IxD — AR Scavenger Hunt Reflection

Going into the scavenger hunt project, I didn’t know what to expect. Initially, I was under the impression that each group would be working in a slightly more isolated way. I was also curious how well communication would go and how work would be divided. These things slightly unsettled me until we all discussed the project both as a group and as a class.

Our first Aero experience for a piece called “Square Dance” was a learning experience. As a group, we knew roughly what we wanted to do. When it came to executing the plan, we had to play around with file formats in order to keep our Aero file size down. I made it clear to my group that we needed to use vectorized graphics, which would provide infinite scalability but most importantly compact data size. Learning Aero and communicating with my group on this all went very smoothly, and we were all very satisfied with the result.

Our second Aero experience for a portrait in the Intersections on Main Street exhibit was a bit more challenging due to the unique space. We went through about 3 possible ideas for our experience. One involved the user flipping through a book of photos to find the image trigger, taking advantage of the space’s allowance for users to touch objects. However Aero’s limitations didn’t allow us to make it clear enough to the user where they were looking. We decided to have the image trigger be a framed portrait in the space, requiring a bit of searching and exploring. My group felt this element of exploration was important as to draw attention to the history and local relevance of the exhibit, one that may be overlooked at times.

I am very satisfied with this project. The communication between my group members and I as well as with the greater class collective went surprisingly well. What seemed like a daunting task became a very easy, flowing and shockingly organized one. I am certain our entire project fit in very well at the Arts and Draughts event.