Since we had five people in the group, each of us critiqued four other projects.
Luke wants to make a “Magic Brush” that allows users with physical disabilities to create artworks without difficulty. The device will include various sensors of Arduino to receive sound, light and movement of the body, and turn the received data into certain styles of strokes and colors to draw beautiful paintings on the canvas in Processing. We considered it a good idea for it helps people explore the endless possibilities of art. Not only disabled people but also everyone can find some inspiration in it. The project so far is just a basic frame, and we suggested providing various art styles for users to choose from, and hoped that users could save the current picture they paint. Also, there can be some ready examples to show some amazing works done with the program, because users may have no idea about it in the very beginning.
Eugene will design a game based on Avengers. It is an arcade game for two players that includes three Marvel superheroes and Thanos. Superheroes cannot move but can decide when to attack, and Thanos must keep moving to dodge the ranged attacks. Thanos wins if staying alive in one minute, otherwise, the superheroes win. The design is simple but exciting. To make it more playable, we suggested adding ultimate attacks with fancy effects and taking the distance between both sides into consideration to improve gaming experience.
Yixuan would like to make a device to provide immersive experience in a room. Users will see a scene in the natural environment and can interact with flower-like objects. When doing so, the device plays the sound of Bianzhong, a traditional Chinese musical instrument. However, we agreed that it is difficult to make it eye-catching and attract users, so it needs further adjustments. As for the feeling of traditional Chinese culture, we thought that more instruments could be added.
Gloria will create a game to promote environment protection. Two players control a salvage ship and a whale to remove all the plastic garbage in the ocean. This is a very unique game for it encourages cooperation instead of competition. We noticed that making different pictures to show the motion of the ship and the whale might require a lot of work, but there were not any problems for the rest of the game.
Most of us share a similar definition of interaction and believe that game is the perfect way for it. But the immersive project is also in line with my definition of interaction, where the activity between at least two actors who affect others in a cycle of receiving input, processing and giving output, and it arouses people’s emotional or mental reactions.
For our project, others appreciated its focus on hearing and the 3D audio effect, but they also pointed out that it would be a complicated task to make the dark maze and the limited illumination. Whether to move the background has not been decided as well. Based on the feedback, we will move up the time for the start of the project to figure out these big problems first. Besides, the use of Arduino may lack creativity, so we are considering adding signal light or some other parts to strengthen the interaction part. The 3D audio seems like something geek, but it is actually easy to make and we may add more effects to move the sound not only left and right but also forward and backward.