A.X.

E
Alternative eXperience in Eating

USER STUDY REPORT

A New Dimension in Dining Experience

Capstone Project 2010-2011

Prof. Andres Wanner

Eric Tsai

Michael Mau

Tim Liu

Jessie Hsieh

Lisa Wong

What is it
Main Elements Table Interface How to Use the prototype in the Study What we aim to learn from the users

User Study Design Summary

User Feedback Events Considerations Setup Duration of the event Location of the event Event Run-through Prototype and Props Event Observations Information Sought User Study Recording Method Insights

Conclusion

What is it
Main Elements
AXE Multi Touch Interactive Tea Interface allows the users take part in an unique immersive eating environment. With the use of projectors changing the environments on the wall, calming nature sounds and a digital multi touch tea interface, we want the user to feel as engaged in the experience as possible. Taking senses, stimulating and questioning taste while holding back and manipulating sight with the changing background, is one of the main key features in conveying the experience from beginning to the end of the tea-making ceremony. The platform is raised allowing users to participate in a very Japanese-oriented tea ceremony. The three main aspects we want to cover in the overall experience is the social aspect, stimulation of taste and keeping the users mindful of what they eat. In the end, the experience piques on the idea of the juxtaposition of merging technology with tradition and culture and focus on the selfreflection of eating.

Table Interface
The table interface is the main component users interact with during the tea-making experience. The unit comprises of a projected image onto a glass table covered by frosted film, which can detect fiducials and finger gestures with the help of an infrared led and webcam. Users can navigate the interface and use it as a tool for people to adjust and control their experience. During the interaction period, users can navigate through the interface to possible tea combinations and suggestions that they may like to start with. This guides the users and caters to different people who may not have as much tea-making experience, and opens up the engagement and interaction further while still understanding the steps and progressing correctly. During this period, open discussions in the choice of tea between the tea-maker and the tea-tasters. Users may not know what flavours they particularly enjoy so without a consensus, they would rely on the teamaker to brew their own flavour. After the users partake their initial tea-flavour, the tasters will recommend adjusting tweaks such as a fruitier, minter or a sweeter tea. At this time we expect the users form and develop a social interaction with each other and understand each others tasting style and share their flavours and open a discussion talking about their feelings and senses with the rest of the users. Using the interface is a good measurement to gauge the progress of the users if they ever feel detached or confused in the experience.

How to use the prototype in the Study

In order to get the most accurate and immersed feeling, we decide to place the installation in a closed room (room 3400 SIAT Glass Box) .The interface is set up under low ambient lighting as close to actual setup conditions as possible.

What we aim to learn from the users

There were many aspects of the experience we wanted to test with users. We wanted to test if what we hypothesised would be proved or would there be some changes we needed to make in our design. Some of the questions we wanted to find out were regarding the interaction between the users and the system. Was the system open enough to allow users to explore or was it too rigid and linear? Were there any new behaviors that we had not hypothesised or previously documented? And how could this new possibility change the overall experience? We also wanted to test how easily the system was to learn and adapt. How were users able to handle errors? Was there any features or functions that were never used? Over we wanted to streamline our design and interactions for our final prototype.

User Study Design Summary

User Feedback Events
We set up the user study to be as close to a fully working prototype as possible, from the environment to the interface and even the scenarios. We set the user study groups to small groups of 2 or 3 users at a time, first we debriefed them outside the our studio lab room and then led them into the immersive environment space. From there we gave them a quick run through with one of our team members guiding the initial run. Afterwards, we got the users to try out taking the role of being the host tea-maker and serve their fellow users. After this second run, we took the users to a debriefing room where we interviewed them about the experience and any questions or concerns and then got them the fill out post-questionnaires.

Considerations
Culture We had based our research on both western and eastern eating habits. But most of our design considerations learn more towards a eastern cultural viewpoint, especially the tea ceremony. This was something that we felt needed a brief introduction to all our participants. Waiver/Consent Form As with all user studies we made the basic waiver and consent forms to all our user study participants. These waivers ensure that we are able to test our users, and use their data for our study. Target user group Our target user group would be people who are familiar with the idea of tea, but have a busy life and never had the time to do much cooking or eating with others. The users can range from young adult and up. Participants Our user testers comprised of young adults. We feel that they are familiar with digital interfaces since these people have smart phones and have used a touch system. However we want to cater to a broader range of people since people from different backgrounds and age groups would enjoy tea. Stakeholders We got in contact with a local tea shop that we were able to discuss our project with. They were highly interested in our project and the potential it could bring to people who believe they never have the time to slow down to enjoy tea. We were able to consult the tea shop for their ideas on brewing teas, flavor mixing and the qualities of tea ingredients.

Setup
Here is the set up used for the user study.

Duration of the event

We are expecting each session to be approximately 45 minutes long. The time allotment is shown below: 5 minutes briefing time 30 minutes of tea making and testing 5-10 minutes post-test questionnaire filling As the users first arrive in our installation we greeted the participants and gathered them to brief them about our project. We want a general sense and get the participants in the mindset of making tea, how the fiducials work with the interaction experience and talking about the multi-touch interface. After the participants get settled in their respective seats,

one person as a chief, the tea-maker, drives the project. We give them about 10 minutes to select the first batch of tea to brew, 5 minutes to brew. 5 minutes to taste. We expected a second batch to be made and the tasters had an opportunity to share their comments with the tea-maker to adjust and manipulate the quality of next set of brewed tea. Generally, we give them another 5 minutes to navigate their next selection. A second set of tea is brewed within 5 minutes. While the tea brewed, the tasters engaged in open discussion and conversation.

Location of the event

The location of the event was held at our school SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY on the Surrey campus location. Our team had access to a studio lab room 4300 SIAT GLASS BOX to set up our environment installation.

Event Run-through
1. Debriefing
The first step we took with our users was to bring them to a debriefing area and give them an overview of our team and project. We then explained the basics of what they are to do in this user study, we told them about the roles of both host tea-maker and guest.

2. First run eating experience

For the first run of the user study, we had our team members act as the host tea-maker for the users to be guests. The role of the users was to evaluate the experience from a more passive point of view, although being more vocal and active amongst each other and the host tea maker was highly encouraged.

3. Second run eating experience

In the second run of the user study, we got one of the users to volunteer as the role of host tea-maker. They were given no prior warning that we would have a change of roles. The users did not have any prior training for this because we wanted to see how the users would be able to adapt and learn our interface and the role of being the host.

4. Post-questionnaire
After the second run, we took all the users back outside to talk to them about how they felt about the experience. We asked them how it felt as both guests roles and host tea-maker roles. After a short interview, we got them to fill out a post-questionnaire to gather more information about the overall experience and what they thought could be changed.

Prototype and Props

For this user study, we used our latest prototype to test our full featured interface. The interface we ran for this user study was Capstone_v8.fla. For the physical components, we had installed the new lens on the web cam for better IR detection, as well as new sets of IR LED strips were also installed. New additions to the physical set up were the inclusion of our projection walls and immersive elements. We had two concave projection walls constructed around the main table area that were back projected from both sides with calming and ambient video and sound.

Event Observations
Overall this user study provided us with a lot of information on the eating experience. In comparison with our previous user study we got a lot more feedback on the users experience. From our last user study, we got a lot of feedback on our system and how there were many incongruncies that prevented people from fully understanding and using the system and interface. In our new user study, we got a lot of the previous incongruencies figured out, so now that the system and interface was smoothed out, we could focus on the users interaction, primarily inter-user interactions.

Information Sought
We mainly looked at qualitative information from our users. We looked at the over all understanding of each of the users and how well they understood the interaction and experience. The longer the user took, and more mistakes the users took to figure out the tea making process meant that we had to streamline the system more. We also looked at the reaction from the users when they had to take a turn as the host tea-maker, and how well they transitioned to the role. The host has much more intricate steps and interactions and we hoped that it would not be very difficult to adapt.

User Study Recording Method

While the users interact with our project, we left them inside the enclosed space while we took notes about anything particularly interesting. We also took pictures and video for our own reference. The videos solidified anything during the conversation and interaction that we missed and allowed us to re-adjust or enhance any issues to our interface or interaction.

Insights
During the user test we found that people were generally engaged with the projections and the table interface helped those people who made tea for the first time and for those who do not necessarily know how to make tea. The users felt very comfortable as the guests and were very enthusiastic in participating in the tea ceremony. As for the users who had to transition to becoming hosts tea-makers, they fared pretty well in learning the role from just watching our team members perform in the first run session. Some users did not like how there were parts of the table that were not as sensitive or certain fiducials would not ID correctly. These are some considerations that we will address in future interface designs implementations.

Conclusion
Our project helped us understand what people find calming and the interaction with the different aspects with design. The interactive multi touch interface, raised platform and the enclosed projections worked in unison to help engage the users in an overall experience. From this user study, we learned that our project ideas are on track for building an immersive and captivating eating experience. The users were easily able to follow the interactions both as guest and as the host tea-maker. We still have to further implement design changes that will further address fiducial sensitivity issues.