Something we talked about lot about when designing the Copper Charlie. A lot of induction ovens use an off the shelf capacitive interface. If you look at a lot of them they use the same component under the glass top. The head of product at Copper was determined for things to be done with knobs, even the now typical oven interface. Happy to connect you to the V of product there if you like.
I’ve worked in various science museums making interactive exhibits and that’s a battle we’re always fighting. A lot of people engage more fully and learn more when they have tactile controls. But installing software that runs on a touch screen is easy and cheap, and less maintenance. So management regularly pushes for more touch screens, where I try to design as much as possible using knobs and cranks and buttons.
is there a premise that the touchscreens are “more exciting” ? I’m thinking of the Eames’ Mathematica exhibit in Boston, lots of moving parts. Probably breaks a lot
Scrolling with my Logitech MX Master to get down this page, and playing with the little button that switches between detents and free scrolling. Kind of take that for granted, but there’s some cool little haptic or other switch inside that actuates the change. Makes a good solid “CLICK” when it changes too.
Similar background or ‘peripheral’ information is communicated on the Peloton Bike+, where turning the resistance knob shows both on the screen as a number increment, and in a very subtle ‘buzz’ coming from the frame itself as the resistance servos move in and out to make the flywheel harder to turn. I’ve heard it was unintentional but it adds to the exercise IMO.
How much history is going to be covered in the book?
Like there are also interesting “commercially failed” interfaces, like the Gametrak by Elliot Myers and Co which I know about because we bought it and used in an media art project. The art project though was not extended as the game traks production was ended at one point.
Hi Steve, I love your idea about writing to connect ID and UX design. I have a few good cases studies if you are interested. Here’s my contact info as well as a link to my company website.
Gametrak is fascinating! I have limited space, so will be promoting other great design history books. I’m hoping to include the highlights of industrial design history for non ID’ers, to illustrate key ideas like aesthetics, manufacturing constraints, HCI, etc.
OK there is something that confuses me. Either you changed your book’s scope or I misunderstood or missed out something - on your website you write: “Designing the Tangible Interface is a hands-on guide for designers” now you say: I’m hoping to include the highlights of industrial design history for non ID’ers. I always thought that ID - industrial design was part of Design, it actually very often used to be called Product Design. But then Product Design is now UX and so may be Product Design is now abbreviated to be “Design” and thus ID is not anymore part of “Design” ?
Glad to hear that the term “design” currently seems not to undergo some renaming within some communities.
I could imagine that the analysis of “highlights of industrial design history for non ID’ers” with respect to the question in how much they encompass tangible interfaces would be interesting also for ID’ers. That would also adumbrate the subject of tangible interfaces. I would though expect from a “hands-on guide” concrete examples of past tangible (user) interfaces and how they were adopted or nonadopted within a certain audience. That is there are obvious criteria what might be e.g. a bad design, like putting two knobs so close together that you can’t handle them anymore for sure, but there maybe more subtle ones and the study of past examples may give some hints. So I asked in order to get a sense of how much of that type of investigation will take place in the book.
Yes it looks a bit similar because of the two strings hold by hand. By the video I found it though a bit hard to understand what the kinethread really does. I understood the kinethread more as a way to “apply forces directly to users’ joints” (thats what they write), than as a “sensor”, which the gametrak was mostly. That is the “force feedback” of the gametrak was via the spring mechanism of the pulley and it was not part of some computer controlled action, unless I missed out something relevant…
Correct, it is haptic feedback only. There is no triangulation or positioning. They discuss the Bowden cables in the paper which I assume are similar to the Gametrak mechanism.
