Bodystorming for movement-based interaction design

Abstract

After a decade of movement-based interaction in human-computer interaction, designing for the moving body still remains a challenge. Research in this field requires methods to help access, articulate, and harness embodied experiences in ways that can inform the design process. To address this challenge, this article appropriates bodystorming, an embodied ideation method for movement-based interaction design. The proposed method allows for early consideration of the physical, collocated, and social aspects of a designed activity as illustrated with two explorative workshops in different application domains: interactive body games and interactive performances. Using a qualitative methods approach, we used video material from the workshops, feedback from participants, and our own experience as participants and facilitators to outline important characteristics of the bodystorming method in the domain of movement-based interaction. The proposed method is compared with previous ones and application implications are discussed.

Documenting the Elusive and Ephemeral in Embodied Design Ideation Activities

“…It is often common to find documentation forms that solely documents one of these (e.g., [41][42][43][44] on bodily or social action; ( [4,[45][46][47] on artifacts). Capturing these aspects is key to better understand elusive aspects of embodied action, such as how these elements are interconnected, affect, and are affected by the unfolding of the activity [7].…”

“…The most common approach is accompanying the textual descriptions with graphics, such as photographs (e.g., [4,7,8,[41][42][43][44][45][46][50][51][52][53][54][55][56]) or illustrations and drawings (e.g., [57,58]). Another performativity purpose is helping build empirical evidence: Photographs accompanying the main text are widely used, which can also help the reader better understand interaction (e.g., [4,6,41,[44][45][46]50,[52][53][54]56]).…”

“…An example of this are embodied design ideation (EDI) activities (here, we use the general term of activities to refer to what other authors have labeled as methods, approaches, practices or processes), which have been used in design and research [5,6] to complement traditional design ideation ones [5]. They put the designers' and/or user's embodied experience at the core of the design process, and work well to spur creativity, and to better understand and shape future embodied experiences [7], foregrounding relationships between the moving, lived body and other design materials, including artifacts, and situated and contextual elements [5].…”

“…There are various EDI activities (see [5,7,8]), many of which take inspiration in somatic practices and are developed by designers-researchers through their work; their inherent bodily nature make them particularly difficult to articulate and transfer [5]. As Wilde et al ([5], p. 2) argued: "the reasoning behind how and why different methods work is often difficult to grasp, especially when the format of sharing is text-based, such as through conference or journal articles.…”

“…They were primarily developed as tools for the design-researchers' team-yet some of them have also been used to communicate RtD findings [6,7].…”