of the object and the wearer together. According to Goffman’s “The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life” [6], the different behaviors that wearers make will change them into the frontstage or backstage.
Changing the Distance Spectator -> [Wearer -> ( Wearer + Object )] If a spectator perceives that the wearer also perceives her/him, it will cause the uncanny feelings so that the civil inattention [6] would happen. The shorter geographic distance makes the spectator and the wearer so close that the interaction distance becomes longer. However, when the wearer closes her/his eyes, the interaction distance would be shorter.
Changing the Performance Spectator -> [Wearer -> ( Wearer + Object )] When the wearer holds the smartphone as others do, the uncanny feelings would suddenly disappear. “Someone just come to ask me the way”, performing the same behavior with smartphone makes the interaction distance shorter and brings back the wearer to the backstage.
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
Changing the Performance Spectator -> [Wearer -> ( Wearer + Object )] However, if the wearer’s behavior is out of social norms, like laying down on the street, it brings the wearer to the frontstage, and even becomes the main character attracting the attention of mass media reporters. The interaction distance becomes shorter, since pedestrians would feel comfortable about reacting to the situation.
Summary:
Why We Need the Stage Performers Cameras hide no more
After the exploration of stage 1, we found it is difficult for us to make in-depth interviews with the wearers and the spectators if they are too insensitive to perceptual interaction and experiential description, such as “I just don’t know how to say, but I feel weird.” Rather than hiding the manipulation in the stage 1, in the stage 2, we enlarge it, to make the action as a performance in the public. We invited professional performers to be the wearers and the spectators. Based on their own training, they are more sensitive to people’s behaviors and feelings. During the tons of selfexploration practices, the stage performers can quickly engage themselves instead of being afraid of cameras or the spectators. It takes more time for the wearers in stage 1 to be situated. We think we should do the closed trichotomy for deeper exploration in the stage 2, rather than opened trichotomy in the stage 1, in order to reduce too general opinions or inexplicit voices.
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
Stage 2 : Performance in the public Stage 2 is the condensed version of stage 1. We invited a drama student from Chinese Culture University as a wearer to present a 20-mins performance encompassing four action settings. 5 dancers from cloud gate participated as spectators to walk with the wearer, followed by 3 recorders and 1 researcher. The location we chose was the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall MRT Station, it is an ideal place ranging from intimate to public space.
Music Different from stage 1, we chose the Brain Wave music for meditation, it is a music clip that can help the wearer concentrate more on themselves. Stage 3 : Express yourself by dance After stage 2, the 5 dancers shared their experiences while acting as spectators. According to their own understandings of the Wearable R.I.P, in the stage 3, we asked them to be the wearers to preform. They could choose whether to interact with the public or not.
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
Stage 2 : The exploration about the wearer & the object
“I didn’t think I am dead. I just let go the responsibility of being here. I acted as who I am.” “With the Wearable R.I.P, I felt relaxing because at that moment I could ignore everything, I didn’t have to worry about other people: should I make way to the elders? I only felt myself and peace in my mind.” Wearable R.I.P is truly an object that provides a relaxing moment for the wearer and allows her to step into the peace in her mind. “However” she said, “I felt like my life is flashing by. It reminded me the happiness but also the sadness. Therefore, I was not always comfortable.”
Stage 2 : The exploration about the Spectators to the wearer + object The followings are different levels of the spectators’ perception.
1st
APPEARANCE (object <-> death)
2nd
IDENTITIES
(object + behavior <-> identities)
At the first sight from the spectator, the appearance indicates the function & symbol: a. the death metaphor b. the protection c. comfortable rest “At the first sight, its shape, colors and the outfit all reminded me to think it is a wearable coffin.” “She was like wearing a shell, protecting herself against the outside world that I want to give it a try to knock.” “It looked like comfortable inside.”
After understanding the object, the spectators observed the behavior she performed and gave the story why she wore in the spectator’s mind. “She walked slowly but unlike a dead people.” “I could feel she is struggling at some time, thinking something.” “She was experiencing the death because it is so important.” “It seemed like she was protecting herself.” “She was helpless, giving the outside world a silent protest.”
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
3rd
AWARENESS
(object + behavior + environment <-> meaning / reflexivity)
The meaning of interaction between the wearer and the object allows the spectators to perceive more, why she is here and even reconnect to their own memories: a. Funeral memory (the imagery from the slowness of the wearer and the haste of the pedestrians) b. Memory of wiping the remains (the imagery from the space and the wearer constructing the “dedication” symbol.) “It reminded me that I had the experience of wiping my dad’s remain. It seemed very sad but I am glad I did it. It is the last intimate touching with my dad.”
When changing the distance from the intimate to the public, the flow of the sights are like from focus to drifting to focus. “In the elevator, you could feel the air was stuck. Everyone was so quiet. You had to face her, like facing the death.” “When we got out of the elevator, I finally could breathe, lots of people walking around, you could be distracted to other things. However, you knew you just pretended to be released, you knew you still needed to face the death at the end.”
Interact with others Stage 3 : The exploration of the dancers as a wearers After exploring the Wearable R.I.P., the 5 dancers started to perform as their ideal wearers. As we can see, with different characters of the dancers, there are two types. 1. Interacting with others: to share their feelings to others. 2.Self-exploration: to perform what is the death or their feeling when wearing it.
Wiping the remains with me.
Self-Exploration
experience the death Broken bones memory freedom & constrain
experience the flow from music
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DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
Discussion
Overall Interaction Distance Reviewing 130 wearable cases separated into the technologydriven & fashion-driven [7], we found they focus more on the two sides instead of three.
The Level of Perception “User can be seen as three roles: operator, performer, and spectator [1].” Drawing on this framing, we extend it to further describe how a wearer creates meanings for another spectator in four levels of perception: function, identities, meaning, and reflexivity.
This project is based on the 130 cases studies collecting from a wearable class at ArtCenter, taught by Elise Co (16 interaction and product design students). Taking these data to fit into the trichotomy of “wearer-object-spectator”, what we found is that most of the technology-driven wearables focus on the interaction between a user and an object: how can a designer enhance the user experience? The fashion-driven wearables focus on the interaction between an object and a spectator: how can a designer design something that presents users’ identities and expression to others? We seldom see wearerobject-spectator as a whole but more focus on the interaction between the wearer-object or the object-spectator. We rarely emphasize the interaction between a wearer and a spectator. Additionally, learning from the exploration, it is the users’ personality to determine what kind of the object they wear and want to be seen by a spectator. These results create different interaction distances for the wearer and the spectator. The wearer’s character appears to be the keypoint to the interaction. As described in “The Aesthetics of Interaction” about the user role: “The tension between the user operating on the system and the spectator watching this operation is imbued with the user’s awareness of being in the center of the spectator’s focus [1].” A User can be seen as three roles: operator, performer, and spectator.
The Level of Perception
In the stage 2, the participants’ accounts show different levels of perception: appearance, identities and awareness. We further frame the description into 4 levels. In the 1st, function, the spectator perceives the object from appearance (material, color, shape) and understands the functionality. In the 2nd, identities, when the object is combined with the wearer’s behavior, it revels her personality. In the 3rd, meaning, the spectator interprets the meaning for the wearer with the indexicality from the environment. In the
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4th, reflexivity, it strikes the spectators’ mind and evokes their own memories from the past, and even reflexively changes their values. This framing of 4 levels implies that the technologydriven cases are at the 1st level, and the fashion-driven cases are at the 2nd. Also, the higher level, the higher degrees of expression, interpretation, and meaning-making.
Is the death a TABOO?
The death is usually a taboo topic in our daily life. When we tried to find a wearer, some people refused our invitation due to the taboo. In the exploration, some spectators were afraid at the first time. However, it made them have to face it. After facing it, they started to realize the death is not as horrible as they think anymore. It reconnected to the memory when she was wiping the family member’s remains. When she became a wearer, she even asked people to wipe with her. What she wanted to say is that wiping the remains is not sad, it’s the intimate moment for you and the one you loved. Moreover, one of the spectator said, “It encourages me. She can ignore everything; she doesn’t have to worry about the outside rules. She can do whatever she likes. I really want to, too.”
The Distinct Experiences
In the wearable design, we should know that the experiences for the wearer and the spectator are totally different. In this case, we enlarge the differences of the experiences for both, comfortable rest & uncanny metaphor. In the stage 2, when the dancers were spectators,
DIS 2016: Fuse, Brisbane, Australia
they shared the uncomfortable, serious feelings while observing the Wearable R.I.P. In the stage 3, when they became wearers, the performances changed. They experienced how comfortable it is and how the music is like. While one of the dancer ran with children, she said, “I am comfortable and happy right now.” The wearers focused more on self-feelings by the material and the music.
4 Speculative Worlds
Additionally, we asked a stage director, Anyi Chen, to make a review of the Wearable R.I.P. Not knowing any concept of the Wearable R.I.P, he only experienced it and he totally understood the concept. Mr. Chen also pointed out two main issues, the social interaction & the self-expression. The Wearable R.I.P. is an interesting but contradicting project. The wearer wants to keep anyone away (passive social interaction) but still wants to announce what he/she is doing (active self-expression). With all of these wearables and interaction discourse as well as these two main issues, we create 4 speculative worlds/characters. In each extreme world, it evokes the 4 levels of the perception to the public in order to provoke more ideas & values for the future imagination of wearable design [3, 4].
The Wearable R.I.P. is invited by director Anyi Chen to be one of the props for his romantic comedy in April, 2016. Additionally, it is posted on a famous online design magazine [8]. Taking these opportunities, we actively communicate our speculation [5] and hope to open more discourse to the public.
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Acknowledgements anonymized
References [1] Dalsgaard, P. and Hansen, L. K. 2008. Performing perceptionâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;Staging aesthetics of interaction. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI), 15(3), No.33. [2] Edward T. Hall. 1966. The hidden Dimension. New York: Doubleday. [3] Lindley, J. and Potts, R. 2014. Anticipatory ethnography: Design fiction as an input to design ethnography. In Proceedings of the Conference on Ethnographic Praxis in Industry, 237-253. Minneapolis, MN: Americen Anthropological Association. [4] Lindley, J., and Potts, R. 2015. Operationalizing design fiction with anticipatory ethnography. In Proceedings of the conference on Ethnographic Praxis in Industry, 58-71. Minneapolis, MN: American Anthropological Association. [5] Malpass, M. 2013. Between wit and reason: Defining associative, speculative, and critical design in practice. Design and Culture: The Journal of the Design Studies Forum, 5(3), 333-356. [6] Scollon, R. and Scollon, S. W. 2003. Discourses in place: language in the material world. London: Routledge. [7] Seymour, S. 2010. Functional Aesthetics. New York: Springer. [8] anonymized
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