Chronoscope is a domestic technology that enables its owner to view, explore, and reflect on a wide range of potentially known, forgotten, or entirely unknown connections from the past that are captured in their vast personal digital photo archive. When peering into Chronoscope, a single photo tied to the specific time that it was taken is visible. A rotating wheel (large black or grey cylindrical surface) moves in two directions: navigating forward and backward in time (as a subtle analogy to the temporal flow evoked by the movement and circular shape of clocks). When the user stops the rotation, Chronoscope settles on the specific image associated with where ‘in time’ the device is at according to different temporal organizations of their archive (basic, date, time) chosen by turning the side knob. While Chronoscope’s design is highly resolved, the experience with it is largely undetermined and unstructured. It does not suggest where one ought to look in their past. Our goal is to catalyze ongoing, open-ended experiences—moments of curiosity, contemplation, reminiscence, and inquisitive exploration.
Chronoscope is envisioned, designed, and developed by Amy Chen, Will Odom, Henry Lin, and Ce Zhong. It is an ongoing project still in progress. We have published an ACM DIS 2019 paper that details practical and theoretical insights that emerged through Research through Design process of crafting the Chronoscope design artifact. We also had an exhibition at the DIS 2019 conference in San Diego where attendees could interact with and explore the Chronoscope. We recently completed a small batch production of Chronoscope research products that we aim to use for field studies with people in their everyday contexts over time.
Publications
Amy Yo Sue Chen, William Odom, Ce Zhong, Henry Lin, and Tal Amram. 2019. Chronoscope: Designing Temporally Diverse Interactions with Personal Digital Photo Collections. In Proceedings of the 2019 on Designing Interactive Systems Conference (DIS ’19). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 799-812. (.PDF | ACM Link).
Amy Yo Sue Chen, William Odom, Ce Zhong, Henry Lin, and Tal Amram. 2019. Chronoscope: A Near-eye Tangible Device for Interacting with Photos In and Across Time. In Companion Publication of the 2019 on Designing Interactive Systems Conference 2019 Companion (DIS ’19 Companion). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 1-4. (.PDF | ACM Link).