The ‘Oriented’ Self engages a familiar context through an unexpected orientation. Detected bodies are turned upside down and projected onto the ceiling.
In changing one’s orientation within an environment, movement slows and becomes more deliberate. The mental mapping of action to representation required an unexpected effort: “If I put my hand here, it corresponds to this. Do I need to move it up? Down? Left? Okay, now it’s here.”
By changing the relationship of body and context, users explore the space in new ways: hanging from the lights, moonwalking, trying to touch elements they wouldn’t typically be able to reach.
Technicals
The map uses a Kinect camera to detect a body in space. When initialized, the camera captures a static image of the context and places it as the background of a website. When a body is detected, it is isolated, rotated, and updated in realtime.
Next Steps
- Rather than orient the body to the ceiling, how would the interaction be different if the digital representation of the environment was flipped?
- Use a live-background, which shows the detected body twice — oriented to the ceiling and ‘normally’.