=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-2009/fmt-proceedings-2017-paper18
|storemode=property
|title=Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2009/fmt-proceedings-2017-paper18.pdf
|volume=Vol-2009
|authors=Christina Niederer,Stefanie Größbacher,Wolfgang Aigner,Markus Seidl,Peter Judmaier
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/fmt/NiedererGASJ17
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==Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2009/fmt-proceedings-2017-paper18.pdf
Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative
Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
Christina Niederer, Stefanie Größbacher, Wolfgang Aigner, Peter Judmaier and Markus Seidl
Institute of Creative\Media/Technologies, St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences, Austria
first.lastname@fhstp.ac.at
Abstract—Most art museums provide audio guides or, more answer these questions, we applied an ensemble of research
recently, multi-media guides, with static context such as back- methods: First, we identified user’s needs and created personas
ground information to enrich their exhibits with an extra layer of and scenarios. The needs were then taken into account while
content. Usually, there is no actual interaction with the museum’s
exhibit possible, no hands-on experience that fosters a deeper developing paper prototypes and the interactive application.
cognitive engagement. The integration of multi-touch tables has Furthermore, two usability studies (one in a lab environment,
a great potential for collaborative experiences. We designed a one in the field) were conducted to evaluate the multi-touch
touch table application that allows for collaborative and active application in general, and the user interface in particular.
drawing experiences and conducted two usability studies, one In the next section we discuss Related Work dealing with
in a laboratory setting and one in the field. The design study
was structured in three phases: domain and problem analysis, multi-touch and multi-user approaches in museums, partic-
user experience and interface design, and evaluation. The results ipatory projects and drawing applications. The section De-
show that the collaborative aspect – drawing on one picture sign Study describes the research methods used during the
simultaneously in different personal areas - was accepted and development of the application and the application’s features.
praised by the visitors. The study indicates that museums with In the section Evaluation we give details of the procedure,
mostly passive viewable artefacts can profit from interacitve and
collaborative content, which enhances the general experience in participants and test results of the conducted studies. In the
their exhibitions. section Discussion we summarize and interpret our findings
of the two usability studies. Finally, we discuss possible
I. I NTRODUCTION directions for future research in the section Conclusion.
In art museums the exhibition design is limited, because
their focus is on displaying collections of objects such as II. R ELATED W ORK
paintings, sculptures, multimedia works, and installations. Large-scale table-top devices have already demonstrated
Usually, there are hardly any opportunities for visitors to their great potential in public use of interactivity and collabora-
interact with artefacts or other visitors, other than discussing tion in the past. In 2002, the project SmartSkin [3] investigated
exhibited objects. Most art museums try to increase their vis- a new sensor architecture for making interactive surfaces
itors’ interactivity by handing out handheld devices providing sensitive to human hand and finger gestures. Besides technical
static content like audio tours [1], [2]. Multi-touch technology, achievements, the study of Rekimoto [3] also reported new
in combination with appropriate interaction design concepts, insights into interaction techniques using multiple fingers. One
allows for true interactivity between visitors and the exhibition year later, a study with Diamond Touch was conducted by
objects. The presented research examines the emerging role of Dietz and Leigh [4]. They proposed a touch-sensitive input
interactivity with exhibition objects by developing a collabora- device which allows multiple, simultaneous users to interact in
tive drawing and viewing application running on a multi-touch an intuitive fashion. Nowadays, multi-touch table-top devices
table and a web application for smartphones. The collaborative can be found in various locations such as airports, information
drawing and viewing application adds interactive elements centers, retail stores, and museums [5], [6]. To provide an
in accordance to the visitors’ desire for self-expression. The overview of work related to our problem domain, we focused
interactive comic experience specifically developed for the on multi-touch and multi-user table-top applications, partici-
Karikaturmuseum Krems makes drawing for visitors easier, patory projects, as well as drawing applications.
actively engaging them with drawing styles of exhibited artists,
and allows collaboration with other visitors, even outside of A. Multi-user Table-Top Applications
the context of the museum. The Museum of Science and Technology in Islam [7]
Based on a user-centered design approach we conducted demonstrates 1500 years of history of Muslims on a large
a design study to investigate whether using the collaborative multi-touch table. Visitors can simultaneously interact with
drawing application introduces novel user behaviors or social the application and create a social learning experience. Fur-
interactions. Moreover, we studied how digital brushes have thermore, Horn et al. [8] conducted a survey at the Harvard
to be designed and implemented for strokes performed by Museum of Natural History, showing that visitors collaborate
human fingers in order to work well on the touch surface, effectively and engage in on-topic discussions of the exhi-
independently of the target group and its drawing skills. To bition. They presented a design and evaluation of a table-
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Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
top multi-user game to help visitors learn more about evo- context has not been investigated. Apart from these studies,
lution. The multi-touch table installation of Hornecker [9] there is a lack of research on the integration of drawing
in the Berlin Museum of Natural History demonstrates that applications on multi-touch tables in a museum’s context,
information-browsing applications may be inappropriate for especially for art museums with the focus on collaboration
a museum’s context, as it was not used much and hardly and participation.
provided discussion topics. The potential of interactive table-
tops was not exploited satisfactorily. III. D ESIGN S TUDY
Multi-user scenarios can also be found in other areas besides
Our design study is divided into three parts: gathering
a museum’s context. Blumenstein et al. [10] have described
information to deduce requirements, conceptual design for an
inter alia general requirements and challenges for multi-user
easy-to-use interactive comic experience, and evaluating the
and multi-device scenarios from the perspective of interactive
application to identify problems.
data visualization.
B. Participatory Projects A. Requirements Research
Ideum [11] developed a photo kiosk for the Crystal Bridges The first step in the process of defining requirements was
Museum of American Art in conjunction with the exhibition to collect qualitative data about the potential users of the
Warhol’s Nature and Jamie Wyeth. The participatory aspect of museum. In this research phase real world observations and
the project was that visitors were able to capture their own interviews were conducted. After collection, the information
photograph and then choose different style elements to apply was modeled in form of personas. In the final stage scenarios
to their photograph based on the works of the two American were developed to define the requirements.
artists. After styling their photograph, users could send it via 1) Observations & Interviews: Firstly, we physically vis-
email to either themselves or others. ited the museum to gain insights by interviewing the museum’s
Moreover, the Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA) developed employees and conducting observations such as: what does
a number of participatory projects [12]–[14] that allow visitors the exhibition area look like, what is the average exhibition
to contribute to the museum experience by creating their own period or who are the visitors. Four employees of different
content and sharing it with the public. In 2013 the IMA functions were interviewed: the director of the museum, a
launched a drawing competition with the Matisse, Life in Color cashier, and two museum warders. The conversations took
exhibition encouraging visitors to create drawings inspired roughly 15 minutes. The museum provided all their data they
by the works of the French artist [12]. This concept based had already collected about their visitors over the years. Dur-
on an app available on a number of iPads was installed in ing the observations we also analyzed published advertising
the exhibition entrance. The created drawings could then be materials, the gift shop and the guestbook. The document
submitted via the app to a provided competition website, where analysis showed that the guestbook is full of sketches and little
people could view submissions and rate and comment the cartoons, showing the visitors’ desire to express themselves
drawings. IMA stated that this participatory project worked not only graphically, but also by relating their drawings to the
well, because visitors could see themselves and/or their works context of the museum’s exhibition.
represented within the network. 2) Personas & Scenarios: Based on the interviews and ob-
servations three personas [21] were created: an older married
C. Drawing Applications couple, a class of high school juniors and a young guy in his
There are a number of drawing applications on the World twenties. These personas became the main characters of the
Wide Web where users can draw on their own device and developed scenarios. The scenarios describe their visits to the
then share it with others or draw collaboratively over the museum, why they go there in the first place, how they act
web. Awwapp [15] and sketchpad [16] are two well known in the museum and how they react to and interact with the
examples. Awwapp offers collaborative drawing by connecting table. Storyboards have been created to illustrate the scenarios
through the Internet. The available functions are very basic (Figure 1). The output of this process was the requirement
but effective. Basic functions that most of the applications definition.
include are a pencil with different sizes and color, an eraser, 3) Results for Requirements: The target group of the mu-
texts, and sometimes images that can be placed. Deleting the seum includes nearly every age group (young children as
whole image, as well as saving and sharing it, are additional well as retirees), and different social groups (tourists, students,
functions. Drawing applications on multi-touch tables can be regulars). Regarding the touch table the target group is reduced
found in domains like design, in the form of a brainstorming to people interested in technology. The list below presents user
tool [17] or in educational organizations [18], [19]. Partarakis requirements for the target domain:
et al. [20] presented a painting game for pupils, introducing • Expressing themselves graphically: The paper guest-
physical objects to a large touchscreen. The aim of this book shows that visitors express themselves by drawing
installation was to teach drawing techniques to pre-schoolers. funny sketches based on the exhibition topic.
Beside the work of Partarakis et al. [20], the usage of • Collaborative work: Sketches in the paper guestbook are
drawing applications on multi-touch tables in a museum’s often drawn by more than one person.
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Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
Fig. 1: Storyboard image from one of the scenarios in the museum exhibition: An elderly married couple visits the
Karikaturmuseum Krems and comes across a touch table. The husband is interested in new techniques and shows his wife how
to read comics on the table. Tom joins them at the table and starts the drawing application. The wife is all eyes and copies
his interactions. They draw a panel together.
• Self-representation: The drawings in the paper guest-
book, which any visitor of the museum can flip through,
are nearly always signed.
B. Design
Paper prototypes showing the concept of the drawing ap-
plication and the first design of the look-and-feel of the
application were developed. In the next section we describe
the final interactive prototype running on a multi-touch table.
The core concept of the drawing experience is the narrative
aspect to it. In case of the Karikaturmuseum museum, the
visitors get the chance to become storytellers by drawing
panels for a collaboratively created comic. The collaboration Fig. 2: Interactive element “start screen”: drag and drop a
is not limited to the museum context because user-generated pencil in one of the four semicircles to start drawing.
drawings are exhibited both on the interactive table and the
web application, once the comic is finished. Visitors who do
not wish to draw in public and have their work presented
publicly can interact with the table by flipping through com-
pleted stories. This way, the multi-touch table caters not only
to the needs of visitors who wish to be actively involved in
the exhibition, but also to those who prefer to passively take
in the art presented.
Start Screen: As proposed and evaluated by Klinkhammer
et al. [22], we divided the whole screen into four personal
working areas seen in Figure 2, where the user can interact
with the tool. The main screen contains elements for drawing
comics (pencils) and one element showing already finished
artwork (book).
These two features are included to cover the needs of Fig. 3: Story options to choose when drawing a comic: starting
different forms of participation in museums identified by illustrations are caricatures by Austrian artist Manfred Deix.
Simon [23]. On the one hand, the visitors, who are “creators”,
can produce content by drawing panels for a comic and, on
the other hand, the so called “spectators” read and discover stories, which are based on famous drawings by Deix, a well-
finished comics. known Austrian cartoonist. Furthermore, the user chooses a
To start the application, the user has to drag one element story they want to contribute to.
into their personal working area. The selected element then Collaboration Concept: After choosing a story the users
pops up in the chosen area and the user can then either start have to decide if they want to draw on their own or collab-
drawing a panel for one of the provided stories, or look at oratively in a group (Figure 4). To work collaboratively, the
completed comics (Figure 2). Figure 3 shows the provided system provides the possibility to draw individually on two
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Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
Fig. 4: Divided Screen – Personal Working Areas: The users Fig. 5: Drawing Interface
are able to work on four areas on their own or collaboratively.
This means that users work on their personal working area,
but when cooperating with another visitor they draw in their Following the Story: After finishing a drawing, users can
respective drawing areas simultaneously. sign the comic panel by filling out a form with a name,
residence and an email address. Then users can see their
picture lined up with the previous panels. This allows the
different working areas. Each user sees what the other draws in visitors to see how the drawing just finished integrates into
their own working area. To do so, the user needs to share their the whole comic strip.
story before starting to draw. The chosen story then reappears By scanning the provided QR-Code on the multi-touch
on the main screen, giving other visitors the chance to join table, visitors can take the story home with their personal
this work. If users choose to work on a comic, they get to see smartphone seen on Figure 6. The QR-Code leads to a mobile
the last three pictures that have been drawn for the selected web application, which links to the comic the users took part
story in the form of a carousel. This way, users get a glimpse in the museum. So, visitors stay in contact with the exhibition
of how the story developed so far, without telling everything and the collaborative aspect does not end when leaving the
that has been going on up to this point. By not knowing the museum. The integrated QR-Code does not provide extra
whole story the comics should turn out more compelling. This information about the exhibited arts in the museum [25], but
concept was used to encourage the creativity of every user and rather complements the mobile website.
to get interesting stories.
Sketching: The sketching part of the system provides a
drawing application with various tools: brushes, balloons, text
areas, an eraser and the functionality of undo (Figure 5).
The basis for the design of the brush implemented on the
multi-touch table was the analogue drawing behaviour with
a pen. To make it easy to use for the broad visitor audience
we integrated one type of brush. The line style of the brush
is comparable to a felt pen. To vary the type of brush, a
thickness slider with a preview area and a colour palette was
implemented. The colours depend on the story the user has
chosen.
The interaction concept for adding text elements and bub-
bles is based on known concepts of graphic applications such Fig. 6: Interface Design for scanning the QR-Code
as Adobe InDesign or Photoshop. The text box appears on the
surface and users are able to drag and drop the box into the Reading Finished Comics: The application on the touch
place of the picture where they want it to be. table also provides the possibility to look through finished
Related to the text input methods, we decided to integrate comic strips from other visitors. Thus, the visitors can get
a soft keyboard based on the QWERTY approach [24]. The an idea of the stories and inspiration for their own sketching
physical keyboard elements are mapped to the on-screen work. The interface is arranged similar to the drawing area
keyboard. The touch elements have a squared shape and the seen in Figure 7. On the left, there is a tool bar showing the
size of the touch elements was adapted to a finger-friendly different stories. In the main area, different versions of one
size. selected story are listed.
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Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
The research about different technologies showed that Flash
(Actionscript 3.0) together with the framework Open Exhibits
(http://openexhibits.org/) for recognizing gestures is the sys-
tem most suitable for us on the touch table. At the time of
prototype implementation, Flash had a large community and is
well-documented. Furthermore, we chose this platform for our
comic experience application because of the experiences with
Flash on multi-touch tables in previous projects concerning
the stability and easy installation on Windows PCs.
Our application supports up to four simultaneous users and
the process of drawing needs sensitive reactions by the system.
The gesture framework Open Exhibits provides the advantages
Fig. 7: Reading finished comics in the exhibition. On the left, of predefined touch-gestures and the support of simultaneous
the sidebar shows the main stories. The grey area on the right touch events, which are needed to develop collaborative ap-
contains all versions of a finished story in the museum. plications. The first step in the implementation phase was to
build a clear object- and action structure, defining which data-
objects should be used and which actions would be performed
C. Prototype on those objects. A database contains all the data objects and
their relations. This database is also used for our website,
The prototype was developed for a 40 inch framed high where the users may open their drawn images from home or
definition (1920 x 1080 px) table-top, including infrared track- on their smartphones.
ing to discern the touch points. Up to four museum visitors
may use the application simultaneously. The application was IV. E VALUATION
developed for a multi-touch and multi-user approach and
combines a touch table with mobile devices (Figure 8). The Two user tests were performed: one was conducted in a
system is an interactive installation where visitors can do laboratory setting (at an early conceptual stage) and one in
creative, graphical and collaborative comic storytelling. On the the field (with a completed first release prototype). The study
one hand, the users may sketch a drawing and become part of design and results are presented in the next sections.
a bigger story and, on the other hand, they can look through
already completed artworks by other users. A. User Study in Laboratory Setting
1) Prototype: The interactive prototype running on the
touch table at this stage of the design study already included
these functions: opening the drawing application via drag and
drop interaction; selecting the brush and setting its width;
drawing on the comic panel; erasing the lines; adding text and
bubble elements and typing text into it. Based on a user-based
usability test we evaluated the prototype to investigate (1) how
effective the drawing application is and (2) how satisfying it
is for the users to draw with their fingers on a multi-touch
table. (3) Furthermore, the text-input method, in our case a
soft keyboard (Figure 8), was part of the analysis. The aim
was to find out how easy it is for visitors to type on a touch-
based keyboard.
2) Procedure and Participants: 13 high school pupils (11
female and 2 male) at the age of 14 to 15 years participated in
the user test. At this point of development the main functions
of the application were fully developed and implemented on
the touch table. The test equipment consisted of two 40 inch
framed table-tops including infrared to discern the touch points
and two DSLR cameras recording the interactions with the
system and the users’ feedback. During the observations hand-
written notes were taken. The participants were supposed to
complete a set of seven predefined tasks and were divided into
Fig. 8: Component diagram: The architecture of the interactive two groups: one group consisted of single students working
installation. It contains a touch table, smartphones and a web through the tasks and the second group were four students
server. working together on four individual areas. Both groups faced
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Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
the same tasks to complete and did so simultaneously in two This field study examined (1) how satisfying it is for the user
separate rooms. to draw, (2) how effective the concept of collaborative drawing
3) Study Design: The tasks the students had to complete on a multi-touch table is, and (3) whether stories were being
included: (1) describing what they see, (2) drawing a cat, (3) developed.
letting the cat talk, and (4) changing what the cat is saying. To record user behaviour and interactions remotely, we
Due to the qualitative character of the study, the subjects were installed a webcam beside the touch table and used the
asked to fill out a questionnaire on how well they were able Software iSpy [27] to adapt the recording time of the camera
to handle the application and how much they enjoyed doing to the opening hours of the museum. We also implemented
so at the end of the usability test. instrumentation functionality to log usage data while using
Furthermore, a focus group discussion with all 13 students the application (such as which tools were used, which stories
regarding questions such as: Did they like the application? were chosen, or how long drawing sessions took).
Would they improve certain functions? Do they have general 1) Procedure and Participants: The table was set up in
recommendations? was initiated to get a broad range of one of the rooms of the museum (called Deix room) over
viewpoints and insights. During the test, the thinking aloud a period of one week. Posters on the sides of the table
approach was followed [26]. explained that it was a university project, that visitors were
4) Test Results: The results suggest that drawing with invited to draw comics and that users would be filmed when
fingers on a multi-touch table is very effective and easy to use, using the table. These were the only explanations museum
though some of the students struggled to draw as accurate as visitors received regarding the use of the table. A camera
they wanted to. filmed the interactions of the visitors when using the table.
The suggestions of the questionnaire indicated that the When closing the application, a pop-up with a voluntary
drawing part is very satisfying for the participants. All students questionnaire appeared. In the background, we logged data
ranked the application between 1 and 3 (grades 1 to 5, 1 to get more insights about the interaction behaviours of the
indicating the highest satisfactory level). They commented visitors.
that they would try drawing on the table in the museum, as The test participants were a random group of visitors,
well. Some students also revealed that they like to be creative. regardless of age and media literacy, who attended the ex-
Regarding the brush design and variety of colours provided, hibition at the Karikaturmuseum museum in the time period
they expressed the wish for a thinner brush and more colour of one week. The exact number of participants is unknown,
combinations. as the camera that recorded the users was positioned in a way
The text-input via the keyboard (Figure 9) revealed some that guaranteed their anonymity. Overall, 185 sessions were
room for improvement: during the test it could be observed captured.
that participants had problems with typing on the keyboard. 2) Study Design: The camera was arranged at the side of
The touch areas were too small, causing the keyboard to close the table, filming from high above. So, the whole table was in
itself when they hit the drawing area instead. The subjects also focus while the angle provided the anonymity of the visitors.
called for a cursor. The questionnaire was structured in two parts: After giving
their approximate age, gender and their reason for visiting
the museum (or deciding not to answer), they could choose
between different smileys (laughing, neutral, sad) to state
whether or not they found navigating through the application
easy, they instantly knew how to use the drawing tools, and if
they liked drawing on the table.
User behaviour was also logged in the background. The
following research questions were the basis for the logging
Fig. 9: The improved keyboard design as a result of the functionality: (1) Which of the four comics based on a Deix
laboratory test. drawing (“king of the cats”, “women on the beach”, “playing
indians”, “hedgehog”) was chosen most often? (2) Did users
close the drawing app before finishing their picture? (3) How
B. Field Study many pictures were finished in total? (4) Which comics did
The second user test was conducted on-site in the museum, they like to read? (5) During which times of the day was
testing the application in real world circumstances in the field. the table used? (6) On which day of the week was it used
At this point, the development of the prototype was basically most often? (7) Do users prefer working alone over working
finished. Based on the previous prototype for the laboratory in groups? These are some of the questions the log contributed
setting this prototype was improved and extended. The im- answers to.
provements included: one brush with more colours to choose 3) Test Results: Collaboration and Stories - Findings
from (8 main colours); collaborative drawing functionality; a showed that users are more likely to work on a comic alone
keyboard adapted by resizing the keys. The application was instead of in a group. Their favourite story was a story about
extended by the functionality of reading comics. the “king of cats”, but when drawing alone the story about
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Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
a “woman on the beach” was chosen most often. Concerning The user studies showed that one brush is efficient enough
working in groups, we could observe that people help each as long as the thickness can be adjusted properly enough.
other and work together rather than destroying the work of Regarding the text-input method we can only interpret the
the other drawers. Even when people work separately on their results of the study. 185 sessions were detected during the
own sketches, they stop to help users with problems in using field study in the museum, but only 57 of the drawings were
the application. signed by the visitors and only few comic panels exhibit text
Interestingly, the developed panels/drawings exhibited less elements or speech bubbles. This may result from the input
elements of a comic, such as text boxes or speech bubbles. A method for text, using a keyboard known from the smartphone
few participants used a thin brush to write texts to complete applications. So, we can confirm the results of Wigdor et
their panel instead of using the text tool (Figure 10). Overall, al. [28] stating that text input on large multi-touch tables can be
within 185 sessions, visitors used text elements only every problematic and that more research besides Hinrich et al.’s [24]
fourth session and every second session they placed speech study to investigate new methods for textual input ought to be
bubbles on their drawings. done.
Reading Finished Comics: In the days of the field study, no The concept of collaborative storytelling in this specific
comic was finished completely. Since only completed stories context of the museum Karikaturmuseum Krems works well.
can be read on the table, the visitors were not able to flip We found some storytelling aspects in one comic, but there
through stories. Overall, the video recording showed that the were no completed comics. As there are four different stories
interface design and interaction was clear and easy-to-use, to choose from, it takes a while until one comic is completed.
though. The number of panels resulting in a comic was defined as
Participants: In the testing period visitors between the ages too high. We recommended a number of panels for a story of
of 11 to 25 and 36 to 50 years attended the exhibition. The approximately 10 panels. A way to get visitors to complete
application was used by more women than men. comics quicker, and thus be able to offer the application’s full
Questionnaire: The overall response to the drawing appli- functionality, could be to start off with only one story and have
cation was very positive. 48 of 60 visitors rated the drawing visitors unlock the other three stories by completing one story
application as positive. Respondents were asked to indicate after the other, until all four stories are available. This would
whether the tools (brush, text and bubble, undo) are immedi- also force users to work collaboratively, which could then lead
ately clear. 41 of 60 participants categorized the tools as very to have museum visitors interact more easily. In that way, we
easy to understand and easy-to-use. can avoid the problem that there are no comics to read on
the multitouch table, as well. It is important to show at least
V. D ISCUSSION a message saying that this area is empty until the predefined
number of panels for one story has been finished.
The findings of the two usability and user-experience studies Collaboration: Our findings show that users are more likely
can give some implications and experiences for the design of to work on a comic alone instead of in a group. So, we can
collaborative drawing applications with the focus on story- confirm the results of Block et al. [29] and express the need to
telling on multi-touch tables in art museums. The results seem provide a meaningful single-user experience. But surprisingly,
to be consistent with other research as shown in the following this phenomenon can be noticed differently depending on
sections. the topic of the story. Some topics are more likely to be
Concept & Interaction Design: The interface of the drawn collaboratively than others. To ascertain why there is a
drawing application was designed in analogy to well-known noticeable imbalance in the stories with regards to visitors
applications such as Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator. The tool working alone or collaboratively, more research would be
palette is positioned on the left side of the interface, with the necessary.
drawing area next to it. By tapping a tool, a menu opens and Besides the known behavior of social learning and periph-
provides the different choices the tool offers. By using drag eral interest identified by Hinrichs and Carpendale [30], we
and drop or tapping on the selection of the text elements, could determine the fact that users help each other by giving
for example, they appear on the drawing area. The video hints or performing the interaction for their partners on their
observations of the field study and the personal observation in personal area.
the laboratory show that only few users prefer the possibility Research Methods: The conducted research methods, the
to drag and drop elements over tapping on an element and user study in the laboratory setting on the one hand, the user
have it appear on the drawing area. The comic reading section study in the field on the other hand, can be categorized as very
is structured the same way; on the left, one can choose useful. The early on user-centered research in the laboratory
between the four different stories and next to the sidebar gave important insights on the problems of the interface and
the presentation area is positioned. Based on the statements user behaviors while interacting with the drawing application
of the conducted questionnaires, and interaction behaviors of on the multi-touch table. Here, we were able to discern that the
visitors as seen on the videos of both studies, we can state concept of collaborative storytelling while drawing is effective
that this structure of the interface works well for a wide range and satisfying for users even early in the design process.
of visitors. The second usability study in the field with video record-
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Comic Experience: Narrative & Collaborative Drawing on a Multi-Touch Table in an Art Museum
Fig. 10: Example narrative created during the field study.
ings, logging and a questionnaire provided different insights Collaboration: Museum studies have found that people
into the usage of the drawing application. The video recordings often visit exhibitions in groups [9], [32]. Yet, many muse-
gave us the chance to identify the overall usage of the drawing ums offer elements where visitors work on individual tasks
application and insights into social interactions in groups sequentially or parallel, but never collaboratively [31]. So,
or alone. To get more information of the visitors and their systems should provide aspects of collaborative work not only
interactions the logging of the data gave us knowledge about in the form of integrating large tabletops but also interaction
the exact number of sessions, used stories and tools as well concepts and game concepts for working in groups on one task.
as the age of the visitors. So, the combination of video With our tool, we can introduce a storytelling approach for a
recordings and the data logging can be recommended as it is drawing application with the focus on collaborative drawing,
very useful. In upcoming studies we would integrate a personal by allowing museum visitors to draw on their personal working
questionnaire again, asking the visitors about their interaction area, but simultaneously draw in collaboration with other
with the interface to get more insights into the needs and users.
wishes of the target group. In future research we plan to focus on identifying which
aspects of the application work well in any museum, which
VI. C ONCLUSION & F UTURE W ORK are specific to a certain type of museum, and which only cover
the particular needs of the Karikaturmuseum Krems.
The presented study was designed to determine the effects
of the integration of an application on a multi-touch table in ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
the context of the Karikaturmuseum Krems. Thus, a drawing We want to thank Gottfried Gusenbauer, the director of the
application based on a collaborative concept was developed Karikaturmuseum Krems, who contributed to the project in
and tested in the field and in a laboratory environment. many fruitful discussions. This work was supported by the
The results show that there is large potential for introducing Austrian Ministry for Transport, Innovation and Technology
such kind of digital technology in a museum’s context. The (BMVIT) under the ICT of the future program via the VALiD
development of systems such as mentioned for collaborative project (no. 845598) and by the Austrian Federal Ministry
drawing applications with a storytelling aspect to them for art of Science, Research and Economy under the FFG COIN
museums introduces some challenges, such as: program (MEETeUX project, no. 7209770).
Interplay Between Table-top and Smart Device: Con-
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