Just want to share the results of the eReader and gestural interaction project I had my Basic Interaction class (undergraduate HCI double majors) do for their final project. This was a six-week project with the following focus:

  • Synthesize needs and opportunities from both potential product users and other sources.
  • Discover the intersection between the needs observed by researchers and the needs people perceive in themselves in otder to find rich areas for product development.
  • Design product interactions that support the emotional connections between the person the reader
  • Explore the personal and social roles that ebook readers facilitate
  • Communicate the value of the ebook reader through the visual, auditory, and narrative channels provided by a video sketch

Though the time line was short, I was pleased with the results. During the final, a user research specialist from Daedalus Excel showed up and was very impressed with the presentations and solutions.

I was really impressed with the quality of the video sketches. I had them read John Zimmerman’s Video Sketches: Exploring Pervasive Computing Interaction Designs and showed them several examples. We talked about the advantages and disadvantages of different styles. But we did not go over tools, video techniques, or audio, which is typically done. Also, I told them that there was no right way to do this and that they should design their video sketch according to what they thought would be most effective given their skills and the time they had. The quality of the results were really impressive.

In particular, I enjoyed one group that used simple sketches and a child narrator to tell the story for an eReader for moms.

The students got to select an audience focus from a list of six options. Some of the groups overlapped. The documentation links are below, which contain links to their videos and final presentations.

Commuters
Starburst Reader
EasyNews

Moms
Kava
Oracle Reader

Family
Flip ‘N Share