Moving keyboard buttons to a cup

A while ago I did a rough prototype of a game controller using one of the coffee mugs from my kitchen. I chose the coffee mug for two main reasons. Firstly it is an object which most people are familiar with. One of my assumtions with "homemade" game controllers is that familiarity makes them easier for people to interact with. Secondly I found the circular shape of the coffee mug interesting from an interaction point of view. Aside from the handle I think the circular shape is the most characteristic feature of a coffee mug. I therefore chose to base the controller interaction on this feature. Maybe a piece of iPod inspiration was also lingering in the back of my head at the time. I don't really know.

When setting up the prototype I wanted to keep it simple and avoid sensors and microcontrollers. Inspired by my classmate Anders Kjeseth Valdersnes I went ahead and picked apart two discarded keyboards. I then attached wires to a selected range of buttons on the keyboard and led the wires from the keyboard to the outer surface of the cup. I thereby effectively moved the buttons from the keyboard to the cup.

The interaction with the relocated "buttons" was set up slightly different from one prototype to the next. In the first version (seen in the top image) one only needed to slide a slightly moist finger along the rim where the wires were exposed. When the finger touched two horisontal wires at the same time it would register as a key being pressed . This meant that the interaction was rather gentle, but unfortunately the connection to the keyboard itself was very fragile. From one day to the next the connection on some keys would be lost and I would have to attach them again and again. I therefore chose to make a second prototype (seen in the image below).


The second prototype was much more robust. None of the connections have been lost yet and the prototype has been in relatively heavy use the last couple of days. This prototype was set up by soldering attachment sockets directly onto the keyboard "chip" and then simply placing wires into these sockets.

In the same way as with the first protoype the wires were then taped to the rim of the cup. However it turned out that a simple touch wasn't necessary to create a closed circuit with this setup. The wires had to be in physical contact with each other and therefore more pressure was needed to activate the buttons. In order to get the wires to connect easily I mounted them across each other separated by a piece of paper. When enough force was applied the wires would connect and register as a key being pressed.

I then created a game for the coffee mug to control and did some user tesing. More on that to come...

Hardware store candidates

A couple of weeks ago I did a short tour of some of the hardware stores downtown in order to make a selection of game controller candidates. I visited Claes Ohlsson, Jernia and Åhlens. The reason for visiting these stores was that I knew they held a wide range of tools, kitchenware and items for the bathroom and living room. I felt that by visiting these stores I would cover most of the objects one would expect to find in a home that would also be relevant game controller candidates.

Prior to visiting the hardware stores I had set up a list of criteria that the candidates would have to fulfill in order to be included in the project. The selection criteria were as follows:

1. Not too big
2. Not electrical
3. Not harmful
4. Not expensive

The reasoning behind these criteria is as follows:
Not too big - This is simply a practical criteria. I don't want the controllers to be so big that they are cumbersome to handle. The controllers should be of a size and weight which is managable for one person using one or two hands. At this point I consider a frying pan of normal size and weight to be only slightly too big and heavy.

Not electrical - I consider electrical appliances to be unsuited as game controllers for two main reasons. Firstly most of the home appliances use relatively high voltages. This could be dangerous in a game setting if the appliance for some reason should break. Secondly most home appliances have power cords of some kind attached to them. I would like to minimise the amount of cords and wires necessary in the game setting and therefore I choose to exlude electrical appliances.

Not harmful - I don't want people to hurt themselves or others physically when interacting with the game controllers. Sharp, heavy or in other ways hasardous items will therefore not be included.

Not expensive - I want the game controllers that I will develop to be affordable for the general public. Therefore they shouldn't be too expensive.

By following this list of criteria I selected the following items from the different hardware stores:

Kitchen:
• Potato peeler
• Wine opener
• Whisk
• Grater
• Scissors
• Knife
• Fork
• Spoon
• Spatula
• Tweezers
• Sieve
• Pizza wheel /Pizza slice
• Can opener
• Cheese slice
• Slice
• Mortar
• Brush
• Glass
• Cup/Mug
• Plate
• Rolling pin
• Ladle
• Egg slice
• Nutcracker
• Egg cup

Tools:
• Screw driver
• Brush
• Wrench
• Pipe tongs
• Saw
• Folding rule
• Hammer
• Clamp/Vice
• File
• Broom
• Paint roller

Bathroom:
• Sponge
• Squirting bottle
• Toilet paper roll
• Flyswatter

Other:
• CD-cover
• Sofa pillow
• Tea candles

I will use this list for creating a survey that will map out what people have available in their homes and which items they think have potential as game controllers. Based on the results of the survey and my own judgement I will select a number of promising candidates for game controller development.

Everyday games or Homemade games?

One of the central elements of my diploma are the everyday objects. For a few days now I've been wondering whether the term everyday object gives a slightly distorted impression of what I'm actually focusing on.

A large part of the project is namely rooted in a fascination of the home made. Is it possible for people to use their own belongings as game controllers rather than buy expensive ones from the store? In this sense the term everyday object becomes slightly misleading. It is also easier to talk to people about objects they have in their homes on a general level rather than just focusing on the ones that are considered everyday. When doing surveys later on in the project I will therefore talk about objects of the home rather than everyday objects.

Basic controller setup & alternatives

Most all platform game controllers have the same button/stick layout. Usually there are 4 directional control buttons on the left side of the controller. On the right half one most often find 4 action buttons. In the center there are 2 buttons of more general nature usually used for in-game menu access and starting/pausing the game. Furthermore 2-4 shoulder-mounted buttons are common. In addition some controllers have small, analog joysticks. The described setup is common for most game console controllers available.


I was therefore rather surprised to see the relatively new learning game console for children called V.Smile. The first thing I noticed about it was that the controller seemed to be inverted. In most of the image material I found the directional controls were on the right and the action buttons on the left. This is an invesion of the common setup described above. I was rather puzzled by the reasoning behind this inversion. Why would one want to teach kids to control games using an inverted version of the common setup? Was it because most kids are right-handed that the directional controls were placed on the right?


On closer inspection however it turned out that the controller is actually constructed so that the directional and action controls can be changed or flipped physically in order to support both left- and right-handed children. To me this immediately sounds like an exellent idea. In most console games it is possible to reconfigure the controller buttons and thereby invert the controller through the software. Nevertheless I consider a physical inversion to be slightly more intuitive and user-friendly. However in order for it to work most console game controllers would have to undergo serious design changes.

Meeting with Timo

The day after meeting Simon I met up with my other project tutor Timo Arnall. The topic of the discussion centred mostly around how to define everyday objects and how to conduct a survey of peoples' opinions on and understanding of what an everyday object is.

We agreed that conducting a survey would be a suitable way of setting up a definition for what an everyday object is. The survey could possibly be undertaken in relation with different rooms and depositories in a house/apartment. What is considered an everyday object in the kitchen, living room, bedroom, hallway, toolbox, etc.? This would probably be a useful way of providing me with a range of objects on which to base the game development.

Timo was a bit worried that everyday objects might be a bit too abstract for relating game interactions to. He felt that toys have a more intuitive sense of affordance to them. I partly agree on this point. Everyday objects such as tea candles, pencils or coffee mugs might be abstract objects in relation to controlling games. On the other hand the manipulation of them is very concrete in the minds of the ones who are familiar with them. In that sense I assume that everyday objects can contribute something to the game experience despite their immediate abstract nature as game controllers.

Meeting with Simon

Last week I had a discussion with one of my tutors, Simon Clatworthy, about the focus of my project. The discussion revolved mostly around how to weigh the different aspects of the project. On the one hand there is the study of everyday objects. This study obviously relates to the development of the prototype games, but at some point along the way I will most probably touch upon game culture and social norms as well. In conclusion the prototype games that I will develop will be influenced both by the study of everyday objects as well as game culture and social norms.

We decided that a good starting point would probably be to look at spesific game objects as well as objects in general found in the home. This just to see if one could identify any differences or similarities between the two in the way they are understood and used. The question of whether it would be possible to categorise the objects in suitable game categories quickly arose. Would it i.e. be natural to put a pencil in a category of games involving swords or rackets or both?

In essence this is a discussion involving the affordances of different objects. There are evidently things one can do with a pencil or a hammer which one can't easily achieve with a tea candle or a dinner plate. In that sense the affordances of the different objects could possibly constitute the categories in which to arrange them.

The affordances of different objects is rather closely linked with what one can describe as the tangible language used when interacting with them. The following discussion on the topic revolved more or less around whether the object became irrelevant in relation to body language and tangible language. The question was essentially if the spesific object i.e. a knife or a pencil was irrelevant and the tangible language was determinant. After a while we came to agree that some sort of middle way was most likely to be the case. The object might be irrelevant when i.e. performing a pushing motion on a pencil or knife. When doing the same thing towards the rim of a coffee mug however the object becomes relevant again. Pushing on the top of a pencils we assumed most people would interpret as pushing onto something. In the case of a coffee mug the assumtion was that the interpretation would be pushing into rather than onto something.

The conclusion being that both tangible language and the physics of the object are relevant when studying and categorising them.

What's the project about?

The initial idea behind my diploma project came about when I was playing around with the idea of controlling computer games using toys as input devices. It seems to me that toys in general have something natural and intuitive to them in regards to the ways we interact with them. Manipulating a doll or an action figure is relatively easy and intuitive for most kids. On the other hand manipulating the digital representation of the same doll or action figure in a video game isn't necessarily that intuitive. I thought it would be worthwhile to try and identify some of the intuitive interaction patterns in toys and transfer them into game interaction patterns. In other words I wanted to find out if it was possible to develop an alternative game control device based on interaction patterns taken from a selected range of toys.

A natural way to start this process would probably be to create categories containing different ways of interacting with toys. The next phase would involve buliding games and controllers based on these categories. After visiting a few toy stores I grew slightly worried that there simply wouldn't be enough toy categories around for creating a broad range of game and controller prototypes. Therefore I tried to expand the initial idea to also include other objects that wasn't necessarily related to toys.

I finally landed on everyday objects as the focus for the project. Everyday objects can obviously mean a lot of different things. Depending on who you ask an everyday object can be a dinner plate, a rolling pin, a hammer, a mobile phone and possibly all of them at the same time. In this project I will primarily focus on the everyday objects that aren't digital like i.e. the mobile phone. I'm not saying mobile phone can't be used as a game controller because it certainly can. I just choose to focus on the objects one wouldn't necessarily associate with game controllers.

At the end of the project I hope to end up with a range of everyday objects with sensors mounted on them and a number of prototype games for them to control.

Greetings visitor!

This site will primarily serve as a record for the development of my diploma project in Interaction design at the Oslo School of Architecture and Design. During the course of 4,5 months I will try to update this site in a more or less continuous fashion as the project progresses. More on what's to come later...