baladoestheuxthing

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Paper: 2

Timeframe: Dec 02, ’21 — Dec 09, ‘21

Prototype development

For the interim critique, we presented two prototypes. We received positive feedback regarding our concept, with the class and tutors generally agreeing our idea of ‘paper-blindness’ was clear. The focus was therefore on refining the prototypes as opposed to having to revisit or refine the concept.

During the tutorial following the critique, our tutors commented that both our prototypes had potential, but to pick one style of prototype and expand it into a series of three to increase interactivity between. Tonicha suggested two possible routes to take for the final series: 1) they could emulate everyday items, noting how the first prototype looked similar to ski goggles, or 2) they could be abstracted down into geometric forms.

We tried making a more geometric prototype, as well as to remake the goggle.

We decided to go down the abstracted route, relating the forms of the three prototypes to that of flat, rolled, and folded paper. Jacob and I worked on physically making the masks, Keisha worked on coding the Arduino to have different prototypes fade in and out at different intervals (to mimic a different reading experience for everyone), whilst Ella and Ava focused on the presentation and further research.

One problem we had to solve was attaching our prototypes to the head. I sketched out some different designs.

We also went down to the art store to see if we could get some wire that could support the foam board, after which we managed to combine the sketches and wire idea to be able to support the prototype.

The wire would not be able to support the weight of a battery pack, however, so we decided to create a separate wearable for the battery pack in the form of an armband with velcro. Having done the reading on Criado Perez’s Invisible Women (Chapter 8 and 9) just that week, we made sure to have the headbands and armbands be adjustable to accommodate different head and arm sizes.

Presentation

We explained the concept on paper blindness and reflectivity first whilst having our volunteers put on the prototypes. After which, we switched off the lights and let them roam around the room and interact with others as they liked.

Feedback

People appreciated the production quality of our prototypes.

That we could have different colours of light.

That we could make the prototypes be further away from the face, as people don’t usually look at paper that closely.

That we could make the fade in and fade out more obvious to make clear the distinction between the prototypes.

That it reminded people of staying in the snow, like with ‘snow-blindness’.

That we were a bit too controlling with staging – we ought to let people do whatever they want, instead of telling them to move and interact with others.

That we needed a clearer concept and a link back to a socio-cultural context: this was feedback from last week that we unfortunately did not address this week as well.

Reflection

I agree with the comments, except for the one about the different colours of light as I feel that it would take away from the concept of whiteness. I think we could have been clearer at the start of the presentation as well – people weren’t sure why we chose these forms specifically, and I think it was because we were trying to explain it after our volunteers had come out and the attention was focused on them.

Overall I really enjoyed working with my group; everyone brought something different to the table and were very responsive to one another.

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Paper: 1

Brief: Design an experience of paper that materializes its textural, cultural and emotional qualities

Team members: Ava Shepherd, Balachander Prashanthi, Ella Wilson, Kiesha Mundin, Jacob Tomes

Research methods: Literature review and Bodystorming

Timeframe: Nov 25, ’21 — Dec 02, ‘21

Ideation

We had two main initial ideas:

We wanted to create an experience externalizing the whiteness and reflectiveness of paper. We drew this idea from our literature review, where Da Rold references Claude Galen, Joy Hawkins and Thomas White in her work to emphasise the blinding qualities of white paper, whilst Tobjörk and Österbacka describe the fluorescent whitening agents that are applied to paper to create its highly reflective white surface.

Looking at paper on a microscopic scale, we found the fibres of the paper make for a beautiful pattern – we wanted to externalize that, and the different materials that make up paper, into a bigger scale.

Experimentation

Kiesha worked on actualising these different layers of paper whilst Jacob, Ava and I worked on the whiteness of paper idea.

Jacob made a curved dome like prototype at first, which we realised was too small as we could see out of the sides peripherally, so he made a bigger version. At the same time as when he was working on those, I worked on a pair of layered Styrofoam glasses covered with tracing paper. I did a test by shining a light through it to see if it would diffuse it. It did diffuse rather nicely so Ava and I went to the CTL to get LEDs to put in between the layers of tracing paper. This was successful in diffusing the light evenly, so we made a thicker version of the curved dome so we would have two different designs to present.

At the same time, inspired by Damien Hirst’s Myth Explored, Explained, Exploded (1993), we decided to split up the process of making paper in “layers”, where each layer would illustrate a stage of the paper making process.

Presentation and feedback

The reflectivity prototype was agreed upon to have more design potential, also receiving positive feedback with regards to a clear link between the literature review and the concept.

With regards to the blinding quality, course mates said felt like looking out the window when on a plane, and that the overall experience was quite pleasant. Moving forward, we wanted to increase the number of LED lights so that it would be more uncomfortably white/reflective.

The LEDs in the prototypes had to be plugged into a wall outlet, which tethered the user. Therefore, we were given feedback to make them portable for a less constrictive experience, which we agreed with.

Could we position the prototypes in a socio-cultural context? For example, thinking about how white paper is ‘pure’ and with brown paper, the more recycled it is, the darker it gets.

Reflection

I enjoyed how we were very in depth with the literature review and got straight to making after. There was a comfortable, focused group dynamic where everyone wanted to make this project their best, since it was the last one.

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Skin: Week 2

Timeframe: Nov 18, ’21 — Nov 25, ‘21

Refining concept

Moving forward, we aimed to create more of a full-body experience building off the comfort and sensitivity ideas from our gloves prototype. I noted down the possible expansions we could have taken here:

We eventually decided to scale up to a suit – having done a yellow suit for UX of Yellow prior with Anya (who was also in that group with me), we noted how engaged the participant well.

Having also settled on the idea of comfort and sensitivity, the question also became how we could make it more interactive. We dabbled between the ideas of comfort and discomfort, expressed by:

Having two suits, where when both participants hugged, they would feel either the same/different sensations.

Having one suit, where when someone hugged you, they would feel the same/different sensation to you

We went with option 2, believing we could create a more refined product by focusing on one suit instead of two, and there still exists a level of interactivity between two parties because we would design the outer interface for the person not wearing the suit.

Process

First, we needed to fully understand which parts were sensitive and which weren’t. For this, we researched on types of receptors in the skin. Mechanoreceptors, which are sensitive to pressure, vibration, and texture, are most prominent on skin without hair, for example, palms, lips, the soles of the feet, fingertips and eyelids. Thermoreceptors, which are sensitive to temperature, are most prominent on the face, nose and ear.

What did this mean for the suit? One example is that fingers with many mechanoreceptors are able to sense finer textures, which is why we put a more granular material on exterior of the back, so that the person doing the hugging would be able to feel it as their fingers went around the person being hugged.

The two point discrimination method also aided us in mapping out a plan. Around the less sensitive areas we would have more abrasive materials like sandpaper, whilst we have finer textures in more sensitive areas.

Anya and Ranga tried the suit on, giving feedback as to where we needed more materials to sufficiently stimulate the skin. This was important as some of the pieces we’d made to stick on looked like they would be very stimulatory but in fact were not.

Presentation

We tried to present the research about receptors and the two point discrimination method as succinctly as possible so that more time could be spent for people to hug our volunteer and interact with the suit.

Feedback

People generally liked the idea of the double interface but were quite confused about the plan for the suit – we could have communicated that better

Could have experimented with translucency or transparency so that people could see the inside of the suit better

Could have experimented with staging, where we do a reveal of the inside of the suit

Reflection

I think we could have chosen our materials more sensitively – we pretty much went to the storeroom, found whatever we could, brought random bits from home, and then tried to sort them out, but I think we should’ve sat down collectively and made a plan before getting the materials in the first place.

There was some confusion internally about the concept at various points as well, and I think recording down our plans and ideas, in the WhatsApp chat perhaps, might have helped. I think the problem with working with friends and people you feel comfortable with, also, is that you believe them to “get” you on an unspoken level, which led to some chaos. It wasn’t an unpleasant chaos (I probably had the most fun in this group) but the process could have been a lot more systematic and structured.

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Skin: Week 1

Brief: Design a way to express the skin/world interface.

Team members: Anya Li, Balachander Prashanthi, Dora Alvarez, Jacob Tomes, Ramya Sekar, Ranga Bhave

Research methods: AEIOU and Speed Dating

Timeframe: Nov 12, ’21 — Nov 18, ‘21

Ideation

We started the project by attempting the AEIOU method. We understood it incorrectly, approaching Activities, Environment, Interactions, Observations and User as separate categories to list out ideas into.

However, this initial brainstorming did give us a good starting point to list out ideas we liked and to narrow them down (the ones in strikethrough are the ones we liked).

I then speed dated these ideas to my flatmates, showing them some sketches for their opinions on which ideas they found exciting, and communicated them to the group for further narrowing down.

We went into the tutorial with three ideas:

The first idea built off research about the two-point discrimination method Jacob had researched about, where we wanted to create an experience where people would have to navigate a maze by feeling through the least sensitive parts of their bodies. We hoped to have this experience encourage people to become more aware of their bodies.

The second idea proposed a speculative design inspired by the skins of animals. One example we used was that of giraffe skin, where its spots regulate the giraffe's internal temperature. 

The third idea proposed recreating human touch to create comfort. We based this idea off the warm latex gloves that mimicked human touch for COVID-19 patients in Brazil. Similarly, we proposed creating a backpack that felt like someone hugging you from behind.

Two bits of feedback stood out to us:

To look more into the qualities of skin that make it sensitive: how do we make people feel like the things they’re touching is sensitive and reacting to them?

Building on this idea of comfort, how could other things change if they felt more like skin? Can we make everyday objects be more comfortable?

Experimentation

Experiment 1.1: Taking into account the second bit of feedback and inspired by the work of Marc Teyssier, our first experimentation involved us covering office supplies with chicken skin, hoping it would increase the sense of connection people felt with their objects in these times of COVID, where we work from home.

Experiment 1.2: However, chicken skin was quite slimey, and it also lacked the touch of human skin. As a result, we circled back to the Brazilian glove design which seemed more successful. Combining this with the first idea (where we found out about the most sensitive areas of the body), we tried to create comforting gloves that you would place your cheeks (a very sensitive area) into, thus alerting you to the sensitivity of the area, whilst also creating a sense of comfort. We did this by building a clay structure and gel hand warmers enclosed by blue latex gloves.

Experiment 2: Simultaneously, we looked into skin on a microscopic level, learning about the different layers of skin. We wanted to externalize these layers in a bigger, different form, and decided to make an anatomically accurate lasagna users could interact with to learn about the different layers of skin.

Presentation

The presentation went rather smoothly. One observation we did not expect was that people were quite hesitant to put their faces into the gloves at first, but once they did, they really liked it and many people wanted to try it. Not a lot of people wanted to explore the lasagna with their hands, though.

Feedback

We had opposing feedback regarding our prototypes and ideas: some people felt the lasagna had more design potential (Parth, for example, proposed it making it on a bigger scale), Leon liked the idea of skin on everyday objects, whilst others proposed different routes we could take with the gloves: Sofia proposed placement in airports, whilst Al, similarly, encouraged us to think about situating it differently.

Reflection

We were still quite confused about which route to take, and I think it was because our concepts weren’t situated in a wider context. Whilst I enjoyed working with my group, I think we suffered from wanting to do ‘weird’ things that could be visually exciting, as opposed to being more systematic with our experimentation.

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Yellow: 2

Timeframe: Nov 05 ’21 — Nov 11 ‘21

Ideation

Going back to the drawing board, we looked at the molecular composition of yellow. When researching about how our eyes perceive different colours, we learnt that each colour has its own wavelength and frequency. This led us to think about sound waves and light waves.

Anya suggested that we could record people saying what they think yellow sounds like and create a sound installation from there. Adding on to that idea, we thought about how different shades of yellow would sound like, and decided on creating a suit with different shades of yellow, when worn, could create different sounds based on how you move.

Development: coding

From our research, we found that yellow, as a colour of light, has a range of frequencies. Instead of a vague idea of “shades of yellow”, we decided to map this range of frequencies onto a pitch range. To do this, we enlisted the help of Delia Hamwood from the Creative Technology Lab.

Anya and I started by writing code that would take the average value of the RGB colours captured by the webcam when we clicked on a key, using P5.js. To add on sound, Delia suggested we use PolySynth, a program that uses MIDI numbers (digital interface sounds) that correlates to actual key notes.

So we did, and mapped the range of values of yellow onto the range of synth sounds. We used a range of 25 < h < 60 to correspond to the pitch range of 0 < note < 100. To complete the code, we had it capture the average of the webcam image every one second in order to create a melody.

This bit of coding was fairly manageable, but the range of frequencies we found online were more of a rough guide and Anya and I did a lot of fine-tuning with adjusting the range according to different yellow objects that were to produce sound.

Here is the final code.

Development: Making of the suit

Our initial plan for the suit was for it to have a combination of yellow objects as well as to paint certain areas different shades of yellow. Anya, Ava and I went shopping for yellow objects and yellow paint, and got a good variety of objects and paint samples from B&Q. However, we decided to simplify the suit and just paint it with different shades, as opposed to both painting and sticking different yellow objects of different shades onto it (which felt unnecessary).

Presentation

Unfortunately, during the presentation, we could not get the sound system to amplify the sounds from the code, and the class could not hear the sounds of yellow as Ramya moved around. However, we also gave the class the code, so they were able to use their own phone cameras to find out the sounds of yellow objects in their surrounding vicinity.

Feedback

The class appreciated the phone aspect, noting how it vibrated as it played a sound as well

The fact that we projected our code and camera onto the screen also meant that people could see what Ramya was doing from the front, which made it more engaging

We could’ve explained the phone part more clearly at the start, or linked it to the staging of the suit better

The class also questioned our decisions to use the synth sounds as opposed to other sounds – if we were to continue to develop the project, this is something we could definitely look into

Reflection

I really enjoyed working with my group. I liked how we took a risk and scrapped our previous idea to try to do something out of our comfort zones, and all supported one another whilst doing so. I don’t do a lot of coding, so it was quite challenging at the start, but became more fun as more of it started to work. I’m definitely less scared of coding now.

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Yellow: 1

Brief: Design an experience based on the characteristics of the colour yellow

Team members: Anya Li, Ava Shepherd, Balachander Prashanthi, Effy Liu, Ella Wilson, Vicki Sun

Research methods: Artefact Analysis and Creative Toolkit

Timeframe: Oct 28, ‘21— Nov 04, ‘21

Artefact Analysis

Our team initially came up with a list of yellow objects that we could possibly do artefact analyses on.

Effy picked pinwheel, Anya picked tea, Ava picked the yellow smiley face, Vicki picked cowardice, Ella picked yellow paint, and I picked my gold ring. My artefact analysis can be found here.

Creative Toolkit

When sharing our individual artefact analyses with each other, Effy mentioned “The Yellow Wallpaper”, a story in which a woman was driven insane by yellow. We quite liked this notion of yellow inducing insanity, as opposed to the joy that we usually relate it to. During our tutorial with Al, we received feedback that insanity was too broad a topic; that insanity had become shorthand for many different types of madness. We agreed, and later decided to narrow down into the feeling of frustration. We met up to concretize our plan for the toolkit, during which I jotted down these pieces of feedback and the ideas discussed during the meetup into a summary. Most of our ideation was about creating difficult tasks that would create frustration in the user.

Anya had the idea of a cone that would fit over the face and would mess with the user’s depth perception, making the tasks we wanted them to accomplish harder. We also wanted to gradually increase the level of frustration, by blowing wind onto them, and then making them wear the cone.

We also had three different frustrating tasks in the toolkit:

A fully yellow jigsaw puzzle that would not fit together as we cut off parts of the puzzle

Another fully yellow puzzle, this time wholly composed of abstract shapes as opposed to a more conventional jigsaw puzzle, that would also not fit together

To make a bracelet with alphabetical beads (spelling out the word COMMUNICATION) whilst wearing thick winter gloves

Testing

Anya and Effy tested the toolkit out on several of our coursemates and noticed that the tools for the puzzle were too easy until users put on the cone. Therefore, we decided to present during the interim presentation with the cone and beads, which was challenging in the beginning already.  

Presentation

Rylee, our volunteer, found the experience more fun than frustrating, which meant that our activity was probably not frustrating enough; perhaps the cone added a more humorous element as opposed to a frustrating element, as the class laughed a lot during our presentation as well.

Feedback

We received some suggestions as to how the experience could have been made more frustrating:

Having the user spell out the word in a different language: an unfamiliar script could have caused more confusion and resulting frustration

In the vein of Karan Singh’s puzzles, we could add patterns 

The most important piece of feedback we received was that the association between yellow and frustration was not clear – which we agreed with – the link between yellow, then to madness, then to frustration, was tenuous.

Reflection

In the afternoon tutorial, John told us that we were playing it safe with our ideas – university is where we can try to do something which could fail. I did agree – our progression seemed comfortable and too easy. This also inspired the rest of the group to scrap our more conventional ideas thus far and start looking at sound, light and other elements that we were unfamiliar with. I’m glad we did! 

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Boredom: 2

Timeframe: Oct 21, ‘21— Oct 28, ‘21

Development

We really liked the idea of time manipulation and dilation that we’d been experimenting with, and talked about other ways to express it tangibly into an experience, for example through a stretchy goop, but it was quite difficult to actualize. With very little time left to the final presentation, we decided to go back to one of our older initial ideas: the weight of boredom, and its ability to make you feel slow and sluggish.

Prototyping

Unfortunately I fell sick on the day we were prototyping the idea, but the group tested out attaching different objects to a coat to make it really heavy. These objects are examples of what people might seek to do when they feel bored. For instance, the towel represents cleaning, book represents reading, food items eating etc. as activities we gathered that people do from our directed storytelling interviews.

Presentation

Like with UX of senses, the presentation went smoothly. Ramya volunteered to try on the coat, and we blindfolded her and attached items to her. She definitely felt the weight of the items, remarking that she was thinking “When are they going to stop?” and that she could barely move.

Feedback

We received some positive feedback with regards to staging – Tonicha liked that we had blindfolded Ramya and had added on objects to the coat consequently, as it added momentum and intensity.

However, whilst we were more successful in creating an experience as opposed to an experiment like with the previous week, there were still aspects to improve on. We had struggled throughout the project to entail a metaphor, either for time or later on, weight. We received feedback as to how we could have done this better – John commented that we could have focused on thresholds a bit more, perhaps layering on objects in one, two, or three layers, and to experiment with transparency so we could see what objects have been layered on already.

Reflection

I think we took a lot of time on trying to visualize the manipulation of time idea. We simply could not think of a way to do it, and I am disappointed that we were ultimately unsuccessful in actualizing it. However, I’m glad that we managed to go back to the drawing board and come up with and present another idea so close to the final presentation date. With more time, we could have polished up the weight of boredom idea: perhaps we could have created our own coat, or staged it layer by layer, as suggested in feedback.

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Boredom: 1

Brief: Design a way to express the value of boredom

Team members: Ava Shepherd, Balachander Prashanthi, Dora Alvarez, Jinqi Han, Zhe Lou

Research methods: Directed Storytelling and Prototyping

Timeframe: Oct 14, ‘21— Oct 21, ‘21

Ideation

As a starting point, we noted down some words describing boredoms, feelings about boredom, and physical expressions of boredom in a mindmap. We then discussed our plan moving forward, which was to interview three people each using directed storytelling.

Directed Storytelling

Over the weekend, I interviewed three of my flatmates, trying to use as many leading questions and following up where I could. In the zoom calling following our interviews, we tried to find common themes and draw links between our interviewees in order to create something that could be relatable.

Idea development

With the above main concepts, we met up in person to attempt to express these rather abstract concepts visually, which was quite the challenge.

After a few hours, we had a few ideas that I noted down in a google document. For our tutorial, we ran with the three ideas of  the value of boredom being that it:

Inspires productivity, and hence we could create a device that would spur you into action: possibly involving a non-newtonian fluid (corn starch and water) that acts like quicksand

Reduces efficiency, like a Rube Goldberg machine

Has the ability to manipulate time, therefore an experience that would mimic the feeling of warping time for users

John encouraged us to look into entailing a metaphor instead of simply expressing it, and also pointed us to some references such as Heath Robinson for the second idea and Christian Marclay for the third idea.

We decided to focus on the third idea. I came up with the idea of possibly having users time their perception of a minute when doing a boring activity vs. a more exciting one, to show how time passes more slowly when you are bored, which the group liked. Dora had the idea of having two people or rows of people do a boring and exciting activity. I noted that different people may just be different in their perceptions of time that might not have anything to do with the activity, and suggested that we do a second round as a control. The group agreed with this.

In terms of the logistics, I noted how that one of my interviewers would just stare at the wall when he was bored, and suggested that as the boring activity, which the group also liked. In terms of the exciting activity, we talked about a few videos that we liked before settling on this one.

Presentation

The presentation went smoothly. Desire and Effy’s timings proved our hypothesis that people’s perception of time is longer when they are bored.

Feedback

We should try to explore a question rather than trying to prove a hypothesis, because there’s then no point of doing the experiment

We could explore a conscious/unconscious perception of time

We could construct the boring/exciting experience better – can we stage boredom/excitement better, engaging more of the senses?

Being fresh out of the exciting experience, would boredom change for the participant who watched the video first, and vice versa?

Reflection

A valuable takeaway for me this week was that we shouldn’t try to prove things – it is more useful as a learning experience to create experiences that people can partake in to explore rather than present. This has changed my mindset considerably – moving forward, it will enable me to become more relaxed and experimental.

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Senses: 2

Timeframe: Oct 7 , ‘21— Oct 14, ‘21

Prototype Development

Prototype 1: We made a translucent box. Rylee also thought of stretching out parts of a bin bag to cover it so that different areas would have different levels of visibility – similar to how certain parts of London seem greyer or darker than other parts. We also cut out a hole to fit a bottle in that could spray water into the box, or fill it up with smoke.

However, we thought that the view ended up being too obstructed, with us barely able to see anything outside the box even if we held our box up to the light. We also tried to fill the box with smoke by smoking some leaves in a can. The smell of smoke wasn’t very similar to exhaust, though, so we kept this on the back-burner.

Prototype 2: The second prototype covered the whole head (creating a more immersive experience). We covered the two eye-holes with cotton to mimic mistiness. Additionally, we fit a plastic bottle over the holes and sprayed it with water, to mimic a sense of wetness.

Prototype 3: Rylee had brought along an air-bag that we liked for its pale translucency. We made it into spectacles that someone could wear, and felt that it reflected a sense of mistiness quite well, just that it was blue.

Concept development

In our tutorial with John, he pointed us to the fact that the word we were looking for is overcast, not foggy, as London doesn’t have a lot of fog.

In the latter part of the tutorial, we also shared how we included Dany in our prototyping and experience via video calls, and how his experience was starkly different to ours, which was an interesting aspect we could look at. Relooking our prototypes, we realised that we were experimenting with changing our sight for a moody outlook.

We did like the idea of manipulating sight as we had done with our prototypes. Relating it to Dany’s quarantine, we realised that he, too, was getting a partial view of London. A small window and us on WhatsApp video call were Dany’s only avenue to London. Rylee had also been in quarantine before, so we decided to draw on their experiences of isolation.

Dany’s visual of London was one that was bottom-up, as we were very often calling him with our phones held below eye level. It was very fragmented as well, as he’d only be able to see bits and pieces of what we saw on the outside. Dany shared how he felt like he was in a hotel jail, surrounded by people he knew was in quarantine as well, but still separate and alone in his room.

Prototype development

We really liked the idea of a bottom up view and the idea of getting a partial view whilst being separate yet together, so we got a bigger box that could fit two people. We also fashioned a phone holder so that we would be able to show the viewer what Dany would have seen. 

Dany, working remotely, clipped together the videos we had taken that day with some ‘Reconnecting’ clips, as what happened in Brick Lane frequently.

Presentation and feedback

For our presentation, we made sure that everyone would have an equal part to say by writing up a script with delegated parts beforehand. Furthermore, we played the video on the screen so those who were not in the box would also be able to participate to an extent.

Feedback from the class and tutors was generally positive. People really liked our concept and how sturdy our box was (go Rylee, our product designer!).

Improvements suggested to us were to:

Have the ‘Reconnecting’ clips be spaced more erratically apart so that they would be more unexpected, because we had them come up so frequently in our video it almost became rhythmic.

Look into a different material for the divider, maybe a frosted glass, so that they people in the device would be able to sense the other

Consider sound: the box, being an enclosed space, could provide reverberation that we could take advantage of for a more immersive experience.

Relook the pinhole: it was very small, which coupled with the distorted mirror paper, made it too hard to view what was outside.

Reflection

I agree with the feedback and would definitely incorporate them if we were to develop the project further. I’m happy with how much we got done in just a week and how flexible, cooperative and communicative everyone was. Overall, I had a great experience with my team and I really enjoyed working with them!

[baladoestheuxthing]

UX of Senses: 1

Brief: Design a tool or instrument that enables you to access the invisible, the unmeasurable, the intangible on London’s streets.

Team members: Balachander Prashanthi, Dany Garcia, Jacob Tomes, Kiesha Mundin, Siyuan Li (Rylee)

Timeframe: Oct 7, ‘21— Oct 14, ‘21

Brick Lane: Outing Day and observations

On the 8th of October, Kiesha, Jacob, Siyuan and myself met in Bishops Square at 10 am. Dany was in quarantine, so we had agreed earlier that we would text him and be in contact via video call on our learning journey.

We started off by going to Brick Lane, a short 15 minute walk away. I took notes throughout the journey on my phone. We kept bouncing ideas off each other the whole time, which led to some interesting observations and ideas, all chronicled below.

1. There were lots of stickers on lampposts, and we wondered if we would be able to tell how many there were on a lamppost by running my finger over them.  We weren’t able to, as there were overlapping stickers and cling wrap that covered them sometimes made it harder. Nevertheless, getting into noticing and touching things put us in the right mindset for the rest of the day.

2. When we video-called Dany (for a short period, as the connection was very weak), he encouraged us to close our eyes and take in the surrounding. We noticed the erratic, yet constant, hum of cars and bicycles.

3. Looking at the edges of the pavements, we also noticed lots of dirt. Jacob floated the idea of measuring this dirt with pipe cleaners and doing a comparison across different parts of London, which we found quite interesting.

4. When we stopped by a park, it felt like there was a grey fog in the park and on the lanes outside as well. This made us feel a bit sleepy.

5. In the park, we noticed the crackling sound of leaves when we stepped on them. Building onto that idea, Jacob floated the idea of how leaves show the movement of humans: mounds of leaves usually swept to the sides of the pavement which humans occupy less, as opposed to the middle.

6. We also noticed that there were various types of ageing bricks that could also possibly reflect the weather, or show how much dirt or pollution there was in the environment.

When we got back to LCC, we did some experiments. With regards to Jacob’s idea earlier about dirt, he taped some pipe cleaners to his hand and tried to pick up some dirt on the side of the windowsill.

While fun, he didn't manage to pick up a lot of dirt, and we liked the idea of the overcast weather more and decided to experiment with it more the following Monday.

[baladoestheuxthing]

Class Exercise

On our first day of in-person classes after our lectures for the day had ended, we played the Magic Triangle game. The game was intended as an ice-breaking activity.

The instructions are pretty long, so here’s my summary of the game.

Spread evenly across a space. The space should be big enough for players to walk a couple steps in any direction without obstacles.

Remember who is in front of you. If you have to turn a little to find someone in front of you, that’s fine.

Turn 180° and remember who is in front of you now.

Rearrange yourself so that the two players you have remembered and yourself are in a triangle. The triangle should be an equilateral or isosceles triangle. Remember this triangle!

Appoint two-three people as managers. The managers decide on where an invisible line dividing the playing field in two should be.

The managers need to move everyone to one side of the imaginary line. The manager’s triangles do not need to stay intact, but everyone else’s triangles need to stay connected.

An observation I had was that people stretched their arms out to remember the people in their triangle. I was part of another triangle as well (I was the person to remember in Step 3 for Effie), so when we were moved by the manager I ended up in the middle of two triangles. 

Here’s a video of my triangle groups saying hi!

I think the managers tried their best to follow the rules of the game. However, I think that because not everybody understood the rules, there was more standing than moving. 

On the bright side, we got to know each other more whilst waiting for directions from the managers!

One area of concern was that some people did mention that they felt a bit left out due to them not understanding the rules, which, coupled with the shyness that we feel when meeting others, meant that there was less room for clarifications than there could have been. In the future, we could try to make sure everyone felt involved by checking in at more constant, regular intervals.