ABSTRACT

This dissertation investigates whether superimposing physical and digital media to create new interfaces for CAD has merit. Findings are presented from experiments performed with Illuminating Clay, a prototype interface that superimposes modeling clay and computer-based topographic analysis. The objective was to discover whether these new kinds of interfaces could successfully combine the cognitive, motor, and emotional advantages of physical media with the capabilities of computation. Findings indicate that Illuminating Clay can indeed supplement a designer's eyeball analysis with more-accurate feedback while retaining the tactile and spatial advantages of working with a physical material. Salient issues pertaining to the design of tangible, and augmented-reality user interfaces were raised by these experiments: what the appropriate scale limitations should be, what the appropriate type of feedback is from computation, and whether real-time feedback is necessary.

TABLE OF CONTENTS (pdfs)

FRONT MATERIALS

Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION

Chapter 2: THE PRACTICE: VISION VS. REALITY

Chapter 3: A MEDIUM OF EXPRESSION

Chapter 4: QUALITIES OF PHYSICAL MEDIA COMPARED WITH DIGITAL MEDIA

Chapter 5:   THE EXPERIENCE OF A PHYSICAL MEDIUM

Chapter 6: SUPERIMPOSING

Chapter 7: RELATED PROTOTYPES

Chapter 8: EXPERIMENTS WITH A NEW PROTOTYPE: ILLUMINATING CLAY

Chapter 9: PROTOCOL ANALYSIS: THE FINDINGS

Chapter 10: CONCLUSIONS

NOTES

BIBLIOGRAPHY