FUTURE OF TRANSFORMABILITY Today’s digital objects and systems are layered with functionality, which presents a new challenge for designers: how can forms subscribe to multiple functionality while maintaining a simplicity in user interaction that clearly describes their functionality? In current products, multi-functionality is usually maintained at the expense of ergonomics or ease of use. Kinetic programmability in interface design may offer a method to address this, in the form of physical transformability. A kinetic surface or skin, or a transformable internal structure can be linked to computational data sensed from the object’s use (gestural or positional controls) or the surrounding environment and the physical form of the object changes in response, making objects physically adaptable to their function or context. No longer does form follow function, form becomes function. While the current state of shape-changing objects may be relegated to the science fiction of Transformers, advances in shape memory materials and nanotechnology are bringing cutting-edge experiments to life.

 

mation communication can be found in haptic user interfaces: devices that allow users to feel information through tactile or kinesthetic sensations. This is can be achieved by applying forces that restrict user finger, hand, and limb movement, such as in force-feedback interfaces, or by mechanically stimulating user skin in tactile user interfaces. Haptic interfaces have been extensively investigated in virtual reality and telepresence applications, to allow users to feel objects properties, such as resistance, weight, and surface texture. Recently, haptic interfaces have been used in desktop and mobile interfaces, allowing users, for example, to feel information on a touch screen with their fingers. Although haptic user interfaces have a long history, past research has been primarily focused on the specifics of producing and understanding haptic sensations. In KOIs we take a much broader approach that looks to explore the use of kinetic motion on multiple perceptual levels, including haptics.

Actuation as Embodiment of Gesture. An emerging class of KOIs record motion and gestures directly from the human body and replay them creating a sense of a living organicism. For example, Topobo [ 11] is a 3D constructive assembly with kinetic memory, the ability to record and play back physical motion in 3D space (see Figure 2b). By snapping together a combination of static and motorized components, people can quickly assemble dynamic biomorphic forms like animals and skeletons. These constructions can be animated by physically pushing, pulling, and twisting parts of the assembly. Topobo

components can record and play back their individual motions, creating complex motion behavior in the overall structure of a creation. Importantly, the kinetic recording occurs in the same physical space as it plays back: the user “teaches” an object how to move by physically manipulating the object itself. This provides an elegant and straightforward method for motion authoring in future kinetic interactions.

Actuation as Form Generation. Perhaps one of the most inspiring categories of kinetic interfaces is that of devices and displays that can dynamically change their physical form to display data or in response to user input. Such displays have been often referred to as shape-shifting devices. One approach in designing such self-deformable displays is creating kinetic relief-like structures either on the scale of table-top device, such as in Feelex [ 5] and Lumen [ 9] (see Figure 3a) or on the scale of the entire buildings, such as in Mark Goulthorpe’s Aegis Hyposurface. An alternative approach is illustrated by The Source installation [ 3] that allows direct creation of low-resolution 3D shapes hanging in space. It consists of 729 balls suspended on metal cables forming a 9x9x9 spatial grid, where each ball is a “pixel” (see Figure 3b). By moving on the cables, the balls can form letters and images floating in space.

Shape displays explore the possibilities for how physical transformability can embody the malleability so valued in the digital realm (see the sidebar here). They communicate information by manipulating 3D physical shapes in real time that can be either seen or felt by hand. The information can be communicated not only by creating a physical shape but by modifying or rearranging existing shapes, such as in case of claytronics robots (self-reconfigurable robots), under development at Carnegie Mellon University [ 2].

 

TOWARD A DESIGN LANGUAGE FOR KINETIC ORGANIC INTERFACES

The preceding examples of Kinetic Organic Interfaces have demonstrated a variety of methods to incorporate kinetic behavior as a valuable strategy in interface design. However, they have barely scratched the surface of the possibilities we see available in this relatively untapped arena. As designers and HCI scientists begin to explore the language of motion more fully, we now discuss some of the salient design parameters and research questions to consider when utilizing kinetic motion in interaction design.

Form and Materiality. In order to recognize and comprehend motion, it must be embodied in a material form. Hence, a crucial and little-understood design parameter is how properties of materials and