How can I turn my Star Trails music visualization into an interactive landscape a user could play? One starting point is to look to Don Norman’s usability principles in The Design of Everyday Things:
*Visibility* – Things must be visible, correct mapping between intended action and operation
- The visuals of the landscape will indicate interactivity
- An overlay message before the interaction starts hints at this: “Play the universe.” Maybe ask the user to choose starting scale for visualization.
- The landscape could be designed to look like the strings of a musical instrument. The lines should already be moving and generating tones
- The landscape will drawn moving to the right, and the window the viewer looks through also moves to the right in order to draw a new scene that changes to the music suggesting a dynamic scene not to be passively watched.
- If the user moves the mouse over the scene, tones are generated and the visuals change color to indicate interactivity
- Some visuals spin and move more aggressively to hint at user interaction
*Affordances* - Clues to the operations of things
- Shape of the visual should mimic real world interactivity. For example, a circular visual object can be “spun” by the user. Button like visuals can be pushed on and off. String like objects can be pulled. Etc.
Conceptual Models – Ideas we already have in place about how things should work based on look, culture, etc.
- Playing a visual landscape is an abstract idea, not rooted in the real world. The visuals should hint at musical interactivity by resembling elements of musical instruments that can be played like strings or piano keys.
- Visual elements should resemble real world objects with same mapping (i.e. button like visual should be pushed)
Feedback – Give user confirmation that action caused result
- Clear change in tone generation if user interacts with visual elements on page with mouse
- If user moves mouse over visuals, tones should be generated or colors change to indicate the elements are interactive and encourage user to play with the interactivity
- Correct interaction should reward user by dramatically changing the music and visuals
