1. Interactivity Mark Green School of Creative Media

2. Introduction  Another one of the major features of new media - not just viewed but interacted with  Unfortunately, interactivity is not well understood, both in theory and in practice  Need to look at what interactivity really means, how it can be used, how to design it into a piece

3. Interactivity  Can be looked at on several levels, vary from surface to deep  Surface level interactivity: provide the user with some buttons to push or some links to follow  Gadgets they can play with while they are viewing the “real content”

4. Surface Interactivity  In this view interactivity just adds fluff to the piece, something to keep the user’s hands busy  It doesn’t add to the piece, or give the user any control over the presentation  Designers feel it should have something interactive, but they really don’t know how to do it

5. Surface Interactivity  Can be frustrating to the viewer, doesn’t give the viewer any control, something they learn quite quickly  Gives the viewer the feeling that the author is looking down on them, not taking their participation seriously  Need to ensure that all interaction is real and contributes to the piece

6. View Controls  Viewer has control over how the piece is viewed, but nothing else  Can change viewpoint, or display style  Example: changing skins on media players, can change what the player looks like, but not the content  Example: web site customization  Gives the viewer more control, but still doesn’t have control over the piece

7. View Control  For some types of pieces this could be the major form of interaction  the author has produced an environment to explore, there are no other opportunities for interaction  these pieces tend to get boring quickly, unless they have some other purpose, like visualization

8. Deep Interactivity  The viewer has control over most or all aspects of the piece  The author allows the viewer to fully participate in the piece  Viewer input viewed as equal to authors input or design  Gives the viewer the greatest feeling of control

9. Deep Interactivity  Can be very hard to accomplish: Need a software structure that supports full viewer participation, not supported by all authoring tools Need a software structure that supports full viewer participation, not supported by all authoring tools Designer needs to really understand interactivity, know how to work with the user Designer needs to really understand interactivity, know how to work with the user  Need to structure the piece so it is fully interactive

10. Interactivity  Quite often have different levels of interactivity in the same piece  Some sections may have limited opportunities for interaction, example: background material that must be presented to the user in a particular order  Design interactivity to flow with the piece

11. Interactivity  But what is interactivity?  What do we mean by an interactive piece?  Its more than buttons and gadgets  its more than clever programming or authoring tricks  it starts with a particular way of thinking, a particular mind set

12. Interactivity  Many artists want to be in complete control  they view their art works as personal statements, the viewer plays no role  they are not thinking about communications, but rather talking to themselves  this is okay some of the time, and for some media, but it doesn’t work for interactive media

13. Interactivity  This is a problem that many artists and media designers have, they don’t know how to include the viewer  foreign concept in traditional art, the viewer is rarely considered  can take some time to get used to, need a major shift in attitude

14. Example  Contrast computer animation and computer games  Both use similar technology, and can use the same authoring tools  Computer animation is one long sequence, no opportunity for interaction  Animator plans out the motion in detail, overall structure of the piece

15. Example  In games still produce animation, but sequences are very short, a few seconds  Animator considers how sequences can be pieced together based on user input  Transitions between sequences as important, or more important than the sequences themselves  Thinks about the interaction

16. Interactivity  Start by thinking of the viewer as a partner, an equal partner in the creative process  make sure that the viewer has a significant role to play in the piece  design the piece so the viewer can play that role  they have to buy into your piece, know that they are being treated seriously

17. Interactivity  Think about your story or message, how can it be told?  You will need to provide the foundation: background to the story background to the story the framework for interaction, the parts that the viewer can put together the framework for interaction, the parts that the viewer can put together the introduction the introduction the rules of the game the rules of the game

18. Interactivity  Determine the parts of the story that the viewer can tell herself, these are the truly interactive parts of the story  give the viewer freedom in these parts of the story, you can be more rigid in the other parts  how do you do this? How can the viewer tell the story?

19. Interactivity  Best if the viewer discovers it themselves, they feel part of the process  this could take the form of a puzzle or other activity that leads to the important part  it could be an exploration, or path of discovery that leads the user to the appropriate conclusion

20. Interactivity  It could be a process where the user eventually draws the desired conclusion  make one path easier than the others, encourage the viewer to see the world in that way  be prepared for viewers with different views, they might get something completely different out of the story

21. Interactivity  Some interactive fiction fails to be interactive for these reasons  the viewer really doesn’t have control over the story, the author has planned out all of the paths  the viewer can’t create a new story from the parts provided by the author  viewers detect this lack of control

22. Interactivity  What if the viewer doesn’t want to play?  Provide enough structure to encourage the viewer to play and explore  should be interesting enough to entice the viewer to participate  there must be some reward for taking part in the process

23. Interactivity  What type of rewards?  Depends upon the application and what the viewer is doing  in a game its obvious, the player gets points or some other resources for playing the game  use some type of scoring system, player tries to get a high score

24. Interactivity  In educational applications can use percentage of correct answers, or the ability to go on to the next topic  children’s educational software can use special activities to reward progress, little animations or games that are fun  for goal oriented activities the rewards are fairly obvious

25. Interactivity  For an art piece or installation the problem is harder  need to interest the viewer, get them to interact  piece must have an idle mode, what it does when no one is interacting  this mode should encourage people to look at it, use sound, but not too interesting

26. Interactivity  Once the piece has caught the viewer’s attention it must encourage interaction  highly obvious responses to viewer actions, quick initial rewards  go to sleep if the viewer stops, or start whining and complaining  always be prepared for quiet times

27. Intent and Consequences  Another view of interactivity in new media pieces  intent: the viewer makes informed intelligent decisions, knows why he is doing something  the viewer’s choices aren’t random, they have an idea where their choices will lead them

28. Intent and Consequences  At each point the viewer has enough information to make an intelligent decision  doesn’t have perfect or complete information, but has some information  can guess what might happen as a result of the decision with some certainty, but still could be surprised

29. Intent and Consequences  Examples: intent: reach a fork in the road, one path leads towards a lake and another leads towards a castle in the mountains intent: reach a fork in the road, one path leads towards a lake and another leads towards a castle in the mountains no intent: viewer faced with three identical doors, no way of knowing what is behind each of the doors no intent: viewer faced with three identical doors, no way of knowing what is behind each of the doors

30. Intent and Consequences  Consequences: the viewer’s actions has a definite result, not easy to reverse  decision results in a situation that the user must live with, not something that they can easily back out of  if they make a good decision then they will be rewarded, a bad decision will result in problems

31. Intent and Consequences  Gives the viewer the impression that their decision meant something  the decision has some impact on the rest of the experience, doesn’t result in a random set of actions on the part of the piece  forces the viewer to think about what they are doing

32. Intent and Consequences  Intent and consequences all about viewer control  they can plan their actions and know what the results will be  the piece isn’t taking them for a ride, they are controlling at least some aspects of it

33. Immersion  A topic related to interactivity, used in VR and LBE areas  The viewer feels at one with the piece, they are truly part of the experience  Make the viewer think that they really are in a different place, in a different world, acting out some role

34. Immersion  Very important in LBE (location based entertainment), construct an artificial environment for entertainment – Disney Land  With LBE can construct a physical space for the experience, can be quite large and special purpose, use of physical objects under computer control

35. Immersion  Must maintain the fantasy or illusion, don’t give the viewer the chance to realize where they really are  How do we do this?  There are a number of rules or techniques that help with immersion  Consistency is one of the most important

36. Immersion  Must make sure that the world is always consistent, nothing out of place  An inconsistency will bring the viewer back to the real world  Requires careful planning, pay attention to the background and the development of the story/environment

37. Immersion  Fast pace: things must be happening all of the time, don’t give the viewer time to think about where they are  The environment should quickly move from one segment to the next, easier to control the illusion if the user can’t think too much  LBE use vehicles to pull the viewer through the environment to control pace

38. Immersion  Lots of action: lots of things happening all of the time to attract the viewer’s attention  Have lots of things moving so the user always has something to watch  Focus their attention on a few areas, this is where you need to do the work, rest of the environment doesn’t need to be as high quality

39. Immersion  Keep it dark: a dark environment hides details, easier to maintain the illusion  If an environment is bright need to provide good content for all the directions the viewer can look  If its dark, can eliminate part of the environment, or use lower quality

40. User Interface  Interactivity leads us to the user interface  how can the viewer express his or her actions?  How do we support interactivity?  Does the user interface support or hurt the illusion we are creating?

41. User Model  The viewer sees our piece through the user interface, his or her view into the experience we have created  will develop his or her own picture of the piece based on their interaction with it  build a model of the piece based on how it responds to their input, called the user model

42. User Model  User model may not be what we intended  viewers may view our piece in a totally different way  could be okay for art pieces, but for other pieces this could be a problem  viewer could get the wrong message, or abuse the piece

43. User Model  Example: PacMan game, users discovered a certain pattern of actions, repeated on each level, that would guarantee a win  this eventually took the fun out of the game  user could play the game for hours on a single quarter, game owner lost a lot of money

44. User Interface  Design the control and interaction so it fits nicely with the piece  the user interface disappears, the viewer doesn’t think about it  what we can do depends upon the type of piece, may not have a lot of control  for web must work with mouse and keyboard, no choice

45. User Interface  For installations we are free to design any hardware we like, interaction can be customised to the piece  somewhat depends on our hardware and software skills!  For other types of pieces we are somewhere in the middle

46. User Interface  Games can often have semi-custom controllers  example: race games can have steering wheels and peddles similar to a car, removes some of the user interface  joysticks can also be used effectively for some games, force feedback can also add to the experience

47. User Interface  Degrees of freedom problem: the things that need to be controlled can outnumber our ability to control them  example: team sports games, cannot control all of the players on the team  can usually only control one or two, how do we handle the rest of the team?

48. User Interface  Must design piece so only a few parameters need to be controlled at a time  don’t want to loose challenge by being too easy, but don’t want to be so difficult that it’s impossible  this requires some careful design decisions in the piece so the user interface is possible

49. User Interface  Should we follow the standard designs?  Advantages: viewers know the basic procedures for interacting with our piece viewers know the basic procedures for interacting with our piece simplifies the design process, can copy some elements from standard design simplifies the design process, can copy some elements from standard design simplifies implementation, programmers already know how to do most of the UI simplifies implementation, programmers already know how to do most of the UI

50. User Interface  Problems: standard style may be a poor fit for our piece, spoil the look we are trying to create standard style may be a poor fit for our piece, spoil the look we are trying to create may not support the actions that we need may not support the actions that we need could end up with clumsy or difficult interaction could end up with clumsy or difficult interaction  suggests that we might try to produce a custom design

51. User Interface  Custom designs can be closer to the feel of our piece, give more natural control and flow  but, viewer will need to learn how it works, may not like the unfamiliar approach  may be much harder to produce, since we will need to experiment and do more programming