VERSED

Versed is my experiment in interface design. People tend to approach computer applications with a certain premise about its navigation, layout, interaction, and visual look. Trends, like habits, have evolved. So i changed the rules.

Versed is an interactive animation experience of some poetry that i wrote years ago. The poetry is slowly presented with an orchestrated soundtrack and continues at a set pace, visuals animating on their own accord, with various live changes depending the action, or inaction, of the mouse. Some interactions are more elaborate, such as a co-ordination of the mouse, a streetlight, and moths, or the acquisition of scissors to cut an object, take it away and give it to a figure. Some interactions are simple, like spinning and hiding the moon and stars, or directing clouds, or offending a sheltered figure.

The visuals are heavily desaturated from colour to greyscale, sourced from rough and grainy charcoal sketches. But the aim was to make people -- dubbed 'visitors' -- think about what they are trying to do directly with the computer, ie the mouse, by not having the computer respond in particularly expected ways. For example, the mouse pointer is repositioned and even locked in, or from, parts of the screen. Clicking the mouse shuts down the program. Navigation is gestured by sweeping the mouse across words, end to end, in either direction.

Some visitors found it very enlightening for themselves, or at least something purely strange and interesting. At simplest, they enjoyed the visuals, music, and poetry even without investigative mouse movements. Then there were some who refused to read, played ignorance, and got frustrated because their mouse clicks weren't responding as expected.

Several weeks of research into interface design, HCI guides, and humanist issues of memory and understanding helped fuel Versed's unusual nature with intent. This research is presented in the Versed In Theory website.

Versed was my major project completing my Bachelor of Arts: Multimedia Design.

It has since been used as an example for later students, twice exhibited on campus to internal and external audiences, and entered for professional exhibition by a university lecturer.

Completed June 2001.