In the chapters above, simplicity has been defined through a theoretical framework and it has been discussed how these Qualities of Simplicity can be designed in the creative work of interactive media artists. I also discussed how simplicity can be experienced, using as examples well-known works of interactive media art. Next, I iterated the creation process of Climatable
and mapped out Qualities of Simplicity which were related to it. User observation into whether this works furthermore gave me data on how the work was used and understood, and user sur- veys, in the end, gave me data on how well the Simplicity Framework and the Simplicity Matrix worked.
From the earlier discussion, two different aspects or manifestations of simplicity in an artefact or a system can be observed. One is the simplicity which has been created: applied in various parts of the (interaction) design, as an actively pursued goal of the artist or the designer. The other is the perceived simplicity, a form of interaction which is expressed during the user’s experience (Landin, 2009). Here I reiterate the Qualities of Simplicity from the viewpoints of the user and the designer.
Some things keep reappearing in the design of interactive artefacts which are based on the findings of this research can be considered as simple. First of all, the formal characteristics of
the work need to be addressed by giving attention to organisation and reduction: getting rid of the clutter, providing only the things that are meaningful to the interaction process. Secondly, making sure the functionality is in place — the design focuses on preferred affordances and is tangible. Conceptual coherence is created by designing for intuition and with familiar inter- action methods, text, audio and images. All these are designed to guide the interaction process over time.
Qualities of Simplicity in Designing Interactive Art
Table 14 displays how different Qualities of Simplicity operate during the interaction process from the designer’s point of view. Different Qualities of Simplicity are thought about in different phases of the design process. Typically, every Interaction design process begins with organising data into coherent entities. Organisation is followed or paralleled with reduction of unnecessary data and information. Designing for intuition typically should start early on in the process. Intuition should get users interested in the artefact, and to try different possibilities afforded by the interface during the interactive session. This means designing elements, which invoke exploration. Familiarity should be thought afterwards, to support solutions made only with intuition in mind — the designer should think about how the exploration will be answered. The kind of feedback which is given to the user, along with the actions and behaviours of the interactive artefact should be recognisable and familiar. It is related to how different kinds of information could be used, touched, selected and navigated. Familiarity leads to tangibility as well: it is important to design, what kinds of things should be used as input methods, how navigation takes place, how user selections will be communicated. This relates to the presenta- tion, including graphical, audio and even tactile feedback: how does the visibility and audibility and the layout of the interface, for example, afford the desired interaction? Finally, the designer should use his or her knowledge to ascertain whether trust towards the system can be generat- ed — whether the interaction methods, content elements, understandability and organisation of the information are consistent, there is proper fluidity, the feedback is consistent, and the
Table 14. Designer’s timeline.
Reduction Organisation Affordances Tangibility Intuitiveness Familiarity Trust Time
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system is elegant enough.
To be able to use these features, a certain skill set is required from the designer. Although none of these is very easy to accomplish without experience and practice, some can be learned more easily than others. For example, organising information, graphics and the audio into navigable entities is a task comprising many tools and methods, such as card sorting, mind map- ping, and various types of low-fidelity prototyping. However, coming up with a solution that is perfect for everybody is often impossible — the same data can be organised in many ways. Nevertheless, the task should be something that makes sense and gives an order to things, and I feel this occurs naturally in most of the interaction processes. Reducing things already requires more thought: what is essential to the content? When is fewer options better as a solution (is
less always more)? Usually, the organisation process helps the reduction process, and after the
content reveals itself, things snap into their places and the final quantities and qualities remain. Designing things which are familiar needs a bit more practice. It is a very common mistake for designers to assume they know the skill-level, the jargon, the knowledge level, the assump- tions of the user and the context of usage. The designer has a much bigger mental picture of the system or the product than the user. Probably the designer knows much more about similar products. Familiarity can be thought of as common sense, and often user testing is done in many phases of the design process to see if the users understand how to operate a system. Somewhere between familiarity and tangibility, one can locate affordances. Somehow they are based on familiar things, but these familiarities often remain unseen or unnoticed. Affordances are possi- bilities, and not one designer can think about all the possible affordances a product or a system has. Affordances relate strongly also to the notion of tangibility: things which are grasped or touched help us to do or understand something. Choosing the right interaction method so that things are tangible requires an even higher-level knowledge from the designer. When a correct method for interacting with the content is selected, things become understandable, graspable and tangible. As with many other Interaction design duties, this is a problem where there is no certain specific answer. I also believe the designer’s experience in selecting the correct or most suitable method is crucial — however different designers might come up with different interac- tion methods.
The highest level of knowledge or expertise requires some kind of personal vision and responsibility from the designer. Building things or systems which are intuitive to use and build trust requires a strong design vision which thoroughly covers the process of a user interacting
Qualities of Simplicity in Designing Interactive Art
with the system. The designer makes decisions which in his/her opinion support the users’ in- tuition — the designer’s intuition (born with a long experience of creating, using, and observing such systems) should contain the user’s intuition. Designing for intuition differs from designing for familiarity: intuition works on a subconscious level, whereas familiar things are already recognised. Intuitive things raise curiosity, while familiar things can be easily contextualised. Along with designing for intuition comes building up trust towards the artefact. It really cannot be injected into it in a way that would guarantee it works with everyone in every situation, but certain things can be designed to increase trust of the user towards the artefact during interac- tion. Various options and different possibilities to make choices, selections and input things give the user more power and a feeling of mastering the device or system can foster trust if executed well. Exquisite elegance, attention to detail and a superb execution can make interaction more enjoyable. This offers a feeling of relaxedness which strengthens our trust towards the system (Maeda 2006).
8.2 Experienced simplicity
The users’ experienced Qualities of Simplicity have been mapped to the matrix in Table
Table 15. User’s timeline when experiencing interactive art.
Reduction Organisation Affordances Tangibility Intuitiveness Familiarity Trust Time
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8 Emerging themes
6 in chapter 6 along with the designed qualities. It is worth recalling, that the experienced qualities differ from the designed qualities: the users’ experiences will always differ from the designers’ experience. For example, when the designer reduces elements, the user experiences clarity – he or she does not know what kinds of data or what graphical worlds were originally planned.
In Table 15 different Qualities of Simplicity are mapped to the timeline of the user’s in- teraction. An interaction process begins with using intuition to start experimenting somewhere. Soon, familiar things and behaviours are observed. Familiar things lead to tangible things, which afford the possibility of interacting with the system. We learn the ways in which the In- teraction design affords us to use the work, perhaps trying out things which were not originally intended just to prove the point. After interacting with the system for a while, we start noticing how the interactive system has been organised. After this, we can notice the limits, its bounda- ries, what it contains and what has been left out, how the work has been executed, although as users we do not know all the options and possibilities which the designer has gone through. In the end trust (or distrust) is built between the system and the user, if it supports the previous mental models of the user, adding new material for the mental model to change, grow or expand — this happens both when the interaction experience is negative and positive.
I aim to address the importance of the different qualities in the construction of the experi- ence of simplicity. Here I try to step into the user’s shoes and understand how this experience happens inside the user’s head (Colborne, 2009). Tangibility operates perhaps more in the realm of pleasurability than simplicity. We like to touch and understand things, and when things are clear they seem simple. As I mentioned, tangibility can be seen as the point of contact with the object or the system, as more or less bodily understanding. However, it is also an every- day experience which operates somehow unconsciously, and under various circumstances. Fa- miliarity makes us more comfortable with a system or a product than plain tangibility. Familiar things are easier to identify than unusual things. Novel things and situations can perhaps arouse curiosity and adventurism and this can be very exciting, but it hardly adds to the experience of simplicity. Affordances take familiarity one step further, as the product or the system exhibits in its design what is possible, the users perhaps finding out new ways to operate with it.
As the product or system becomes more personal, and as the feeling of closeness increases, we can start trusting the system. Trusting a system or product leaves some responsibility for exe- cuting tasks to the product or the system, giving us more room to breathe, which helps us to feel
Qualities of Simplicity in Designing Interactive Art
that the tasks are simpler. Organisation is needed so that the system appears coherent and un- derstandable, and reduction of elements helps to clear the clutter and present the system as be- ing as simple as possible. However, affordances and familiarity, not to mention long-term trust, cannot happen without the experience of trying something out based on intuition — trusting a feeling — which was successful. Intuition works on a subconscious level, but it is born after long and serious preparation (Löwgren & Stolterman, 2004) and in an interaction process, it guides every new situation before anything else kicks in. If the design fails to support intuition, the danger is that the system is never interacted with, or is interacted with in the wrong way.