fischer.kinder - ROKKA spot

Vision

Creating a public interface with an “incidental form of social”.
Merging architectural properties and social properties in an computational situated device.

Ideation Process

The ideation process was approached from multiple perspectives, looking into innovative hard- and software ideas, research for new forms, but also into new materials and uses of space. The guiding dimensions and their entanglements are shown below.

Analysis_ of Form

Early on in the process we were worried if kicking is an issue in public space. As it might socially interpreted as a violent act, we thought reactions of crossing pedestrians might be aggressive once in a while. Thus we did a little study with the best sliding system we found that far - the green buiscuit.

Analysis_ of Material

The research into the best way of getting an object to travel a long resp. defined distance over tarmack led us to the purchase of the green buiscuit. A street hockey puck which is considered one of the "best" sliding pucks on the market. The use of it made us understand it is not just the material that makes a thing slide well, but also the construction technique, which is quite elaborated. We also understood what is considered "best" in the context of street hockey. Distance and low affinity to tumble and roll are quality properties for good street hockey pucks. However, this section is about material and the exploration of different materials led us to different ideas.

Analysis_ of Space

Conceptual Ideas_ from Material

Rope Concept

Bench Seating

Remote Concept

Shoe Concept

Arrow Concept

Tagging Concept

Mirror Concept

Conceptual Ideas_ from Software

SoundBeam

Conceptual Ideas_ from Hardware

Position frough Shadow

Prototyping

Apprearance prototype_ Arrow Concept

Space_ Using GPS for micro-spatial interaction

Hardware_ Puck Base

Frome the various conceptual ideas, the three most promising were selected and turned into a more elaborated prototyp. The "Arrow" concept (picture below, left) was intreaguing to us, as it expressed the relationship between architecture and human the most. Using the interface to "select" elements of the built environment and comment or question about it seemd an interesting prospect for a use case. The second most promising concept was the puck idea, as it turned out in the analysis phase it is a viable form of moving an interface around. The "Mirror" concept was similar to the arrow concept in terms of referencing elements in the public space. The difference was just in the way of how archtectural elements are related to the body of the user. In the mirror concept the own body is visible in relation where it stands in regard to the surrounding buildings. By looking at the interface one was able to see all three important entities: environment, interface and surrounding people, resp. one self in relation to the environment. There is only one point of focus while interacting with the environment, while with the arrow concept one has to map the arrows with the surroundings. Thus requireing the user to look back and forth.

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Hardware_ Hi-Res Display

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Material_ Displays

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Software_ Animation Builder

Software_ Situation Manager

The general idea of the situation manager software was a modular design in which wireless sensor and actuator modules can be orchestrated as needed. The video below shows a sensor module of the PlazaPuck. It is a combination of a compass sensor and a Wizard-of-Oz module for positioning on the plaza. The viedo shows the "viewing frustum" of the puck turning red if it "sees" a statue (visualized by a square) placed at George Square, Glasgow.

ROKKA spot -

Ideation and Implementation Process