Workshop Objectives
Date: 6th April 2008
Location: CHI 2008 conference, Florence, Italy
The objective of this workshop is to bring together researchers from a range of areas with a view to furthering understanding of user interface issues relating to the design, development and evaluation of urban mixed reality systems.
Mixed reality environments encompass a range of domains from pervasive games through to systems to support cultural heritage, and currently represent a growing area of research. However the growth in such systems has resulted in a need to further explore their situated and social nature, and how these aspects impact upon their use of such systems and alter the environment around them. Although there has already been a substantial amount of research into telepresence and sense of place much of this has focused on more traditional technologies such as purely virtual environments or mobile tour guides. In contrast urban mixed reality environments require a substantial change of research emphasis and in doing so must take into account the following shifts:
- From virtual to mixed reality environments which mesh or augment places and times
- From psycho-physiological and “constructive perception” to understanding social action, interaction and meaning making
- From a focus on individual behavior to interaction in groups who are co-located and distributed
- From immaterial environments to those which combine real and virtual elements
- From a passive sense of place and presence, one where creation of place, meaning and engaging of all senses plays a critical role
