A Seeing Place – Connecting Physical and Virtual Spaces
Doktorsavhandling, 2020

In the experience and design of spaces today, we meet both reality and virtuality. But how is the relation between real and virtual construed? How can we as researchers and designers contribute to resolving the physical-virtual divide regarding spaces? This thesis explores the relations between the physical and the virtual and investigates ways of connecting physical and virtual space, both in theory and practice.
 
The basic concepts of the thesis are Space, Place, and Stage. The central idea is that the stage is a strong conceptual metaphor that has the capacity to work as a unifying concept relating physical and virtual spaces and forming a place for attention, agreements, and experience – A Seeing Place. The concept of seeing place comes from the Greek word theatre, meaning a “place for seeing”, both in the sense of looking at and understanding.
 
In certain situations, the relations between physical and virtual spaces become important for users’ experience and understanding of these situations. This thesis presents seven cases of physical-virtual spaces, in the field of architectural and exhibition design. The method of these studies is research by design. The discussion then focuses on how each setting works as a stage, and how conceptual metaphors can contribute to the connection between physical and virtual spaces.
 
Building upon the explorations and experiments in different domains, the thesis contains a collection of seven papers concerning the relations between physical and virtual space in different contexts outside the world of theatre. These papers range from more technical about Virtual Reality (design of networked collaborative spaces) to more conceptual about staging (methods in interaction design) and virtual space (using a transdisciplinary approach).
 
The results of those studies suggest that the Stage metaphor of a physical-virtual space can contribute to the elucidating of relations between physical and virtual spaces in number of ways. Conceptually, the stage metaphor links together the semiotic and the hermeneutic views of space and place. And, from a practice-based perspective, A Seeing Place view opens up the way to creating contemporary spaces and resolving the physical-virtual divide.

stage

VR

theatre

Virtual Space

virtual reality

place

physical space

Jupiter 473, Lindholmen (only for mandatory participants)
Opponent: Jonathan Westin, Associate Professor, Centre for Digital Humanities, University of Gothenburg

Författare

Josef Wideström

Chalmers, Data- och informationsteknik, Interaktionsdesign

The Collaborative Cube Puzzle: A Comparison of Virtual and Real Environments

The 3rd Collaborative Virtual Environments (CVE), San Francisco, USA, September 10-12,;(2000)

Paper i proceeding

The Pelvis as Physical Centre in Virtual Environments

Presence 2000,;Vol. 1(2000)p. 1-2

Paper i proceeding

Immersiveness and Symmetry in Copresent Scenarios

Proceeding of IEEE VR2005,;(2005)p. 171-178

Artikel i vetenskaplig tidskrift

The Virtual Culture House – Shaping the Identity of a Public Knowledge Institution

http://thevalueofdesignresearch.com/,;(2015)

Paper i proceeding

The transdisciplinary nature of virtual space

Lecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics),;Vol. 11613 LNCS(2019)p. 186-202

Paper i proceeding

Designing for Science Center Exhibitions - A Classification Framework for the Interaction.

International Design Conference,;Vol. 1(2020)p. 1657-1666

Paper i proceeding

Styrkeområden

Informations- och kommunikationsteknik

Ämneskategorier

Data- och informationsvetenskap

ISBN

978-91-7905-316-1

Doktorsavhandlingar vid Chalmers tekniska högskola. Ny serie: 4783

Utgivare

Chalmers

Jupiter 473, Lindholmen (only for mandatory participants)

Online

Opponent: Jonathan Westin, Associate Professor, Centre for Digital Humanities, University of Gothenburg

Mer information

Senast uppdaterat

2020-05-14