We're getting there!

This week we worked on some new graphs and our augmented reality project in Unity3D. We were required to make a lean canvas for our project(s) as well as an interim report but we felt like some update about our AR things was in order.

Lean Canvas

Interim Report

 

 

 

Getting the Unity AR project working

After some testing and fiddling around with the Vuforia plugin, we did get the Unity AR project up and running!

Then we replaced the basic cube with a Canada cup we made before.

Sketching, prototyping and mockups

In the end, our team decided that our best option would probably be the Canada Cup augmented reality application which uses the robocam of the hockey arena. With this idea in mind, we first had a team meeting to discuss mockups, prototyping and testing.

We decided to do mockups for both the application used by the arena staff and for the application that could be used by any mobile user at home or at the arena. These mockups would show some sketch-like ideas for the layout and overall structure of the programs, and would function as good way to represent our thoughts to the PO as well.

In addition to the mockups, we thought that making a visual screenplay for the big screen application would be useful. In this screenplay there are images in a sequence representing the different situations that occur onwards from the moment the audience members enter the arena.

While our Unity AR project is not in a working order yet, we did manage to get a browser-based AR system working.

To test the public's interest in the idea as well as how well it works with people unrelated to this project, we plan on organizing a small testing event in the ICT building after we have a sufficiently working prototype ready.

The results of our brainstorming sessions

To get ideas for our project we got together and used two idea finding techniques. The first one was the good old brain storming where everyone wrote any idea that was on his/her mind. In the end we came up with about fifteen different ideas with this technique.

 

After that we got together to a table and used brain writing. The idea behind it is that everyone starts with a simple idea he/she has in mind. Afterwards, a piece of paper containing the original idea is then passed off to someone else who then modifies it or adds something. With this technique we came up with seven other interesting ideas.

Out of these ideas we created a moodboard. The moodboard was done to visualize our ideas, so that everyone gets what our project is about. It contains pictures related to our ideas and shows the variety of our scope and the overall themes.

 

To narrow our idea selection better, we used the site called strawpoll.me where everyone could select three ideas they would wish to work with. Not everyone was able to participate yet, but the results showed some general direction of people's interests. The three ideas that received the most votes so far were:

1) An ice cleaning game for the breaks between the periods
2) A Canada cup application: Utilizing the robocam, pamphlets and a mobile application to create some interesting AR interactions on the big screen by utilizing at least QR codes
3) A piano/organ tune app where one could create his/her own intermission tunes to share with others (and the best ones could be played through the stadium speakers).

PO meeting summary

On the 20th of November in 2015 we had our first meeting with our product owner (PO), Jussi Marin, the creative director and co-founder of Uplause. He had two ideas in mind: either developing for the big screen using augmented reality (AR) or making an app for the recently opened Hall of Fame for more information about the players. In our vision phase we should think of a few ideas for both environments (the app and the big screen) and get feedback from surveys and/or the PO. If we develop an app it should ideally be supported by at least both iOS and Android operating systems, though the best solution would be a browser based app. For developer accounts he has to check with his development team. However, it might be possible that Turku University of Applied Sciences has some for us. The PO will also give us access to the app they are currently developing.

In the arena we could use the Robocam to implement AR. In such a setting, the image of the camera gets sent to an iMac and can get modified for the big screen. We are also allowed to give away prizes to the fans but it would most likely need to include a sponsor or brand for financing it. Since most of our team members aren’t game/app developers we will get a contact person for questions in their development team. So, if we have any questions, we can send them to our PO and he will forward them to his team. After we finish the vision phase, we also have to present one to three ideas to a representative of the HK Areena, who has to approve them. If we want to test our product in the arena, we can ask our PO and he will arrange an appointment on the site. To see the hardware on the spot we will go to a game in the arena with our PO. We can meet the PO every friday if we want to. In the end, we should be have a product to go live with, either in during a game on the big screen or any other TPS related topic.

Based on the meeting, we also created three graphs for the project in order to keep things well-structured. These graphs were a stakeholder map, an idea tree and a mind map of the key points regarding our project:

The stakeholder map

As one can see, the stakeholder map was divided into three tiers based on the stakeholders' involvement in the development of the product. The most inner (involved) tier consists of our small team and our PO, the second tier includes for example the rest of Uplause, the crowd and HK Areena and the most outer tier includes for example the media, the local community and the sponsors.

The idea tree

In the idea tree, the project was divided into six sections: the customer, the product, the employer, the workers, the user and the crowd. Under each section we wrote down the key points of interest and also some thoughts and questions that arose from the meeting.

 

The mind map

The meeting also sparked up a new mind map for our project where the ideas of augmented reality and the use of a big screen received special emphasis. A secondary objective, a Hall of Fame app, was also included as a key point from the meeting.

Blog review of other groups

One of our tasks for this week is to go through the blogs of our peer-groups and find the most outstanding blog post. The blog post we picked can be found here.

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The blog post we find the most interesting is from the summary of an academic article from the 3C group. In the summary to "The Lifecycle of a Medieval Stone House and How to Model it in 4D" by Kari Uotila (2007) they stated that the use of 3D in a model might not be enough to show the whole story of a castle. That is why they should use 4D which also includes a time lapse of the castle where you can see how it was build, how it maybe got damaged at certain points in history and so on. That sounds like a really intelligible way to educate the visitors of the castle about it’s development.

Researching interactive crowd participation

To research the concept of interactive crowd participation we searched the internet for interesting videos, websites and articles on the subject. Here's a couple of the most interesting ones we found:

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McDonald's Save the Sundae Cone

People in the crowd open up an app to spin a fan and try to prevent the sundae shown on the billboard from melting. The fan on the screen moves faster when more people are spinning. Everyone who participates gets a voucher for a sundae. We could definitely do something similar to this the exception being that instead 1 to 5 people who participated would get a free sausage mug for example.

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Levi’s® Stadium mobile app

Another interesting find was Levi's Stadium mobile app which helps its users to buy tickets, navigate in the stadium area, order food and find replay videos of the games among other things. We feel like this was an inspiring idea and it sparked some additional thoughts on where this project might be going.

[Source]

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Techniques for Interactive Audience Participation

 

In their article from the year 2002, Dan Maynes-Aminzade, Randy Pausch and Steve Seitz discussed the unique aspects of interactive audience participation: The focus on interactive crowd games should be on the activity, not technology. Although it may use an old technology, simple games have a higher chance to entertain the crowd. This is because the crowd has to understand the game and its goal immediately in order to cheer for it. That's why you have to make the control mechanisms obvious. You don't even have to sensor every member of the crowd, though it is important that they know they control the game. In the end you have to ramp up the difficulty of the game to make the it more interesting and bring the game to a point where the crowd is expected to lose and it doesn't go on forever. But it should contain pauses or lower paces in between for the crowd to cheer for themselves.

[Source]

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Bannerbattle: introducing crowd experience to interaction design 

 

In their 2012 article, Rune Veerasawmy and Ole Sejer Iversen delved into the concept of designing interaction technologies for crowds such as the audience of a sports game. They viewed crowd situations as something quite unique compared to normal interaction between people and technology, especially since people tend to act in much more sociable way, and additionally their behavior is significantly more spontaneous. As such, the whole design aspect for the technologies must also follow its unique path.

[Source] 

The Skipper

Hi, 

My name is Peter Palmroth and I'm studying business and data processing at Turku University of Applied Sciences. I'm intrested in pretty much everything that works with electricity. I started with this project because I've played ice hockey all my life.

Hello, I'm Rami

My name is Rami Mattila. I'm 23 years old and currently studying information technology in Turku University of applied Sciences and I'm specializing in embedded systems. I'm interested in all programming related work and my strengths are problem solving, group work and innovating.

hejsan svejsan

Hi! 
  
My name is Viljami Saloranta, im 23 years old and im 3rd year stundent at game technology in Turku university of applied sciences. I think my strengths are group working and innovating. Im interested about 3D-modeling and games in general. My hobbies are orienteering and football.

Looking forward to this project :)

Hi, I'm Teemu

My name is Teemu Myllylä. I'm 23 years old and live in Turku with my wife and son. I would describe myself as a bible-believing christian, a husband, a father, a geek and a sports enthusiast. I follow NHL intensively and my favorite team is the Boston Bruins. Passion for sports made me to apply to this project.
 
I study embedded software at Turku University of Applied Sciences and I'm also interested in gaming and game development - especially sports related. My strength is innovative thinking and I'm also able to do programming and some graphical designing. During this project I expect to gain experience and learn more in programming, graphical design, innovating and teamwork. I have previous experience in game development and web design from school projects.

Hello, hello, hello!

Hi to you all, my name is Jenni Lehmonen and atm I'm studying information technology at Turku University of Applied Sciences and I specialize in game technology.

Previously I've studied media arts at Savonlinna Senior Secondary School of Arts and Music so I have experience in graphical design, photography and product design.

My strengths also lie in project management. In various school projects I've worked as the contact person between the customer and the work group as well as a project manager/leader.

I'm looking forward to working with this team and hope that I can bring some new and innovative ideas with me!
 
contact:
jenni.lehmonen@edu.turkuamk.fi

"Ahoy!" from Petri

My name is Petri Linja-aho and I’m 23 years old. I study Information Technology and am specializing in Embedded Systems. My interests include gaming and ice hockey, which is why I hoped to participate in this project. I expect to gain more experience in innovating and working as a group. I have limited technical skills in programming and graphic design so I hope I can provide great ideas to the table and assist in product design. I have previous work experience in desktop computer manufacturing and medical instrument manufacturing.

"Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success."
-- Henry Ford

Hi, I'm Valtteri

My name is Valtteri Rauhala and I'm 23-year-old embedded systems student originally from the countryside of a little town called Sauvo. I do programming in my spare time but have also work experience on the field since 2011.
My strength is web programming (mostly php) and SQL but I also have some experience in other languages like C, C#. One of my weaknesses is compromising but I look forward to progress in this area.
As a reference, here is my newest site: http://opiskelijabileet.fi






I like to watch a lot of hockey and sometimes play guitar and compose/produce music. Have a look at http://www.soundcloud.com/valtzu

Why hello there, I'm Ville!

Good morning! My name is Ville Kentala and I study information technology (more specifically game technology) in Turku University of Applied Sciences.

So far I have obtained skills in the areas below:

• Music and sounds
• 2D graphics (both rasterized and vector ones)
• Programming
• Web development
• Video editing

In my free time I mostly either play video games, spend my time with musical activities or hang around with my friends. I'm glad I could take part in this cool project as both sounds and games/interactivity are very close to my heart.

E-mail: ville.kentala@edu.turkuamk.fi

Hi, I'm Dennis Kirsch

Moi, my name is Dennis Kirsch. I am 21 years old and come from Hamburg, Germany. In Hamburg I study Technical Computer Sciences which is a degree focused on Embedded Systems, Software Engineering and Datacommunication. This means I can provide experience in high level and embedded programming as well as project management. At home I play the guitar and like to watch soccer. I'm looking forward to this exciting project and hope for innovative ideas with great results!
  
E-Mail: d.kirsch1994@gmail.com
Phone: 041 7245149