Interactive Applications Post 01: A Visit to the St. Louis Science Center
An Insightful Trip
A couple of weeks ago, my classmates and I took a trip to the St. Louis Science Center as part our Interactive Applications course at Maryville University. This trip was to prepare us for our first big project of the semester — an educational interactive kiosk that will be installed at the Science Center upon completion. Throughout the trip we took photos and documented many different aspects of the experience. We payed close attention to the typographic styles found throughout different exhibits, the ways in which people interact with said them, the wayfinding systems present throughout the building, the interactive kiosks, and how these educated participants about their given topics. Through this trip we hoped to better understand the design language of the St. Louis Science Center as well as areas which we could enhance with our projects. The following are the observations that I made during our trip and that I will take into account as I move forward with creating an interactive kiosk.
Typographic Styles and Graphical Conventions
Throughout the Science Center, I noticed several typographic trends emerge as I ventured through the different exhibits. I noticed that, overall, most of the type throughout the entire building was sans serif. The typefaces that were an exception to this trend were slab-serifs and showed up when the subject matter was something closely associated with topics such as structures, robots, or things that are closely associated with industry. One of the biggest trends was that the type would be moderately stylized to match the subject matter. For instance, a slab-serif type that looked like it was made out of pipe links used on an exhibit about water usage. This trend was present throughout all of the science center in many different forms. Another good example is the usage of monospaced type on a piece of wayfinding for the Mars Base exhibit (shown later). All of the type appeared to be very intentional — even obvious — in its attempts to fit in with the subject matter.
I also noticed that most of the time there were no more than three levels
of typographic hierarchy. Layouts were consistent throughout most of the exhibit plaques and were focused on communicating clearly rather than taking on expressive arrangements. While there was typographic and layout stylization, throughout all of the exhibits it was clear that they were trying
to communicate the information they contained, rather than simply express
a visual aesthetic; education and clarity took priority.
The only real exception to these conventions of organization and typographic style were found in the older exhibits — namely the fossils, geology and weather section — where they employed borderline zany serif typefaces with faux drop caps, less consistency in point size, and the occasional squashed
(or stretched) block of type. I think these particular exhibits stand as a great contrast to the more recent exhibits. They highlight the higher level of attention to detail and design coherence present in the newer exhibits while at the same time acting — almost ironically — as a fossil of past graphical sensibilities. They really stood out and made me realize the consistency in quality that has been maintained throughout the rest of the Science Center.
I think that there are a lot of well thought out reasons for the choices that
the designers made on many of the exhibits. I think that a lot of this has to do with the target audience that attends the Science Center: kids between the ages of 5 and 16. Now, these ages are a speculation, but from my observation most of the exhibits seemed to be geared towards that age demographic.
These are also what I would guess the ages were of most of the people I saw playing and exploring the exhibits. The only exhibit which I felt vastly broke this age range was the video game exhibit; everyone seemed to love that one.
Continuing this thought on the rationale behind these stylistic and organization trends, I think the main idea was to sub-brand each one of the exhibits within the larger visual identity of the Science Center; almost like
an amusement park. In a way, that would make a particular exhibit much more memorable than if all of the exhibits followed a single visual style,
with a single typeface, and a single color-palette. I think it also plays into
the wayfinding mechanism of the Science Center; rather than use signs
and arrows too extensively create unique areas within the larger building
to enhance spatial memory in order to help attendees both remember the exhibits and find their way back to them next time.
People and Engagement
While I was at the Science Center, I tried to pay attention to how the design of physical exhibits affected the ways in which people interacted with them. One in particular that stood out was the Makerspace exhibit, located upstairs right next to the Mars Mission Control. The exhibit was very hands-on and allowed people to solve simple problems by constructing objects out of simple materials and then testing them. Many of these involved compressed air, like a sort of miniature wind tunnel — it almost always made something float, suspended in the air. Another one allowed participants to stick magnetized pieces of plastic pipe to a wall in order to create a way for a ball to get from one hole to another; once the pipe was build, the participant could flip a switch and launch the ball through their pipe via compressed air.
While everyone seemed to really enjoy this exhibit, I noticed a number of peculiarities in how people interacted with them.
1. Firstly, since the section had loose parts and objects for people to use, it tended to get a little bit disorganized. This seemed to cause a slight apprehension to interact with the exhibit — especially in older participants.
2. In parts of the exhibit where building something was integral to interaction, people often spent a good amount of time digging through the different parts to find a certain bit they wanted (the green handkerchief for instance). The whole experience was very tactile, and I was surprised how long some people (even my classmates) spent building tiny contraptions.
3. People seemed to avoid the “get the ball through the pipe from point A to point B” exhibit. I think a lot of that had to do with the experience of interacting with its constituent parts. The pieces of pipe were fairly difficult to place on the walls in such a way that a decent seal could be made for the air to push the ball through. Another reason could be that it was a smaller part of the area and would require a lot of effort to even make something testable.
4. People seemed to enjoy the exhibit more when other people participated with them in a given activity. Perhaps this was due to the easily competitive nature of certain activities.
5. People didn’t seem to read a lot of the material featured in the exhibit unless it was instrumental for them to understand how to interact with a certain part of it. Much of the exhibit, I could be argued, is self-explanatory.
6. People flocked to the parts of the exhibit that used air to make things float. This was especially true with a part that let people try to float foam balls through makeshift basketball hoops.
7. One of the difficulties of this exhibit was the all of the activities required some kind of work. Participants had to build things in order to feel gratification. This is probably why they favored the “levitating ball” part rather than the “build and test your own miniature sailboat” part.
8. While certain parts of the exhibit kept people entertained for longer than other parts, none of these seemed to be too engaging for most of the people I observed, with the exception of the floating ball basketball part; everyone seemed to really like that one.
Wayfinding
I found the wayfinding system within the Science Center fascinating. A lot of this fascination was likely due to its employment of a dominant, primary wayfinding system as well as a conglomeration of branded, secondary systems to help in both exhibit location as well as incite the interest of visitors. The primary system consisted of a more typical spread of wayfinding fare: signs hanging from the ceiling, arrows, explosion diagrams of the entire building near the elevators, large lists of exhibits with two-letter abbreviations for floors; things like “LL” for lower level, etc.
The secondary system was what interested me the most, and I would venture to say that it was perhaps even more effective as a means of wayfinding than the primary system. Here and there, spaced throughout the Science Center, there were a number of signs that really stood out. Often these would consist of a simple arrow and the title of the exhibit set in the dominant typeface used within said exhibit. I think that these were effective for wayfinding because they not only communicated the most basic information (that thing, that direction) but their visual style served almost like an advertisement for the exhibit itself; they helped people find things they didn’t even know they wanted to see. Another reason for their success is that they almost always stood in strong contrast to their surrounding environments, which made them much more noticeable than the primary wayfinding system.
Interactive Exhibits
While tactile “physical” exhibits dominate the Science Center, many of these included interactive kiosks that served an integral function. One interactive kiosk that stands out is the Lunar Lander kiosk. It was shaped sort of like an arcade console — only larger — and it had four buttons for input. The exhibit employed a core game mechanic based almost entirely on timing, paying attention to diminishing fuel levels, and orientation. The game is designed to simulate the factors that must be taken into account during a lunar landing: fuel levels, rate of descent, reduced gravity, and navigation.
The player first selects a difficulty, which determines how certain variables are affected. Specifically, these variables are fuel consumption, impact tolerance, and angular velocity. Then they control a lunar lander on its descent towards the surface of the moon. The rate of fall increases the longer they wait to activate the thrusters. There are two thrusters — one on either side of the lander — and they are activated by a left and a right button respectively. The player must land on all of the landing platforms in a certain amount of time, but they must also be careful not to let their fuel run out. If they hit the thrusters too hard, the lander will escape the moon’s weaker gravity and drift off into space. Once they complete the game, they get to enter their initials into a ranked leaderboard, thus adding a competitive element.
There were four main observations I made that stand out the most.
- I thought it was interesting that the hardest difficulty was called “NASA” rather than hard. I also appreciated that this was obviously the hardest mode despite its indirect name due to the fact that it was placed to the far right of the other two modes. Taking advantage of a linguistic convention was a good idea that allowed the designers to give the kiosk more personality and communicate more information in less space.
2. I was taken in immediately by the immersive nature of the game. It was easy to focus on. I was also impressed by the graphics used; while it wasn’t necessarily hyper-realistic in terms of graphics, it employed a motion blur that was directly proportional to the rate at which you moved. This greatly enhanced the experience.
3. The way that the kiosk used only two buttons for gameplay really made me think about how far an idea can go and how extensively an idea can be expressed with a limited amount of user input. The tactile experience of pushing physical, analog buttons added to the immersion factor.
4. The content was presented in an almost identical visual style to that which the Science Center uses for all of its space-related exhibits (with some slight variation of its own). It is high in contrast, uses a sans-serif typeface that has a characteristically monospace style of letterform design, and a more decorative display typeface for the title of the exhibit.
Takeaways and Thoughts
Something I learned
One of my favorite exhibits that I saw during our trip to the Science Center had to be the GameXploration exhibit. They had all sorts of information as well as a section that felt like a miniature game history museum; they had different gaming consoles ranging from the 1970s to those that emerged within the last few years.
They also had a lot of easily digestible information spread throughout the entire area. On one of these pieces of signage, I read a brief bit about Ada Lovelace, who is considered to be the first computer programmer. I had no idea that computer programs existed — at least mathematically — nearly a century before the invention of the electronic computer. This ended up really piquing my interest in this piece of history and has become a fun personal research project. Thinking back on how I actually came across this information, I realize that the games exhibit employs a very clear and concise methodology in how it delivers information. The reading material is stuck at an average eye height in areas where people will tend to stand while they wait for their turn on one of the activities (as I mentioned earlier, this section is pretty popular). I think that the unimposing size of the reading material and its borderline “Crystal Goblet” approach to information hierarchy and organization. I think the signage in that are owes a lot of its efficacy to solid, intentional, and appropriate typographic style and organization.
Wrapping it all up
Overall, I enjoyed the trip. I made a lot of observations that doubtless I will carry with me while I work on this project and beyond. It was nice to see the St. Louis Science Center through a pair of fresh, intentional eyes that haven’t seen the place in many years. I thought it was also great to be surrounded by my classmates and my professor so that we could interact with the exhibits and share our observations with each other. Many of us had not been there in a long time, and it was great to see the many ways in which the Science Center had improved and grown since we had last been there.
In thinking about how I will use this information move forward with this interactive kiosk project, I think it will help inform how I formulate the questions which I will be asking myself and my fellow designers.
1. How do we make this fun and educational?
2. How do I target a specific audience?
3. Does this help educate the user?
4. What is their motivation to interact with this application?
5. What subject matter would complement and expand the teaching abilities of the Science Center?
6. How do I present information that treats the user with respect while also condensing it into a digestible form?
7. How can I inspire participants to seek more information on the subject?
8. How can my kiosk inspire change for the better on varying scales?
9. How to I create something that differentiates enough from the overall visual voice of the Science Center that people notice it, but not so much that it is not coherent as a part to the whole of the Science Center experience?
Final Thoughts
All of these questions have helped to steer me in a focused direction as I move forward with this semester. I look forward to creating an application that will both educate and entertain all who interact with it.
