My Naturewatch Camera Disseminating Practice Research with a Cheap and Easy DIY Design
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My Naturewatch Camera Disseminating Practice Research with a Cheap and Easy DIY Design William Gaver Andy Boucher Michail Vanis Interaction Research Studio Interaction Research Studio Interaction Research Studio Goldsmiths, University of London Goldsmiths, University of London Goldsmiths, University of London London, UK London, UK London, UK [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] Andy Sheen Dean Brown Liliana Ovalle Interaction Research Studio Interaction Research Studio Interaction Research Studio Goldsmiths, University of London Goldsmiths, University of London Goldsmiths, University of London London, UK London, UK London, UK [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] Naho Matsuda Amina Abbas-Nazari Robert Phillips Interaction Research Studio Design Products Design Products Goldsmiths, University of London Royal College of Art Royal College of Art London, UK London, UK London, UK [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] ABSTRACT CCS CONCEPTS My Naturewatch Camera is an inexpensive wildlife camera • Human-centered computing → Empirical studies in that we designed for people to make themselves as a way interaction design. of promoting engagement with nature and digital making. We aligned its development to the interests of the BBC’s KEYWORDS Natural History Unit as part of an orchestrated engagement Design research; research through design; DIY design; open- strategy also involving our project website and outreach to source product; camera; nature; wildlife social media. Since June 2018, when the BBC featured the ACM Reference Format: camera on one of their Springwatch 2018 broadcasts, over William Gaver, Andy Boucher, Michail Vanis, Andy Sheen, Dean 1000 My Naturewatch Cameras have been constructed us- Brown, Liliana Ovalle, Naho Matsuda, Amina Abbas-Nazari, and Robert ing instructions and software from our project website and Phillips. 2019. My Naturewatch Camera: Disseminating Practice commercially available components, without direct contact Research with a Cheap and Easy DIY Design. In CHI Conference with our studio. In this paper, we describe the project and on Human Factors in Computing Systems Proceedings (CHI 2019), outcomes with a focus on its success in promoting engage- May 4–9, 2019, Glasgow, Scotland UK. ACM, New York, NY, USA, ment with nature, engagement with digital making, and the 13 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3290605.3300532 effectiveness of this strategy for sharing research products PRELUDE outside traditional commercial channels. Chris Packham, naturalist, author and presenter of BBC’s Springwatch series, walks beside Bill Gaver towards set of un- Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for usual looking devices in a leafy clearing. To the side the ribbed personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies metal wall of an academic building can be glimpsed, offering are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that an incongruous frame to the scene. copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than the author(s) must “Bill, you’ve got yourself a little grotto here, full of - how be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or shall I put it - very homemade gadgetry. What’s this - this is a republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific camera is it?” permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]. “That’s right, that’s a camera trap. And it’s meant to look CHI 2019, May 4–9, 2019, Glasgow, Scotland UK homemade because we want people making them at home. It’s © 2019 Copyright held by the owner/author(s). Publication rights licensed all off the shelf parts, it’s really cheap—it costs people about to ACM. ACM ISBN 978-1-4503-5970-2/19/05...$15.00 £25 to make this.” https://doi.org/10.1145/3290605.3300532 makes two primary contributions: 1) the design of an inno- vative, self-built wildlife camera—a research product [32] investigating how computational devices can promote en- gagement with making and nature—and 2) an example of an orchestrated strategy bringing together a national primetime TV show, instructional website, and social media outreach to encourage people to make the camera. In the following ac- count, these themes and contributions underlie our account of the development and dissemination of the devices. Springwatch: Setting and Vehicle The Springwatch series, and its spin-offs Autumnwatch and Winterwatch, are world-leading examples of public engage- ment with science. Springwatch is produced by the Natural Figure 1: Springwatch presenter Chris Packham discusses History Unit (NHU), a BBC department that has been ded- My Naturewatch Camera with Bill Gaver. icated to producing wildlife content since 1957 and which is responsible for major series such as Planet Earth and The “I love the recycling element to it, and this is obviously Blue Planet. something straight out of the kitchen.” Springwatch is usually broadcast over an intensive three- “That’s just a food storage container, works really well, it’s week period, live from a temporary encampment usually in super easy to make.” a nature reserve. The core of the show consists of footage “It’s dead cheap, you’re recycling, I love all that. I could put gathered from numerous outdoor cameras that film birds and that together myself in my office. But does it work, Bill?” animals throughout the site, as well as footage from other “Oh yeah.” Gaver pulls out his phone and shows Packham a locations, all strung together, enlivened and enriched with photograph of a squirrel. commentary from experts, particularly Chris Packham, who “I’ve got to say, that’s actually pretty good.” has been the lead presenter since 2009. Several TV shows are broadcast daily, with further content available via the INTRODUCTION BBC ‘red button’ digital interactive television service as well My Naturewatch Camera is a simple digital camera designed as a series website, allowing viewers to immerse themselves to be positioned outdoors, usually in front of bait (Figure 1). in the stories of individual animals as well as features on It uses computer vision software to look for movement and issues including flooding or global warming. With UK daily trigger image capture, and thus can automatically take pho- viewing figures of about 2 million, Springwatch engages an tographs of birds and animals that come in view without hu- impressive number of people with its mix of animal soap man presence. We designed it to be used in people’s gardens operas and detailed information. or local green spaces to record images of nearby wildlife. With its balance of entertainment and expertise, Spring- The cameras are available as DIY designs for people to watch seemed well-suited as a frame for research devices make themselves. Constructed entirely from commercially that would be engaging but not utilitarian (i.e., they wouldn’t available components, using instructions and software from contribute to Citizen Science, at least as narrowly conceived). our project website (mynaturewatch.net), they are designed We hoped that such devices would be of interest to Spring- to be as easy to make as possible, and to require no direct watch as a complement to the programme’s usual format as contact with the project team for success. a broadcast from a small production team to a large audi- We designed My Naturewatch Camera as part of a project ence by allowing audience members themselves to engage that we initiated when we realized that, by virtue of its ap- with nature locally. Finally, we anticipated that exposure on peal to a large audience, the Springwatch series could be a Springwatch would motivate some of the show’s audience to key component of an orchestrated strategy for promoting make the DIY designs, thus allowing our research products large-scale engagement with research products by encouraging to circulate to a wide and diverse public. people to make DIY devices designed to promote engagement with digital making and local wildlife. We unpack each of A Delicate Relationship these themes (dissemination, DIY designs and engagement) We initially contacted the NHU, before applying for project in the paper’s discussion section. For now, it is enough to say funding, via a friend at the BBC who introduced us to a long- that, as an initiative integrating these concerns, the project term consultant to the unit. She responded enthusiastically to our ideas and invited us to visit the Springwatch set. She introduced us to a few members of the team, including their Business and Communications Manager, who eventually wrote a guarded letter of support for our funding application that was, no doubt, pivotal to its success. By the time we had secured project funding, however, about half a year had passed since our previous contact, and our project had largely been forgotten. When we fi- nally met about half a dozen members of the Springwatch team—including the series producer—to discuss our plans, we essentially had to pitch the project afresh. The nature of our funding allowed us to make a compelling offer: • We would develop technologies for engaging with wildlife that viewers could make at home; • the devices and our time would not cost the BBC any- thing; Figure 2: Sample proposal: specialized habitats for filming • they were under no obligation to broadcast the designs microbeasts. ©Interaction Research Studio or, indeed, to engage with the project; • all we asked was for them to meet with us occasionally aesthetic practice as well as the ideas we were pursuing. For- to see if our ideas were of interest. tunately, they were receptive, and our discussion was lively This characterisation of the project (essentially we would and productive.