Another academic year at QUT has begun, and again I am saying to myself I have to try and find the time to update my web site more often. One might even say "eat my own dog food" - its not exactly the same , but this year I do want more actively update uber.tv...
This semester is looking to be both busy, and exciting, as I am teaching two of my one of my favorite classes (Design for interactive media, which was previously called Interaction Design), and the lecture for my other class, Embodied Interactions, is in my favorite lecture theater L101.
Both classes focus on the design of interactive media, and draw upon a similar body of theory and practice. Embodied Interactions is a final year design class in which students prepare and develops works suitable to exhibit at the end of year graduate show. This year will be the 15th exhibition hosted by my department, and the 13th end of year grad show - works from last years exhibition can be seen here :: http://www.playon08.ci.qut.edu.au/
Embodied Interactions, as the title suggests, is informed in part by Dourish's text Where the action is : the foundations of embodied interaction.
“Embodied Interaction is the creation, manipulation and sharing of meaning through engaged interaction with artifacts.”1
The class focuses on a number of 'themes' including: Embodiment, design and production for/of embodied interactive media, ontological design(ing), practice and futures.
My other class, Design for interactive media, has grown in size since last year, with 140 odd students enrolled this semester. Up from 70 odd last year, so it has almost doubled in size...
This class provides an introduction to interaction design methods including basic design research, observation, ideation, prototyping, and evaluating. The assessment brief this year it set at the State Library of Queensland, and involves students designing interactive media works for display in the library which "reveal / make visible, the invisible life of the library".
Queensland State Library. Photo by Dan Hill.
The project came about after conversations with the Library staff, and Dan Hill who has been working on a 'post-occupancy evaluation' of the State Library of Queensland's wi-fi network. 2
It is also great that the Library is hosting the Ideas Festival in the first couple of weeks of semester. And Keith Armstrong and Chris Barker's work, Knowmore House of Commons, has just been installed on Level 1 of the Library in the infozone artspace - which will give us something to experience and critique in first tutorials.
So this semester is starting to shape up, and I am really excited to see how 140 students, and 5 tutors take on this project. Plus I will get to spend more time at the State Library.
... Here is hoping I can live up to my New Years resolution of more regularly updating uber.tv ...
Where the action is : the foundations of embodied interaction,
, Cambridge, Mass. :, MIT Press,, pp. x, 233 p. ;, 2004 .
- See Dan's discussion about this project on his site http://www.cityofsound.com/blog/2008/11/wi-fi-structure.html and http://www.cityofsound.com/blog/2008/08/post-occupancy.html