Before doing midterm project research and actually working on my midterm project, my definition of interaction was strongly influenced by Crawford’s idea in The Art of Interactive Design(Crawford) that interaction is a cyclic process in which two actors alternately listen, think, and speak. But later I started to realize that “the quality of the interaction depends on the quality of each of the subtasks (listening, thinking, and speaking)”, which is also said by Crawford in the same article. Hence, I started to pay more attention on several details when identifying the term interaction based on my former definition. For example, about the step “listening”. The device could have the ability to listen to different things whether the sounds are loud or quiet. As I view, the quieter the sound the device could hear, the higher quality the interaction could be. So my definition of interaction has changed to “a series of movements that two or more actors respond to certain changes or movements made by others.”
Two interactive projects that served as inspiration for my final project are Face Trade – Art vending machine that trades mugshots for “free” portraits and DESCENT – A meditation on one of humanity’s blackest hours.
For the Face Trade project, I found it quite align with my definition of interaction. Although what the device “listens” to is user’s face which is not something “quiet” that may not be heard by everyone, the “sound” has an outstanding characteristic that it unique for every user because everyone has a different face from others. Through this way, the interaction quality becomes higher, also the user could have much fresher and more special experience when using the machine. It reminds me of one of the midterm project by our classmates as well. The project aims at creating user’s own music by detecting their heartbeat. Meanwhile, the sensors could create different sounds according to the distance between the sensors and user’s hands. The uniqueness outcomes make the interaction more attractive and entertaining for users.
As for another project, “DESCENT” is less “interactive”. But it was an amazing experience watching the film and it completely shocked me. After the first time I watched the video of it, I started to doubt whether it should be categorized “interactive” list because there’s no obvious interaction and response in this project. So I think it is less align with my definition of interaction from every perspective. But later I started to think that there must be something happening, the “listening”, “thinking”, “speaking” process. I feel like that it is telling us the story of one of humans’ darkest times and urges us to think, to meditate. I can’t deny the huge emotional reactions after watching the project. I consider it a kind of response to it, although it is more like an invisible way that hardly can be told by surface. The interaction takes place inside my body and after the screen of the film about the human history. I really appreciate this kind of interaction which is so quiet but so powerful at the same time, which is something I will try to reach in my final project.
Therefore, my definition of interaction changed a bit after the research. Interaction is the process of being impressed or triggered by others and showing responses in certain ways between multiple objects. It could be a physical movement that can be seen or just emotional change that cannot be observed. The point is after one object’s change or action, some parts of the other objects are not the same anymore. They are all influencing each other.