WIKA: A Projected Augmented Reality Workbench for Interactive Kinetic Art (IKA)

WIKA is a projected AR workbench that allows non-experts to create IKA in the form of a layered picture frame (IKPF). It supports STEAM education through an iterative prototyping including design, programming, simulation, and making in a single workspace.

Article | Spring 2021

Interactive kinetic art (IKA) is commonly created by makers and an excellent means of the STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts, and Mathematics) education. IKA incorporates movement and interactivity. It changes according to human behavior and the environment using sensors and motors. In the creation process of IKA, it is necessary to consider engineering, computational, and artistic aspects altogether. It is difficult to design and make IKA for non-experts unfamiliar with engineering, programming, artistic exploration, and hardware creation.

One of the most challenging aspects of creating IKA for non-experts is dealing with various elements, such as physical I/O components, programming interactivity and mechanical parts during the creative exploration. Many tools and workflows scattered around physical and digital environments increase the difficulty of creation. After designing and simulating prototypes in digital environments, unexpected problems are often found in physical environments. The gap between physical and digital environments causes users spend substantial time finding and resolving problems.

 

In order to bridge this gap, a research team led by Prof. Tek-Jin Nam from the Department of Industrial Design presents WIKA (Workbench for Interactive Kinetic Art, Figure 1a), an integrated environment that offers a whole creation process and elements of IKA. It allows non-expert users to create IKA in the form of a layered picture frame with iterative trial-and-error process. The team adopted a tangible interface and projected Augmented Reality (AR) to support the whole creation process for non-experts and to minimize the gap between the physical and digital environment. They used a mobile device to bridge the workflow between the user and the system and to support the interface according to the situation. The sensor value, motor speed, logical relation, and simulated linkage mechanism are overlaid onto the corresponding hardware. This method enables defining, modifying, and testing the logical relation between sensors and actuators in the workspace. Physical components are involved from the beginning of the creation process. AR plates connect the physical components and system. WIKA was published in the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST) in October 2020 (https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3379337.3415880).