Analysis

What is your piece communicating?

Who are you communicating to/with? (Yourself, someone in particular, a group of people, an animal, the computer, etc.)

I don’t have a specific audience in mind for this piece. Anyone who puts it on above a certain age level and with sufficient English proficiency can engage with it. This story is not well-known.

How does your piece communicate? What tools (gesture, color, text, audio, LEDs, movement, etc.) are you using to communicate your message?

The piece communites visually, through the interactive slides, plus through touch, with the pillow inflating.

What is the desired reaction you are aiming for with this piece?

I’m aiming for intrigue, and engagement—people who never would have expected to care about air quality become engaged with the project and start thinking about the topic.

How did what you aimed to communicate change over the process?

At the beginning, I was focused on the London story, but through playtesting, many participants haven’t been to London and the story didn’t resonate as much. I added connections to New York City, such as through congestion pricing, to make the story more local.

Discuss what your piece communicates to the outside world other than your target audience. Try to step outside yourself for this exercise.

The piece is subdued, funky, and looks slightly medical from the outside—many people compared the physical design to a blood pressure cuff, plus it has silicone tubing entering it.

If you saw someone wearing your piece, what would you think? What draws your eye first?

1. What are they seeing in VR? (the eternal question for VR installations)
2. What’s around their neck? Is it moving?

What senses does your piece activate in those around you? (Sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch)

There’s noise from the motors, though it was far less audible in the show environment. It’s primarily the visual.

How might you utilize an additional sensory modality to improve how your piece communicates?

I would love to have added sound: ships coming up the Thames, factory noise, traffic & chaos in the smog, but I didn’t have the time to source the sounds & consider the equipment. (The Meta Quest’s speakers don’t isolate people well in a crowded environment.) Having headphones on would have better isolated viewers into this world, and the sounds could place them in time.