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THESIS OVERVIEW

THESIS LAUNCHING TRAILER

ITP THESIS PRESENTATION

Project Developments

Brainstorm

Tech Focus: 

AR, VR, user experience, immersive storytelling, spatial design, human-computer interaction

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Initial areas of interest:

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  • The use of Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality to increase efficiency and effectiveness for different audiences and purposes in the architectural design industry

  • Interior designers in the design of virtual and augmented spaces

  • Involving and thinking about the design of immersive virtual space, Is AR/VR a tool or a medium?

  • How AR/VR is used in industries, to discover the possible advantages and disadvantages of using them?

  • What audiences’ performance could be affected and improved by AR/VR?

  • Can you design for virtual reality?

  • Can you design in virtual reality?

  • Virtual does not mean “not real”, it means non-physical

  • VR experiences designed without attention to spatiality misses the most important opportunity of the technology

Ideation

Key Terms:

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  • Virtual Reality: a simulated experience that can be similar to or completely different from the real world. Applications of virtual reality can include entertainment (i.e. video games) and educational purposes (i.e. medical or military training). Other, distinct types of VR style technology include augmented reality and mixed reality.

  • Spatiality: any property relating to or occupying space. spatial property. property – a basic or essential attribute shared by all members of a class; “a study of the physical properties of atomic particles”

  • Emotional Response: the reaction of the body to a situation primarily given by an outer influence such as other individuals, groups, things, or entities.

  • Interactive: (of two people or things) influencing or having an effect on each other.

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 Questions to investigate :

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  • Involvement and thinking about the design of immersive virtual space, Is VR/AR a tool or a medium?

  • How to design for and in VR?

  • Can a virtual environment evoke emotional responses?

  • How and why do we make the uncomfortable as comfortable as possible?

  • What elements are the most important to impact in a virtual environment?

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Research: Scholar and Precedents

Scholar Research:

Research in scholarly articles and books about Architecture, Sensory perception, and storytelling.

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  • Kurt Lewin.[1943] “Psychology Ecology”

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Conclusion: Spatial experience is not a still affair but a live process like a river that moves but still keeps a recognizable form.

 

Quote: "Starting with a metaphor of the relationship between group life and individual life, the article really intrigues me in a lot of ways including all kinds of theories are presented in the article, the different resistances, forces, perceptions, situations, etc. The way how food habits can be influenced by so many factors, mostly depending on their environment. People act differently when they are alone, or in a group; people act differently in different places, in different cultures. People have different perceptions of what are considered as food."

 

  • Manzo, [2003] “Beyond House and Haven Toward a Revisioning of Emotional Relationships with Places”

 

Conclusion: The co-dependency between the environment and the inhabitants of it, mankind, demonstrates the possibilities of a space.

 

Quote: " “Place identity has been defined as dimensions of the self that develop in relation to the physical environment” A place becomes more than a place when the inhabitants make a connection with it, a person becomes more than a person when it encounters a space, an experience that changes his/ her mindset. For example, a theatre place is a home for the performers, a studio space is a home for the creatives, a factory is a home for the workers, a house is a home for the inhabitants, etc."

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  • Sasha Zwiebel, [2015] “Sensual Spaces: When experience meets architecture and art”

 

Conclusion: Sensory perception is deeply informed by the combination of objective properties of materials, subjective responses, and environmental context.

 

Quote: "Space is inherently embodied – to be in space one must physically, three-dimensionally, encounter it. But what would happen if the sensory, affective, embodied human was at the center of spatial design? What would space be if creating an experience was at the center? What is the role of the senses in creating these spacial experiences? How do you materially create sensory, affective and embodied space?"

Precedent Research:

Research in precedents about sensual experience, light, material, color, composition, and perception.

Concept Development

Thesis Statement :

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The Parallel is a series of VR spatial experience that explores the design of space when you are not bound by the limitations of the physical world.

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Thesis Abstract:

 

The Parallel addresses virtual reality as a new medium in designing spatial experience. Instead of using VR as a tool to recreate and replicate the existing environment, It aims to challenge and explore spatial design methods that are without the limitations of the physical world. Within each designed virtual environment, Sensory perception is deeply informed by the combination of objective properties of light, color, materials, subjective responses, and environmental context.

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Can whales fly in the sky? Can you walk on the ocean? The world of Surrealism utilizes the irrational juxtaposition of images to stimulate the imagination; Seeing something so huge yet so light, so solid yet so soft, the world of Lightness will bring you the experience of being easy with pressure and force, gentle and delicate in movement and cheerful in heart; When seemingly walking down the staircases, you enter a door that only takes you back to the top. In the world of Displacement, there is no such thing as a linear journey; For every move you make, you will not be able to distinguish if you are walking on the black tiled ground or a gap down to the abyss. In the world of Perception, you are constantly confused and disoriented by the surrounding environment; How do you inspire texture in a world where there is no touch? The light, color, movement, and viscosity of objects in space will submerge you into the world of texture; Falling from the sky down into this field of spikes, the world of force puts you on a single path of encountering danger with no consequence.

 

The nuance between reality and fantasy fosters a constant complimentary that exists and transmits the experience so that the viewers envision it for themselves. The core of this project is to explore and articulate the possibilities in the design of space with virtual reality technology.

User Experience

1. As the beginning of the Parallel journey, the Palace of the Parallel is the center hub that connects all six worlds delivering six different sensual experiences. Explorers will be placed at the entrance of the palace as the experience begins and guided to walk inside and choose one of the portals that can teleport them to one of the six worlds. All six identical portals are being located along the perimeter of the center pool so that explorers will not know which world they are entering. ​

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2. After being randomly assigned to one of the six worlds, users will be guided by sound and visual to find the glow orbit to escape back to the Palace of the Parallel to continue other experiences.

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  • World of Surrealism: Explorers will be wandering and floating around against normal gravity and eventually reach the bottom of the ocean floor. They will see whales flying in the air instead of the ocean, rain going up instead of falling and sky made out of water instead of clouds, immersed in this dream-like and extraordinary scenery with limitless surprises and imagination.

  • World of Lightness: The world is vibrant, colorful, soft, and active, the explores will be wandering in this joyful wonderland, walking on the clouds feeling like it is that cotton candy dream they had when they were a child,  just with a lot of extra lightness.

  • World of Displacement: In this monochromatic world full of stairs, the explorers will be placed at a beginning of a staircase and guided to walk down to enter a portal door at the end that will only take them to one of the other stairs. The repetitive motion, infinite scale, and endless destination will make them frustrated.

  • World of Perception: Being placed at the beginning of a tunnel, explorers will proceed to walk down the Unsettling and reflective environment. They will feel disoriented and having the doubt in every step they make along the way.

  • World of Texture: Being dropped into space with viscous creatures growing out from the ground and the sky unstoppably, the explorers can not do anything but to be submerged in this explosion of texture.

  • World of Force: A world of deadly dangerous forces are coming towards them the moment when the explores fall from the sky down into this field of spiky crystals. Along with the intense and harsh atmospheric sound, the explores will be falling down into a single path with no return,

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Design Development: Spatial Design & 3D Modeling

Main level:  The Palace of the Parallel

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As the beginning of the Parallel journey, the Palace of the Parallel is the central hub that connects all six worlds delivering six different sensual experiences. Explorers will be placed at the entrance of the palace as the experience begins and guided to walk inside and choose one of the portals that can teleport them to one of the six worlds. All six identical portals are being located along the perimeter of the center pool so that explorers will not know which world they are entering.

An all-white palace stands alone in the center of an isolated iceberg, the palace of the Pratellel resembles a sacred, sublime and epic quality through designing with:

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  • Grand in size

  • Minimal in color

  • Symmetrical in form

  • Theatrical in experience

Secondary Level: World of Surrealism

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Can whales fly in the sky? Can you walk on the ocean? The world of Surrealism utilizes the irrational juxtaposition of images to stimulate the imagination.

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  • Mysterious in lighting

  • Unusual in Gravity

  • Tranquil in color

  • Gentle in movement

  • Surreal in content

Secondary Level: World of Lightness

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Seeing something so huge yet so light, so solid yet so soft, the world of Lightness will bring you the experience of being easy with pressure and force, gentle and delicate in movement and cheerful in heart.

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  • Grand in size

  • Bright and vibrant in color

  • Light and cheerful in movement

  • Soft in form

Secondary Level: World of Displacement

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When seemingly walking down the staircases, you enter a door that only takes you back to the top. In the world of Displacement, there is no such thing as a linear journey.

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  • Repetitive in form

  • Dark and mysterious in color

  • Non-linear in movement

  • Constraint in space

Secondary Level: World of Perception​

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For every move you make, you will not be able to distinguish if you are walking on black tiled ground or a gap down to the abyss. In the world of Perception, you are constantly confused and disoriented by the surrounding environment.

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  • Repetitive in form

  • Disorienting and reflective  in color

  • Linear in movement

  • Uncertain in space

Secondary Level: World of Texture

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How do you inspire texture in a world where there is no touch? The light, color, movement and viscosity of objects in space will submerge you into the world of texture.

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  • Repetitive in form

  • Blent and thick in color

  • Fluid in movement

  • Viscosity in content

Secondary Level: World of Force

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Falling from the sky down into this field of spikes, the world of force puts you on a single path of encountering danger with no consequence.

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  • Sharp in form

  • Heavy in color

  • Urgent in movement

  • Discomfort in content

Unreal Engine VR Development

All worlds were visualized, simulated, and launched in Virtual Reality with Unreal Engine 4. Each world has its own environmental music composed in collaboration with composer Sachiko Nakajima.

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  • Locomotion

  • Gravity

  • Shader

  • PBR material

  • Teleportation

  • Interaction Blueprint

  • Particle system

  • Niagra system

  • Level Design

  • Animation

  • Cinematic

Launching Film

Multiple versions of the titles were modeled and then animated in Unreal Engine

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Each world has its own environmental music composed in collaboration with composer Sachiko Nakajima.

Play Test

The project was distributed and playtested as a first-person perspective computer game due to the pandemic.

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Couple iteration were made after user feedback in

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  • Environmental sound was added in collaboration with composer Sachiko Nakajima.

  • Spatial sound was added as an indicator for user experience elements and guidance.

  • Suggestions in level design: Better connect all different worlds and levels as a cohesive story.

  • The speed and pace of simulation in couple levels

  • Change in light contrast in couple levels

Documentation

The entire project is documented as a book for the archive.

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