“It’s Like Being On Stage”: Conveying Dancers’ Expressiveness Through A Haptic-Installed Contemporary Dance Performance

Research Background and Issues

• Identified Problems and Challenges:
  The author points out that the expressiveness of contemporary dance in traditional performances is often conveyed solely through visual and auditory means. This approach may not be intuitive enough for inexperienced audiences, leading to ambiguity in the emotions and intentions communicated by the performance. While related HCI research has explored the visualization of physiological data (e.g., heart rate and muscle sounds) to bridge the connection between performers and audiences, there is still limited research on optimizing dancers' somatic experiences and enhancing audience resonance.

• Significance:
  The application of cross-sensory technologies (e.g., haptic feedback) offers new possibilities for enhancing interaction and immersion between dancers and audiences. This experiential innovation not only strengthens the expressiveness of performances but also establishes a deeper emotional connection between the audience and the dancers.

• Research Motivation and Related Work:
  Although existing studies have attempted to integrate haptic technology into performances (e.g., transmitting dancers' breathing patterns or footstep movements through haptics), few have explored how haptics can enhance choreographic intentions or dancers' internal somatic experiences, thereby influencing the audience's perception and interpretation of the performance.

Proposed Solution

• Proposed Solution:
  The author designed a contemporary dance performance incorporating haptic technology, combining choreographed dance movements with haptic patterns to explore how the integration of dance movements and haptic feedback can enhance dancers' expressiveness and audience experience.

• Innovations:

  1. Haptic feedback is not merely a passive transmission of dancers' movement characteristics but becomes an integral part of the choreographic creation process.
  2. For the first time, haptic devices (haptic wristbands worn by the audience) were integrated into live dance performances, creating a feedback loop that establishes new connections between dancers' creation and audience experience.
  3. Introduced the role of a haptic "DJ," who controls the real-time synchronization of haptic feedback with dance movements, enhancing design flexibility and interactivity.

• Implementation Steps and Key Technologies:

  1. Co-Design Phase: Collaborated with five professional dancers to design haptic feedback patterns, including initial interviews, haptic technology testing, iterative feedback design, and live rehearsals.
  2. Haptic System Design: Developed a system comprising wearable haptic wristbands, a remote control device (haptic DJ control system), and computer software (using Ableton Live).
  3. Haptic Pattern Development: Defined various haptic types based on dance movement characteristics (e.g., short, forceful "dot" patterns and continuous, dynamic "line" patterns) and metaphor-based haptic feedback (e.g., mimicking "blood flow" or "water droplets").
  4. Final Performance: Tested in three public live performances, where 128 audience members wore haptic wristbands and experienced the performance through multimodal sensory inputs of vision, hearing, and touch.

Research Outcomes

• Specific Outcomes:

  1. Proposed a complete development process from haptic device design to multisensory dance performance, providing a model for interdisciplinary collaboration between dance and HCI.
  2. Found that haptic feedback strengthens the connection between dancers and audiences, allowing audiences to experience deeper immersion and even evoke bodily resonance and creative imagination.
  3. Validated for the first time the practical role of haptic technology in enhancing dancers' improvisation and audiences' understanding of choreographic intentions in dance performances.

• Comparison with Existing Solutions and Advantages:
  Compared to previous studies that focused more on visual and physiological data mapping, this study proposed a new framework of "haptic choreographic performance," deeply integrating haptics into the dance creation process. Additionally, empirical data from audience experiences demonstrated the potential of haptic feedback in multisensory dance.

• Experimental and Evaluation Results:
  Audience feedback collected through questionnaires and interviews indicated that haptics enhanced their sense of presence and attention. For example, some audience members commented that they "felt the dancer's heartbeat" or were "guided to focus on specific dance movements." Moreover, haptic feedback stimulated audience imagination, such as "the vibrations when I couldn't see the dancer's body made me imagine what was happening."

• Limitations and Future Directions:

  1. The audience primarily consisted of individuals with artistic backgrounds or education; future research should explore the diverse needs of broader audiences.
  2. The haptic system was designed with a "wired" format; future efforts could explore wireless transmission to enhance audience mobility.
  3. Haptic design needs to balance individualization and universality to avoid sensory overload caused by excessive information.
  4. Explore the potential integration of haptic technology with other dance styles (e.g., hip-hop or ballet) and its adaptability across different cultural contexts.

Conclusion

This study expands the exploration of the relationship between the body and technology in the field of human-computer interaction and opens new innovative directions for the future development of dance art, extending its reach to establish richer connections between technology, artistic creation, and audience experience.