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A Conversation About Fantasy User Interfaces

89 points by bootload 10y ago

ta834939874 10y ago
reddit has a sub for this community at reddit.com/r/fui
yxlx 10y ago
Very good article. I also enjoyed the inclusion of a demo reel to break it up a bit so it's not all just text.
firasd 10y ago
Great article. One recent example I liked: the latest Mission Impossible had displays in fabrics, which I thought was a good alternative to smartwatches https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CYKRTPmUAAAh7bz.png:large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CYKRTPmUAAAh7bz.png:large
- jschwartzi 10y ago
  Yeah, I think having a display that isn't obviously part of your outfit will be a really big enabler of wearable technologies. That and flexible printed circuits that can survive dry cleaning or a washing machine. One of the reasons Glass failed was because it was about as in-your-face as possible. Resistive screens also failed in the same sense because having to pull a stylus out to use your phone is aggressively technological. In contrast, touch is a really casual interface, and though the touch UIs that I've used all had warts it was at least possible for anyone to grasp the basic mechanics of the interface. In my mind a wearable device that is obviously a wearable device isn't going to be as successful as clothing that monitors your heart rate or SpO2 because you have to consciously interact with the device. If you fill your gym bag with smart clothes then you just wear them like you would wear gym clothes.
  - firasd 10y ago
    Yeah. The way I think of this is, let's start from (my subjective) aesthetic first principles. Take an abstract human body, and look at its poses and movements: standing, sitting (and other forms of resting), walking, running. A smartphone is a complete failure from that perspective: looking down and pecking at a screen? No way. Now, holding and looking at something is a natural enough movement, but chronically craning your neck down with such focus and duration? I doubt it. A smartwatch is a bit more natural, but to bring up subjective aesthetics again, I'm not too comfortable with the concept of adults wearing digital watches. Google Glass was a step in the right direction in my opinion--you can interact with a UI while looking straight ahead--but as you said, the camera and other aspects weirded people out (there may be a future in contact lenses with similar tech?) Voice interfaces like Alexa are definitely in line with my view.
    - mpbm 10y ago
      I don't think it's about the pose. It's about attention. To interact with a system we have to focus on it and that means we have to take our focus off of everything else. Computers are notoriously bad at understanding us if we aren't focused on them exclusively. That's why so many people are trying to get voice interaction right. It's the most natural way to split our attention. A lot of this IoT nonsense is trying to discover a few corner cases where computers can do sensible things without a human needing to specifically focus on them. Like automatically reordering cereal, or unlocking your phone when you get close, or adjusting the temperature when you leave the house.
  - PhasmaFelis 10y ago
    > Resistive screens also failed in the same sense because having to pull a stylus out to use your phone is aggressively technological. Resistive screens worked fine with fingertips, too. In fact they worked perfectly well with gloves, pens, etc., unlike modern capacitive screens. They failed because they were less sensitive and less accurate.
- TeMPOraL 10y ago
  Continuum (TV series) did that too, and I loved that. See some examples of protagonist's police suit: https://vimeo.com/64120587 https://vimeo.com/64120587 My favourite feature - changing colors.
Animats 10y ago
In VR, you can simulate any fantasy user interface. Have any good ones appeared from the Oculus Rift / Vive crowd yet? Yes, Tilt Brush.
- eprime 10y ago
  I enjoyed looking at some of the interfaces developed to interact with scripts in SecondLife - often they had animations that hooked into the avatar to perform, to give feedback. However most appeared to draw their inspiration from cyberpunk, rather than science fiction or showing new interfaces.
EGreg 10y ago
I think movies with "real" futuristic interfaces would be boring. For example the Minority Report movie with wifi would have none of the disks being inserted. Playback would happen in people's heads. Nothing would really be moving. Also, Tom Cruise wouldn't be able to just go back to his base and still get in. Also, they wouldn't make such silly mistakes letting "the hero" have so much leeway. He'd just be quickly captured and that's it.
- mpbm 10y ago
  Yeah, the first thing to go in a good story is good security. Security is designed to make sure nothing interesting ever happens. At best it slows everything down and at worst it just outright forbids everything. That's poison to a narrative.
mpbm 10y ago
Great interview. The thought that stands out for me is the repeated assertion that fantasy UIs must serve the narrative first. That's analogous to the way a lot of people design UIs for real products in that they tell "user stories." However, there will always be tension between that narrative-first approach and the real world where narratives don't exist. A real user, trying to use a real interface, just needs it to work. There's no audience, no dramatic tension, no character arc, etc. It just serves their needs in the moment or it doesn't. In a story, the fantasy UI really is a pixel-deep metaphor substituting for the technological capabilities available to the characters. "Access denied" isn't really an interface, it's a visual way to communicate a complex plot point, just like all of the other crafted visuals in the movie. Nobody ever has to puzzle over a bad interface for the same reason nobody ever has to go to the bathroom. But real UIs are more than one pixel deep. They're the Rosetta stone that translates between human thought and machine logic. So when Minority Report makes up a gesture-based interface it's because they have to show the audience something plausible that they've never seen before. However, when a designer makes a real gesture-based interface it's because there's something their users can't do with the interface they're used to.
- wtbob 10y ago
  > However, when a designer makes a real gesture-based interface it's because there's something their users can't do with the interface they're used to. You're right when the designer is good. A bad designer might make a real gesture-based interface just because he saw Minority Report and thought that it was cool.
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    There aren't many good designers working today (or maybe their work is being hindered in companies). If you look at contemporary UIs, they're shallow. Optimized for looking nice and selling things, instead of being ergonomic and giving users efficient ways to achieve their goals.
  - mpbm 10y ago
    Haha, yeah, I actually rewrote that sentence a couple times because I was trying to phrase it in a way that wasn't wrong, but also got me out of having to address tangential topics like exploration, creativity, and art.
laughinghan 10y ago
This is an interesting take on fantasy UIs. I'm even more interested, though, in truly visionary interfaces that make these handwavy, holo-touchscreeny UIs seem timid by comparison: http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesign/ http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesi...

89 points by bootload 10y ago

ta834939874 10y ago

reddit has a sub for this community at reddit.com/r/fui

yxlx 10y ago

Very good article. I also enjoyed the inclusion of a demo reel to break it up a bit so it's not all just text.

firasd 10y ago

Great article. One recent example I liked: the latest Mission Impossible had displays in fabrics, which I thought was a good alternative to smartwatches https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CYKRTPmUAAAh7bz.png:large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CYKRTPmUAAAh7bz.png:large

jschwartzi 10y ago
Yeah, I think having a display that isn't obviously part of your outfit will be a really big enabler of wearable technologies. That and flexible printed circuits that can survive dry cleaning or a washing machine. One of the reasons Glass failed was because it was about as in-your-face as possible. Resistive screens also failed in the same sense because having to pull a stylus out to use your phone is aggressively technological. In contrast, touch is a really casual interface, and though the touch UIs that I've used all had warts it was at least possible for anyone to grasp the basic mechanics of the interface. In my mind a wearable device that is obviously a wearable device isn't going to be as successful as clothing that monitors your heart rate or SpO2 because you have to consciously interact with the device. If you fill your gym bag with smart clothes then you just wear them like you would wear gym clothes.
- firasd 10y ago
  Yeah. The way I think of this is, let's start from (my subjective) aesthetic first principles. Take an abstract human body, and look at its poses and movements: standing, sitting (and other forms of resting), walking, running. A smartphone is a complete failure from that perspective: looking down and pecking at a screen? No way. Now, holding and looking at something is a natural enough movement, but chronically craning your neck down with such focus and duration? I doubt it. A smartwatch is a bit more natural, but to bring up subjective aesthetics again, I'm not too comfortable with the concept of adults wearing digital watches. Google Glass was a step in the right direction in my opinion--you can interact with a UI while looking straight ahead--but as you said, the camera and other aspects weirded people out (there may be a future in contact lenses with similar tech?) Voice interfaces like Alexa are definitely in line with my view.
  - mpbm 10y ago
    I don't think it's about the pose. It's about attention. To interact with a system we have to focus on it and that means we have to take our focus off of everything else. Computers are notoriously bad at understanding us if we aren't focused on them exclusively. That's why so many people are trying to get voice interaction right. It's the most natural way to split our attention. A lot of this IoT nonsense is trying to discover a few corner cases where computers can do sensible things without a human needing to specifically focus on them. Like automatically reordering cereal, or unlocking your phone when you get close, or adjusting the temperature when you leave the house.
- PhasmaFelis 10y ago
  > Resistive screens also failed in the same sense because having to pull a stylus out to use your phone is aggressively technological. Resistive screens worked fine with fingertips, too. In fact they worked perfectly well with gloves, pens, etc., unlike modern capacitive screens. They failed because they were less sensitive and less accurate.
TeMPOraL 10y ago
Continuum (TV series) did that too, and I loved that. See some examples of protagonist's police suit: https://vimeo.com/64120587 https://vimeo.com/64120587 My favourite feature - changing colors.

Animats 10y ago

In VR, you can simulate any fantasy user interface. Have any good ones appeared from the Oculus Rift / Vive crowd yet? Yes, Tilt Brush.

eprime 10y ago
I enjoyed looking at some of the interfaces developed to interact with scripts in SecondLife - often they had animations that hooked into the avatar to perform, to give feedback. However most appeared to draw their inspiration from cyberpunk, rather than science fiction or showing new interfaces.

EGreg 10y ago

I think movies with "real" futuristic interfaces would be boring. For example the Minority Report movie with wifi would have none of the disks being inserted. Playback would happen in people's heads. Nothing would really be moving. Also, Tom Cruise wouldn't be able to just go back to his base and still get in. Also, they wouldn't make such silly mistakes letting "the hero" have so much leeway. He'd just be quickly captured and that's it.

mpbm 10y ago
Yeah, the first thing to go in a good story is good security. Security is designed to make sure nothing interesting ever happens. At best it slows everything down and at worst it just outright forbids everything. That's poison to a narrative.

mpbm 10y ago

Great interview. The thought that stands out for me is the repeated assertion that fantasy UIs must serve the narrative first. That's analogous to the way a lot of people design UIs for real products in that they tell "user stories." However, there will always be tension between that narrative-first approach and the real world where narratives don't exist. A real user, trying to use a real interface, just needs it to work. There's no audience, no dramatic tension, no character arc, etc. It just serves their needs in the moment or it doesn't. In a story, the fantasy UI really is a pixel-deep metaphor substituting for the technological capabilities available to the characters. "Access denied" isn't really an interface, it's a visual way to communicate a complex plot point, just like all of the other crafted visuals in the movie. Nobody ever has to puzzle over a bad interface for the same reason nobody ever has to go to the bathroom. But real UIs are more than one pixel deep. They're the Rosetta stone that translates between human thought and machine logic. So when Minority Report makes up a gesture-based interface it's because they have to show the audience something plausible that they've never seen before. However, when a designer makes a real gesture-based interface it's because there's something their users can't do with the interface they're used to.

wtbob 10y ago
> However, when a designer makes a real gesture-based interface it's because there's something their users can't do with the interface they're used to. You're right when the designer is good. A bad designer might make a real gesture-based interface just because he saw Minority Report and thought that it was cool.
- TeMPOraL 10y ago
  There aren't many good designers working today (or maybe their work is being hindered in companies). If you look at contemporary UIs, they're shallow. Optimized for looking nice and selling things, instead of being ergonomic and giving users efficient ways to achieve their goals.
- mpbm 10y ago
  Haha, yeah, I actually rewrote that sentence a couple times because I was trying to phrase it in a way that wasn't wrong, but also got me out of having to address tangential topics like exploration, creativity, and art.

laughinghan 10y ago

This is an interesting take on fantasy UIs. I'm even more interested, though, in truly visionary interfaces that make these handwavy, holo-touchscreeny UIs seem timid by comparison: http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesign/ http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesi...