RolyPoly (Design Incubation Centre NYS 2011)

"RolyPoly is a networked installation designed to enable two individuals to 'sense' the presence of each other, even though they may be physically apart." The interaction of RolyPoly is simple and emotional. When one "egg" is tilted in one direction, the remote egg also leans synchronously and simultaneously.

Food Media | Food Teleportation (Wei et al 2011)

"The Food Teleportation system enables users to share their emotions and feelings by designing, and teleporting different food messages globally through the proposed network. Furthermore, the communication architecture is designed as an interoperable platform to attach any system which uses food as the medium by designing standardized protocol. The food messages can either be designed layer by layer to convey a story to the recipient or the properties of designed food message like taste, facilitate recipients to experience the meaning by consuming it. Thus this research may further fertilize several domains such as digital storytelling, communication, as well as social networking."


Reference: Jun Wei, Roshan Lalintha Peiris, Jeffrey Tzu Kwan Valino Koh et al. (2011) Food Media: exploring interactive entertainment over telepresent dinner
26:1--26:8. In Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Advances in Computer Entertainment Technology.
http://137.132.145.178/page/food-media

Callo Robot (Yim et al 2011)

Callo Robot on Youtube:
#1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEPLJPRARY8
#2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCkm2LGrULY
#3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_h05f6nWmo8
#4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuU_HB4_Uck

Callo is a telepresence robot combined with mobile phone. It makes user defined dancing motion when receiving a phone call, or other expressive facial animation and body motion to express emoticons in a text message. It can also recognize caller's hands motion and represent it to the remote receiver.

Reference:
Yim, J., Shaw, C. D. 2011 Design Considerations of Expressive Bidirectional Telepresence Robots. In CHI 2011
http://www.gizmag.com/cellphone-robots-relay-users-movements/15078/

Touch Trace Mirror (by Schmeer et al 2011)

"Touch Trace Mirror" is a mirror which enables leaving a message on a steamy bethroom mirror over a distance. It is a set of two bethroom mirrors, one to be placed in each partners apartment. Writing a message on one mirror will result in the message being sent to the partners mirror, where a light will emerge on the mirrors surface. If the partner places a finger on the light, it will move, letting the partner trace the message that his or her loved one wrote.

Reference: Schmeer, J., Baffi, T. 2011. Touch Trace Mirrir: Asynchronous, Collaborative Messaging as a Concept for Creating a Relatedness Experience. In TEI'11

VideoPal (by Du et al & Microsoft Research 2011)

 

VideoPal is a novel video based asynchronous communication system. Like Pen Pal, VideoPal is designed for children using multi-media video to extend their international friendships.

Reference: Du, H. et al. 2011. VideoPal: An Asynchronous Video Based Communication System to Connect Children from US and Greece. In CSCW 2011.
Inkpen, K., Du, H., Roseway, A., Hoff, A., Johns, P. 2012. Video Kids: Augmenting Close Friendships with Asynchronous Video Conversations in VideoPal.
http://research.microsoft.com/apps/pubs/default.aspx?id=141717

StoryVisit (by Raffle et al 2011)

"StoryVisit allows children and long-distance adults to experience a sense of togetherness by reading children’s story books together over a distance. StoryVisit combines video conferencing and connected books: remote grown-up and child readers can see and hear each other, and can also see and control the same e-book."


Reference:
Hayes Raffle et al. Hello, is Grandma there? Let's Read! StoryVisit: Family Video Chat and Connected E-Books. CHI 2011.
http://www.hayesraffle.com/categories/interaction-design/feed

Magic Sock Drawer (by Gooch and Watts 2011)

The Magic Sock Drawer allws close friends to send drawn or typed digital notes one another which are then automatically printed at the other end. The note can then be hidden to create a pleasant surprise for the author’s partner when the note is discovered. The MSD consists of two devices where each device is made up of a tablet PC and a mini printer. Installed on each PC is some custom software which allows participants to create either free hand, typed or combined notes. The free-form interface allows notes to be created using the tablet-pen meaning that people can write and draw whatever they like on the note. The note will be printed out on credit-card sized glossy paper which are also stickers.

Reference: Gooch, D., Watts, L. 2011. The Magic Sock Drawer Project. In CHI 2011
http://danielgooch.synology.me/lddr.html

CoupleVIBE (Bales et al 2011)

 "In CoupleVIBE, when a user arrives at or departs from a frequented location, her partner automatically receives a vibrotactile message on his mobile phone [...] CoupleVIBE's visual interface is basic, consisting of just two screens, the status screen and the vibration assignment screen. A user tags a location [... and] is asked to give a name to the location [...] the user's partner selects a vibrotactile message to identify the location.

Reference: Bales, E. et al. 2011 CoupleVIBE: Mobile Implicit Communication to Improve Awareness for (Long-Distance) Couples. In CSCW 2011

CoDine (Wei et al 2011)

 

CoDine is an interaction concept with some prototyped parts to explore the experience of dining together over distance. In its concept," [u]sing the CoDine system, they can interact through the tangible dinnerware, together with the edible food [...] CoDine system allows one table surface to reflect and respond to the dining activity at a distant location, supporting video conferencing, gesture interaction, food derving, fabric display sharing, and food gifting to facilitate the natural and affective communication between two connected house-holds."

Reference: Wei, J. et al. 2011 CoDine: An Interactive Multi-sensory System for Remote Dining. In UbiComp'11

Lover's Box (by Thieme et al, 2011)

 

Lover's box is a digital artefact designed to engage romantic couples in reflections on their relationship. It enables couples to record romantic messages (video message) for each other. Each Lover's Box contains two halves, connect by brass hinges, that open like a story book to reveal an integrated RFID reader and display screen hidden inside the box. This box can only be opened with an RFID tagged key. Once unlocked, the RFID tag triggers a pre-recorded video message stored thin the box.

 

Source: Thieme, A., Wallace, J., Thomas, J., Chen, K. L., Krämer, N., Olivier, P. 2011 Lover's box: Designing for reflection within romantic relationships. In International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, Volume 69 Issue 5, Academic Press, 283-297

http://homepages.cs.ncl.ac.uk/anja.thieme/lovers.html