Abstract (Short paper)

Keywords: Digital puppetry, remediation, theatre, Interactive Virtual Worlds, agency, aesthetic experience, co-authorship, interactive storytelling, perceptual computing, motion-sensing.

By drawing parallels from theatre, this paper examines new paradigms in interaction models for the viewer (user) of interactive virtual worlds. Studying the changes in the aesthetic experience of the viewer from theatre to cinema to interactive virtual worlds, changing dynamics of the author-viewer relationship across these media are highlighted. Agency of both, the author and the viewer are discussed, establishing a case for exploring interaction models based on ideas of co-authorship. Puppetree, a digital puppetry platform, has been developed as means to develop the ideas of co-authorship, taking inspiration from the position and agency of a traditional puppeteer. The platform is built with Intel’s perceptual computing that uses a motion sensing technology to detect a user’s hand and translate the movement to a puppet in a 3D environment. The direct handcontrol allows the user to experience the virtual environment as an extension of his immediate physical reality vs. immersing into an environment as an avatar. Exploring narrative structures that shape user-experience in such environments is in further scope of this work which requires an understanding of the logic of interactive storytelling in digital media.

• Priyanka Borar, New Media Design, National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, India. Born 1987. MSc.(Tech.)Information Systems, Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani, India, 2009. M.Des New Media Design, National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, India, 2014.
  Awarded Pioneer award, Intel Perceptual Computing challenge, 2013. Published on Intel® RealSense™ Blog Series. Guest Faculty for New Media, National School of Drama, Delhi, India, December, 2014. Priyanka is interested in playing with technology and bending it to discover new forms of expression. Her works are driven to find new meanings at the known boundaries of human-computer interactions. As a New Media artist, her practice is focused at understanding our relationship with the environment and investigating technology’s influence on our perception of it. She enjoys sketching as much as she likes to fiddle with code. She believes in connecting the knowledge of the old with the capacity of the new.

Full text (PDF) p. 464-467