CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT: PERCEPTION

After talking to Yvonne in weeks 7 and 8, we established that the underlying theme that I was interested in was the unique perspectives that the site has to offer. Some of the things we looked at were user may view the site and what perceptions can be created. I want to be able to manipulate these perceptions and create new perceptions of the site. I am looking at sensory perceptions to stimulate thoughts, visual stimulation, memory and experience. An interesting idea that Yvonne had was that the environment could have an impact on what perspectives are offered. For example temperature change, wind strength/direction, river tides etc could cause the building to change colour. An example of something similar that happens in nature would be plants, where in dry weather with no water they dehydrate and turn brown, in humid/rainy weather plants are green. I will look into other examples of this sort of thing.

To obtain a greater understanding of perception I thought that googling it's definition would be a good start:

per·cep·tion: noun

• The ability to see, hear, or become aware of something through the senses
• The state of being or process of becoming aware of something in such a way
• A way of regarding, understanding, or interpreting something; a mental impression
• Intuitive understanding and insight
• The neurophysiological processes, including memory, by which an organism becomes aware of and interprets external stimuli

SOURCE: www.google.com.au

I am particularly interested in the last definition of perception whereby it refers to the biological explanation of the process of perception. I will investigate if different organisms have different ways/ methods of perceiving at a later stage....

From my research and my own understanding of perception, I put together this mind map exploring the concept and opportunities for perception for my site:

Examples of manipulating perception:

The lines are the same length in each picture. The addition of lines and placement of other lines effects our perception of length. In the second photo, the vertical uninterrupted line appears longer than the broken horizontal line. I will try and play with this kind of visual perception in my project to alter the views of the site.