Preliminary version

1st  EUROPEAN WORKSHOP

on

DESIGN AND SEMANTICS OF FORM AND MOVEMENT (DeSForM)

Newcastle upon Tyne

Nov. 11 2005

NEW: CALL FOR PAPERS DeSForM 2006 www.desform2006.id.tue.nl/

SCOPE AND FOCUS

Forms, either concrete or abstract, always carry meanings.  It is the responsibility of designers to make good use of these meanings, for example, to make products beautiful, to stress the importance of certain values, or to improve a product's ease of use and to promote or negotiate enriched experiences between people (communities) and people, people and objects and in time between objects (systems of objects) and objects.  Design uses its own languages for this purpose, just as poets, painters, journalists, sculptures, film makes and so on do. The topic of this conference is how to explore, study and exploit the combined usage of form, colour and behaviour as a design language. The conference will include presentations, debate and workshop that look for new ways of exploring behaviour, not separately, but in relation to traditional forms.

The vision of ambient intelligence as put forward by Weiser and adopted by ISTAG and many companies and universities, forms the basis of considerable R&D efforts.  The central theme is that powerful computation, communication and storage facilities are available, but are invisible. In Marzano's "La Casa Prossima Futura" the black boxes have disappeared and the living room contains objects and furniture, again. Then if the traditional terminals disappear, what are the mediators between people and this hidden intelligence? How do people control, and get feedback from, these resources in a way that is meaningful and even attractive at a human level.

The conference builds on the assumption that objects will play an important role as mediators.  To take full advantage of the richness of human-object interaction and to use the potential of affective (emotional) interactions, there is a need for a new approach. Although many traditional products, even products which do have mechanically moving parts, follow a trend to converge with computing, this convergence comes in the form of electronic displays and buttons being added to traditional forms. As an alternative it is worthwhile to explore adding behavioral expression to the existing movement possibilities. There is a need for new types of processes and tools to support the creation of the envisaged new product types. Product behaviour will be enriched with physical movements. Several possibilities exist: either the product is moving anyhow, or the movements are added just for the sake of communication. In both cases, the designer has considerable freedom to shape the movements and the interactions.

Conversely, developments in computing are not only a source of new challenges, they also offer new options for addressing long-standing problems in product semantics. For example exploiting the insights gained in programming language semantics. New computerised tools may support the systematic exploration of semantics. Also, the developments in information storage and retrieval such as the Internet and the world-wide web offer new opportunities for collecting and unlocking design knowledge relevant to product semantics. This workshop seeks to bring together researchers in the field of design and semantics of forms and movement to exchange results, show demonstrations and discuss the way ahead.

ACTIVITIES

· Demonstrations

· Keynote lecture

· Long paper presentations

· Short paper presentations

VENUE

The workshop will be in Newcastle with the support of the Regional Development Agency, One NorthEast, Codeworks, as a part of an ambitious Regional Design Strategy with Northumbria University, also located in Newcastle. The workshop will be held in the amazing Baltic Centre on the banks of the Tyne. The Baltic Centre is the latest evidence of the area's growing cultural strength. Sitting in the shadow of the historic Tyne Bridge and the Millennium Eye Bridge, the towering Baltic is an international contemporary arts gallery and is the biggest such venue outside of London.

***** CALL FOR PAPERS *****

Submission Deadline: 5 September 2005

**** CALL FOR DEMONSTRATOR PROPOSALS ****

Submission Deadline: 5 September 2005

The workshop will take one full day. There will be room for 10 long and 10 short papers. It is planned to have the workshop proceedings published as a volume of Springer Verlag Lecture Notes in Computer Science under the auspices of IFIP (Feijs, Kyffin, Young Eds.) Long papers are max 20 pages, short papers are max 5 pages. Please check your calendar for this important conference.

ACADEMIC SPONSORS

The academic sponsors of the event include the International Federation of Information Processing, Working Group 16.3 (IFIP WG16.3) and the Design Research Society (DRS). DRS have offered to pay the travel costs and split the fees with the conference organisers for up to three postgrads from outside Newcastle who can demonstrate (by sending the DRS Council a paper -preferably published) that they are doing research relevant to the theme of the event. They must be proposed by a DRS member from their home institution.

PROGRAM COMMITTEE

Prof. Steven Kyffin Philips Design Eindhoven (co-chair)

Prof. Loe Feijs, Technische Universiteit Eindhoven (co-chair)

Dr. Bob Young, Northumbria University Newcastle (co-chair)

Prof. Matthias Rauterberg, Technische Universiteit Eindhoven

Prof. Bill Gaver Royal College Art London

Dr. Anne Guenand, Université de Technologie de Compiègne

Dr. Sara Ilstedt Hjelm Interactive Institute and CID, KTH, Stockholm

Prof Bernhard Bürdek , Academy of Art and Design Offenbach am Main

Prof. Susan Gold, Sierra Nevada College

Prof Colin Beardon, University of Waikato, New Zealand

ORGANISING COMMITTEE

Dr. Bob Young, Northumbria University Newcastle

Mr Dave Stevens, Codeworks

WORKSHOP THEMES AND  TOPICS

1. Methods and Tools:

Active forms

Theatre and choreography

Sketching in space and time

Aesthetics and notation of motion

Editing and scripting of movements

2. Theoretical developments:

Meaning and perception

Conditions of applicability

Ambient versus interactive movement

Structuring mechanisms and linguistics

Gestalt theory and compositionality of meaning

3. Practice-based research and case studies:

Using movement as a mediator

Appropriation of the everyday

Effects of context on meanings

New typologies and ecologies of objects

Dependencies between form and movement

Keynote Plenary Session Theme:

The Future of Designing with Motion

MORE INFORMATION

www.semantics.id.tue.nl

At this site the latest information will be made available

To be added soon: instructions for authors

Please send the manuscripts to:

info.semantics@tue.nl