Timo Arnall » Information design http://www.elasticspace.com Design, media & research Fri, 25 Jun 2010 20:34:11 +0000 en hourly 1 Graphical data fiction http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/06/graphical-data-fiction http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/06/graphical-data-fiction#comments Mon, 21 Jun 2010 17:43:21 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/?p=287416049

Sumedecina and Graphical data fiction.

]]> http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/06/graphical-data-fiction/feed 0 Augmented (hyper)Reality http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/02/augmented-hyperreality http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/02/augmented-hyperreality#comments Tue, 09 Feb 2010 21:11:38 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/?p=287415995

Augmented (hyper)Reality by Keiichi Matsuda

The latter half of the 20th century saw the built environment merged with media space, and architecture taking on new roles related to branding, image and consumerism. Augmented reality may recontextualise the functions of consumerism and architecture, and change in the way in which we operate within it.

A film produced for my final year Masters in Architecture, part of a larger project about the social and architectural consequences of new media and augmented reality.

A competent visualisation of an undesirable future.

]]> http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/02/augmented-hyperreality/feed 3 Telling stories with interfaces http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/01/telling-stories-with-interfaces http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/01/telling-stories-with-interfaces#comments Mon, 25 Jan 2010 14:04:10 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/?p=287415956 “But where does it go from here? Is this really just a micro-genre best suited to ads for internet companies? Or does the fact that we spend so much time on this stage our selves mean that it really can be the venue for more (and more kinds of) storytelling?

via Telling stories with interfaces « Snarkmarket.

]]> http://www.elasticspace.com/2010/01/telling-stories-with-interfaces/feed 0 Augmented reality experiments http://www.elasticspace.com/2006/08/augmented-reality-experiments http://www.elasticspace.com/2006/08/augmented-reality-experiments#comments Tue, 29 Aug 2006 11:59:37 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2006/08/augmented-reality-experiments AR Teapot A year ago, Even and I played around for an afternoon with ARtoolkit, an open-source application for handling Augmented Reality objects: physical markings that when processed through a video camera can be augmented with 3D digital objects. ]]> I’m really not a fan of the goggle/glasses/helmet variety of AR, where the user wears something in front of their eyes that superimposes 3D objects into the physical world. In my experience this has been slow, inaccurate, cumbersome, headache inducing, the worst of VR plus a lot more problems. But AR is really interesting when it’s just a screen and a video feed, it becomes somehow magical: to see the same space represented twice: once in front of you, and once on screen with magical objects. I can imagine this working really well on mobile phones: the phone screen as magic lens to secret things.

Hand drawing markers

On that afternoon we didn’t have a printer handy for making the AR marks, so we took to drafting them by hand, stencilling them off the screen with a pencil and inking them in. This hand-crafted process led to all sorts of interesting connections between the possibilities of craft and digital information.

AR nail decorations

We had lots of ideas about printing the markers on clothes, painting them on nails, glazing them into ceramics, etc. We confused ARtoolkit by drawing markers in perspective, and tried to get recursive objects by using screen based markers and video feedback.

Confusing ARtoolkit

Now as it turns out there is an entire research programme dedicated to looking at just this topic. Variable Environment is a research programme involving partners like ECAL and EPFL. The great thing is that they are blogging the entire exploratory (they call it ‘sketch’) phase and curating the results online. The work is multi-disciplinary and involves architects, visual designers, computer scientists, interaction designers, etc. Check out the simple AR ready products, sample applications and mixed reality tests with various patterns.

This seems to be part of a shift in the research community, to publishing ongoing and exploratory work online (championed by the likes of Nicolas Nova and Anne Galloway). Very inspirational.

]]> http://www.elasticspace.com/2006/08/augmented-reality-experiments/feed 2 You are here http://www.elasticspace.com/2006/08/you-are-here http://www.elasticspace.com/2006/08/you-are-here#comments Fri, 04 Aug 2006 08:35:00 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2006/08/you-are-here You are here I'm collecting images from around the world depicting 'you are here' marks or ideo locators at Flickr. I'm fascinated by this mapping in context, in particular the relationship to local physical space. This is mapping with a a point of view, and maps as direct interface to the world. The best example to date is from Seoul, where 3D cross sections of a metro station are directly related to the point at which you are looking at the map.]]> You are here I'm collecting images from around the world depicting 'you are here' marks or ideo locators at Flickr. I'm fascinated by this mapping in context, in particular the relationship to local physical space. This is mapping with a a point of view, and maps as direct interface to the world. The best example to date is from Seoul, where 3D cross sections of a metro station are directly related to the point at which you are looking at the map.]]> http://www.elasticspace.com/2006/08/you-are-here/feed 2 Graphic language for touch http://www.elasticspace.com/2005/11/graphic-language-for-touch http://www.elasticspace.com/2005/11/graphic-language-for-touch#comments Mon, 21 Nov 2005 08:37:21 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2005/11/graphic-language-for-touch A graphic language for touch: interacting with RFID and NFC through the mobile phone. This work explores the visual link between information and physical things, specifically around the emerging use of the mobile phone to interact with RFID or NFC. It was a presentation and poster at Design Engaged, Berlin on the 11th November 2005. Download the icons (PDF, 721KB, Gif preview).]]> As mobile phones are increasingly able to read and write to RFID tags embedded in the physical world, I am wondering how we will appropriate this for personal and social uses.

I’m interested in the visual link between information and physical things. How do we represent an object that has digital function, information or history beyond it’s physical form? What are the visual clues for this interaction? We shouldn’t rely on a kind of mystery meat navigation (the scourge of the web-design world) where we have to touch everything to find out it’s meaning.

This work doesn’t attempt to be a definitive system for marking physical things, it is an exploratory process to find out how digital/physical interactions might work. It uncovers interesting directions while the technology is still largely out of the hands of everyday users.

Reference to existing work

Visual references

Click for larger version.

The inspiration for this is in the marking of public space and existing iconography for interactions with objects: push buttons on pedestrian crossings, contactless cards, signage and instructional diagrams.

This draws heavily on the substantial body of images of visual marking in public space. One of the key findings of this research was that visibility and placement of stickers in public space is an essential part of their use. Current research in ubicomp and ‘locative media’ is not addressing these visibility issues.

There is also a growing collection of existing iconography in contactless payment systems, with a number of interesting graphic treatments in a technology-led, vernacular form. In Japan there are also instances of touch-based interactions being represented by characters, colours and iconography that are abstracted from the action itself.

I have also had great discussions with Ulla-Maaria Mutanen and Jyri Engeström who have been doing interesting work with thinglinks and the intricate weaving of RFID into craft products.

Development

rfid_iconography_circles.gif

Sketching and development revealed five initial directions: circles, wireless, card-based, mobile-based and arrows (see the poster for more details). The icons range from being generic (abstracted circles or arrows to indicate function) to specific (mobile phones or cards touching tags).

Arrows might be suitable for specific functions or actions in combinations with other illustrative material. Icons with mobile phones or cards might be helpful in situations where basic usability for a wide range of users is required. Although the ‘wireless’ icons are often found in current card readers, they do not successfully indicate the touch-based interactions inherent in the technology, and may be confused with WiFi or Bluetooth. The circular icons work at the highest level, and might be most suitable for generic labelling.

rfid_iconography_circles.gif

For further investigation I have selected a simple circle, surrounded by an ‘aura’ described by a dashed line. I think this successfully communicates the near field nature of the technology, while describing that the physical object contains something beyond its physical form.

rfid_iconography_2circle.gif

In most current NFC implementations, such as the 3220 from Nokia and many iMode phones, the RFID reader is in the bottom of the phone. This means that the area of ‘activation’ is obscured in many cases by the phone and hand. The circular iconography allows for a space to be marked as ‘active’ by the size of the circle, and we might see it used to mark areas rather than points. Usability may improve when these icons are around the same size as the phone, rather than being a specific point to touch.

Work in progress

This is early days for this technology, and this is work-in-progress. There is more to be done in looking at specific applications, finding suitable uses and extending the language to cover other functions and content.

Until now I have been concerned with generic iconography for a digitally augmented object. But this should develop into a richer language, as the applications for this type of interaction become more specific, and related to the types of objects and information being used. For example it would be interesting to find a graphic treatment that could be applied to a Pokemon sticker offering power-ups as well as a bus stop offering timetable downloads.

I’m also interested in the physical placement of these icons. How large or visible should they be? Are there places that should not be ‘active’? And how will this fit with the natural, centres of gravity of the mobile phone in public and private space.

I’ll expand on these things in a few upcoming projects that explore touch-based interactions in personal spaces.

Feel free to use and modify the icons, I would be very interested to see how they can be applied and extended.

Visual references

Oyster Card, Transport for London.
eNFC, Inside Contactless.
Paypass, Mastercard.
ExpressPay, American Express.
FeliCa, Sony.
MiFare, various vendors.
Suica, JR, East Japan Railway Company.
RFID Field Force Solutions, Nokia.
NFC shell for 3220, Nokia.
ERG Transit Systems payment, Dubai.
Various generic contactless vendors.
Contactless payment symbol, Mastercard.
Open Here, Paul Mijksenaar, Piet Westendorp, Thames and Hudson, 1999.
Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud, Harper, 1994

]]> http://www.elasticspace.com/2005/11/graphic-language-for-touch/feed 18 Social filtering for online forums http://www.elasticspace.com/2004/06/social-filtering http://www.elasticspace.com/2004/06/social-filtering#comments Mon, 28 Jun 2004 01:46:00 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2004/06/social-filtering Yayhooray re-launched with new features and functions, and what looks like a rich environment for writing, browsing and discussion. As far as I know it’s the first forum built to use the buddy list as a form of content filtering: to increase the signal to noise ratio in the content.

Here’s a bit of Yayhooray history:

Built by skinnyCorp in 2001 as an experiment in online community. Along with o8 it soaked up some of the users from Dreamless, the ‘design forum’ that reached critical mass and became its own worst enemy at the end of 2000.

Originally it was built to manage itself through a levels system; allowing users to earn administration responsibilities (similar to implicit moderation systems employed by other forums like metafilter). It worked well at a small scale but led to cliques forming around the early adopter’s own social networks.

The levels system evolved into a points system, allowing anyone to award points to anyone, on a limited (one a day, one person a week) basis, similar to karma systems adopted at slashdot and kuro5hin. This briefly led to multiple account scams, and ended up in the ‘point orgy’ where ‘points were swapped rather than STDs’.

In the end, both systems were abused, subverted and widely discussed, often taking over from normal discussions and swamping the site with controversy. Many regulars left to other places, some seeing closed, invite only communities (like humhum) as the only option left for humane, creative discussion.

Yayhooray, in this latest version, is setting itself up to deal with these problems by globally filtering the content through a buddy system, rather than explicitly administering the content and user reputations. This applies to the entire site including the categorised discussions, blogging interface, links database, buddy lists and search.

The most obvious feature is a meter on the left hand side, which allows 4 different filtering settings:

  • you and only you
  • you and your buddies
  • you, your buddies, and their buddies
  • every user on Yay Hooray!

    This applies a filter to the entire site, including user lists and search, which took me a little by suprise. The site is effectively meshing off into small, interlinked communities of interest, based on individual social networks and collaborative filtering.

    In my case, buddies are mostly people that I have met, talked to, or seen invest time into making things: initiating photographic threads, dealing with social issues, administering creative collaborations, giving good design critique…

    Logging in now (using ‘you, your buddies, and their buddies’) I see a small subset of the overall forum, focused on these parts of the discussion. Given that the filter is so prominent and usable, it is also possible to jump out into the chaos of the full site.

    There is also a useful, if somewhat harsh, system that censors posts and links based on a list of people that you class as ‘enemies’! Being based on proper XHTML, CSS and DOM technologies means that censored posts are easily toggled on and off.

    On the downside there will most likely be confusion and clashes when different groups that don’t mesh with each other, but have completely different experiences of the place, come together in a single thread. There will also be more repetition, or double posts of content gets repeated amongst different groups that are out of sync by virtue of the filters.

    To fully appreciate this you need to invest time in it, and to build up a network of trusted buddies. YH can be hyperactive and annoying, it must be difficult for a new user to become engaged. The filters are perhaps most useful for long-time users looking for relief from ‘worst enemy’ problems.

    Because it has become an adaptive social platform, and has the potential to be subverted and shaped into many different kinds of system, I will reserve judgement for now, and make a new report soon.

    ]]> http://www.elasticspace.com/2004/06/social-filtering/feed 0 Design for television http://www.elasticspace.com/2004/03/design-for-television http://www.elasticspace.com/2004/03/design-for-television#comments Wed, 10 Mar 2004 12:16:11 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2004/03/design-for-television Typographer.org / David Earls has covered the basics of design for television in a clear and accessible way. I have been meaning to write up some guidelines specific to (interactive) television, here is a start.]]> David’s reference to 18 points as the minimum size equates to 18 pixels if you are coming from a web background.

    On some iTV projects I have pushed the type down to 16 pixels, but be very careful about colours and contrast, and enquire about the production path to air: if the work is going to be transferred via DV tape, squeezed through an old composite link, or online-edited with high compression, then you might want to leave type as large as possible.

    In some cases – such as using white text on a red background – you can add a very subtle black shadow to the type, which will help stop colour bleed and crawling effects. Even if you dislike drop-shadow effects, it will still look flat and lovely on a broadcast monitor.

    Safe areas need to be taken with a pinch of salt. The default safe areas in most editing and compositing software date from years ago before the widespread use of modern, widescreen televisions.

    Try extending the safe area for non-essential text in interactive projects, and consult broadcaster guidelines for their widescreen policies: many channels now broadcast in 14:9 to terrestrial boxes, and offer options to satellite and cable viewers.

    The largest problem is that widescreen viewers often crop the top and bottom of the image by setting their TV to crop 4:3 to 16:9. Some cable/satellite companies remove the left and right of the image to crop 16:9 to 4:3 for non-widescreen viewers, leaving us only a tiny, safe rectangle in the centre of the image to work with.

    Robert Bradbrook (maker of Home Road Movies) has a some technical but excellent information on designing graphics for 16:9 television and film formats, including a sample safe area.

    There are also excellent documents on picture standards from the BBC.

    But this is one thing I don’t understand: according to the BBC: “Additional [20 or 26 horizontal] pixels are not taken into account when calculating the aspect ratio, but without them images transferred between systems will not be the correct shape.” Can anyone confirm that this is the case for PAL images?

    ]]>     http://www.elasticspace.com/2004/03/design-for-television/feed 0     Information design books http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/09/information-design http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/09/information-design#comments Tue, 02 Sep 2003 23:35:24 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/09/information-design Visual Function: An Introduction to Information Design

    Paul Mijksenaar. A small, beautiful and polemical book full of fine examples of good information design, read this before tackling Tufte.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    The Visual Display of Quantitative Information

    Edward Tufte.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Envisioning Information

    Edward Tufte.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Visual Explanations

    Edward Tufte.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Double Fold: Libraries and the Assault on Paper

    Nicholson Baker.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Digital Diagrams

    Trevor Bounford, Alastair Campbell.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Open Here

    Paul Mijksenaar and Piet Westendorp.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Information Graphics: A Comprehensive Illustrated Reference

    Robert L. Harris.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Information Design

    Robert E. Jacobsen.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    How to Lie With Statistics

    Darrel Huff, Irving Geis.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Information Visualization

    Colin Ware.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Readings in Information Visualization

    Stuart Card, Jock Mackinlay, Ben Schneiderman.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    The Global Media Atlas

    Mark Balnaves, James Donald, Donald Stephanie Hemelryk.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com / myriad editions

    The Atlas of the Future

    Ian Pearson.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com / myriad editions

    The State of the World Atlas

    Dan Smith.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com / myriad editions

    How Maps Work: Representation, Visualization and Design

    Alan M. MacEachren.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    ]]>     http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/09/information-design/feed 0     Visual design books http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/01/visual-design http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/01/visual-design#comments Tue, 28 Jan 2003 14:00:00 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/01/visual-design Grid Systems in Graphic Design

    Josef Muller-Brockmann.
    Magma Books / Niggli / UK booksearch

    Primer of Visual Literacy

    Donis A. Dondis.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Graphic Design Timeline: A Century of Design Milestones

    Steven Heller, Elinor Pettit.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    6 Chapters in Design

    Philip Meggs.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Pioneers of Modern Design

    Nikolaus Pevsner.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Design Literacy: Understanding Graphic Design

    Steven Heller.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Design Literacy (Continued): Understanding Graphic Design

    Steven Heller.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Paul Rand: A Designer’s Art

    Paul Rand.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Design, Form and Chaos

    Paul Rand.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Designing Books

    Jost Hochuli, Robin Kinross.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    On Book Design

    Richard Hendel.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Design and Form

    Johannes Itten.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    The Elements of Color

    Johannes Itten.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    The Color Star

    Johannes Itten.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Interaction of Color

    Josef Albers.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Basic Law of Colour Theory

    Harald Kueppers / amazon.com

    Color for Websites: Digital Media Design

    Molly Holzschlag.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Wabi-Sabi: for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers

    Leonard Koren.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Katachi: Classic Japanese Design

    Takeji Iwamiya, Kazuya Takaoka.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Dutch Graphic Design

    Kees Broos, Paul Hefting.
    amazon.co.uk

    Experience

    Sean Perkins.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Permanent: Design Is Kinky

    Andrew Johnstone, Jade Palmer.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Catching the Moment

    Terry Jones.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Reload: Browser 2.0

    Patrick Burgoyne, Liz Faber.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Narita Inspected

    Lopetz Klanten.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Mobile Minded

    Miekke Gerritzen. An introduction to Mattmo’s work in motion graphics design, interaction design and print.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Design For Interaction

    Lisa Baggerman. This is a very visual book – somewhat disappointing in it’s coverage of interaction, but offers many visual examples of rich web designs for inspiration.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    ]]>     http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/01/visual-design/feed 0     Typography books http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/01/typography http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/01/typography#comments Fri, 17 Jan 2003 10:04:00 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/01/typography Type and Typography

    Phil Baines.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Signs: Lettering in the Environment

    Phil Baines, Catherine Dixon.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    A View of Early Typography

    Harry Carter.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Unjustified Text: Perspectives on Typography

    Robin Kinross.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Karel Martens: Printed Matter / Drukwerk

    Robin Kinross, Karel Martens, Jaap van Triest.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Counterpunch

    Fred Smeijers.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Stop Stealing Sheep

    Erik Spiekermann, E.M. Ginger.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Basic Typography

    James Craig.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Typo – When, Who, How

    F Friedl.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Typographic Design

    Rob Carter, Philip B Meggs, Ben Day.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    The Elements of Typographic Style

    Robert Bringhurst.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Typographica

    Rick Poynor.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Dimensional Typography: Words in Space

    J. Abbott Miller.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Fuck Off Typography

    Gerard Saint.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Typography

    Wolfgang Weingart.
    Magma Books / Niggli / UK booksearch

    Typography

    Friedl, Ott, Stein.
    Magma Books / Niggli / UK booksearch

    Basic Typography: Design With Letters

    Ruedi Ruegg.
    Magma Books / Niggli / UK booksearch

    Typography: Macro + Micro Aesthetics

    Willi Kunz.
    Magma Books / Niggli / UK booksearch

    ]]>     http://www.elasticspace.com/2003/01/typography/feed 0     Information architecture books http://www.elasticspace.com/2002/05/information-architecture http://www.elasticspace.com/2002/05/information-architecture#comments Tue, 30 Apr 2002 23:36:35 +0000 Timo http://www.elasticspace.com/2002/05/information-architecture Information Architecture for the World Wide Web

    Louis Rosenfeld, Peter Morville. Now in its second edition, undoubtedly the best introduction to IA.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Information Architects

    Richard Saul Wurman.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Practical Information Architecture

    Eric L. Reiss.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web

    Christina Wodtke.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Mapping Web Sites

    Paul Kahn, Krzysztof Lenk. A suprisingly badly designed book, but packed full of very inspirational information architecture examples, from isometric site-maps to flow charts and wireframes.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Dynamics in Document Design

    Karen A. Schriver.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Content Critical

    Gerry McGovern
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    The Web Content Style Guide

    Gerry McGovern
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Web Navigation

    Jennifer Fleming.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Sorting Things Out

    Geoffrey C. Bowker, Susan Leigh Star.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    The Intellectual Foundation of Information Organization

    Elaine Svenonius
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Laws of the Web

    Bernardo A. Huberman.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    Infosense: Turning Information into Knowledge

    Keith Devlin.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    The Social Life of Information

    John Seely Brown, Paul Duguid.
    amazon.co.uk / amazon.com

    ]]>     http://www.elasticspace.com/2002/05/information-architecture/feed 0