Upload
nomensa
View
493
Download
2
Embed Size (px)
DESCRIPTION
Simon Norris presents on Neuroaesthetics: Science embraces art from UX Brighton 2013.
Citation preview
Hi! I’m Simon from Nomensa.
This is my presentation
Neuroaesthetics: science embraces
art from UX Brighton 2013.
I’ve added my notes to each of the
slides. Any questions, please
contact me @simon_norris.
So, what is beauty? Why is beauty
so important? How does it work?
What can we learn from
understanding beauty? More
importantly by understanding it can
we design better experiences?
22
Jan Vermeer painting A girl with
pearl earring c.1665
What does her look mean?
Aphrodite of Milos or the Venus de
Milo, is one of the most famous
works of ancient Greek sculpture
and is currently on permanent
display at the Louvre Museum in
Paris.
We have been creating works of art
for thousands of years.
David is a masterpiece of
Renaissance sculpture created
between 1501 and 1504, by the
Italian artist Michelangelo.
55
Claude Monet’s Impression Sunrise
c. 1872
The name of the picture contains
the name of the art movement
‘impressionist’ in the title even
though it was heavily criticised at
the time.
6
Impression Sunrise in black-and-
white.
Whilst the sun was the brightest
object in the sky in the previous
slide it is hardly distinguishable
when the colour is removed. The
sun should always be brighter than
the sky if painting in a
representational style. Obviously,
Monet knew how to paint the sun so
it would shimmer in the picture and
therefore by breaking the purely
representational style creates
something totally new and different:
the impressionist art movement.
Neuroaesthetics: science embraces art
So, Neuroaesthetics: science
embraces artAesthetics is a branch of philosophy
concerned with art, beauty and
taste has been discussed for
thousands of years since the time of
Plato. It is obviously pretty important!
David Hume a British empiricist in
the 18th century argued that beauty
does not exist in things but the
minds that contemplate them. Does
the property for aesthetic preference exist in all human
brains?
This presentation will provide a
quick tour of the domain of neuroaesthetics and therefore start
by looking at the brain, its function
and how insights from this domain
can be applied to design.But firstly, a definition...
“...neuroaesthetics, is a new scientific discipline whose object it is to identify and understand the neural processes
involved in human art behaviour - those processes that underlie both the
construction and experience of art.”
Skov & Vartanian Neuroaesthetics definition by Skov
& Vartanian which focuses on art
perception and experience.
It raises an interesting question…..
Beauty is also a property of non-art objects
Does neuroaesthetics play a role in
non-art objects?
We don’t just respond to art but we
also respond to non-art. Let’s look at
a range of non-art objects that have
aesthetic appeal.
Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao
designed by architect Frank Gehry
and opened in 1997.
The curves and unusual geometry
make this building interesting and
aesthetically appealing.
Zaha Hadid designed the Innovation
Tower for the Hong Kong
Polytechnic University which was
completed in 2013.
Like the Guggenheim it is unusual
and aesthetically interesting.
From exteriors to the interiors of
buildings.
The Amagerbro Metro Station in
Copenhagen is a beautiful image
showing the fabulous lighting and
geometry of the space.
From the things we build to things
built by nature.
The image of Mount Fuji reflected in
Lake Yamanaka is a great natural
example of symmetry showing the
snow capped mountain rising above
the town.
Human beings are sounded by many
examples of symmetry within
nature. Is it no wonder we have a
strong preference for symmetrical
objects?
Tigers, like many animals within the
animal kingdom, are considered
beautiful.
This image showing the tiger staring
straight at us reveals its amazing
eye colour and the pattern of its
stripes. It’s an enigmatic image.
For everyone who likes cats :)
When we look out into the cosmos
there are a great many objects of
beauty.
Our star, the Sun, may look a little
scary here but it is still beautiful.
Our own Mother Earth showing an
image of our planet only observable
twice a year, during an Equinox.
To our own galaxy the Milky Way
showing Orion Nebula and Orion’s
belt
The cosmos is beautiful.
Even the things we make can be
beautiful.
Smeg’s retro-style refrigerators with
their curves and simple design have
aesthetic appeal.
To a much smaller product designed
with aesthetic appeal. In fact, its
beautiful design is considered one of
its major features and has
catapulted Apple’s iPhone (version
5) to one the top profit generating
companies in the world.
Aesthetics can make or break a
product!
Even websites can be considered
aesthetic. The Nominet website is
responsive and could be considered
as an example of a website with
aesthetic appeal. The responsive
design approach could also be
considered an aesthetic preference.
In other words, we are developing
preferences for websites that are
responsive and the more
aesthetically pleasing they are, as
well as, responsive, the better the
user experience.
So, aesthetics can be commercially
beneficial.
We also like abstract patterns. We
want to make sense of them.
There are many things in our lives
both natural and designed that have
aesthetic appeal.
Why are some things beautiful?
What drives aesthetics?
So, if beauty is not in the eye but in
the brain. That brings us onto
another important question.
What is the function of the brain?
“the acquisition of knowledge...”
Zeki
I appreciate that there can be many
different definitions for the brain
and what it does. That said, I find
the definition by Zeki to be
particularity poignant.
Simir Zeki is Professor of
Neuroaesthetics at the University
College of London and founded the
Institute of Neuroaesthetics in 2001
at Berkeley, California.
Zeki is known among other things
for the discovery of the many visual
areas of the brain and their
functional specialisation for different
visual attributes such as colour,
motion and form.
For example discovering neurones
in a part of the monkey visual
system that would respond only
when a particular colour, rather than
a particular wavelength, was in their
receptive fields. For example, he
showed that a red-sensitive neuron
would continue to respond to a red
stimulus, even when it was
illuminated mainly by green light.
This was important because it was
the first study relating colour
perception to single cell physiology
in the brain.
This is really interesting and maybe
even a little controversial because it
challenges the orthodox view that
processing sites in the visual brain
are separate from perceptual sites
but in fact, that processing sites can
also be perceptual sites. An idea
Zeki calls Micro-consciousness!
An MRI scanner.
Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI),
nuclear magnetic resonance
imaging (NMRI), or magnetic
resonance tomography (MRT) is a
medical imaging technique used in
radiology to visualise internal
structures of the body in detail. MRI
makes use of the property of
nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)
to image nuclei of atoms inside the
body. MRI can create more detailed
images of the human body than are
possible with X-rays.
The image shows the topography of
the primary visual cortex and
surrounding areas.
This type of image is a typical
output of the brain shown in sagittal
view (A and B) with a close-up on
the visual areas (V1, V2, V3, VP, V3A
and V4V) .
It is important to note that there is
no single area where all specialised
visual circuitry connects and
therefore no single neural centre
exists and it is more likely to be a
neural network.
What is interesting about the brain
and specifically the cortex is its 6
layer formation.
The same anatomical structure can
have profoundly different functions.
It is very hard to tell by anatomical
analysis the difference between the
areas for touch, smell or hearing.
Compare this to other areas of the
body where the differences can be
obvious even by the untrained
observer looking at the anatomical
structures of the retina or the
cochlea.
The 6 layers are composed of two
cell types.
29
The architecture of the cerebral
cortex is composed of a few cellular
types, namely Pyramidal or pyramid
cells (a) and Stellate or star cells (b).
The image shows a detailed view of
Pyramidal or pyramid cells (a) and
Stellate or star cells (b).
Interestingly V1 in the Visual Cortex
has no star cells!
brain concepts?
I mentioned earlier the term ‘brain
concept’ but what are a brain
concepts?
...there are two kinds [brain concepts], inherited and acquired. The two kinds are intimately linked and one could not exist without the other.”
Zeki
inherited or acquired
The inherited concepts organising the
signals that come into the brain so as
to instill meaning into them and thus
make sense of them.The acquired concepts are generated
throughout life by the brain, and make
it significantly independent of the
continual change in the information
reaching the brain; they make it easier
for us to perceive and recognise and
thus obtain knowledge of things and
situations.
A good example of an inherited brain
concept is the perception or seeing of
colour. A person with a normal brain
cannot control or ignore the colour they
see.
We have cells in our Primary Visual
Cortex that are orientation-selective
e.g. cells that only respond to straight
lines.
So horizontal orientation-selective cells
will not respond to a vertical stimulus.Zeki’s consider this brain ability of cells
to fire for specific stimuli to represent
the neural building blocks of form
perception.
Zeki also considers it a form of micro-
consciousness that operates below
normal cognitive operation.
constancy
Zeki outlines other important
functions of the brain, namely,
perceptual constancy and abstraction.
Perceptual constancy allows us to
maintain visual stimuli when
variables such as distance, viewing
angle and illumination change. In
other words the brain maintains an
object’s ‘constancy’ e.g. a banana or
a face will remain intact regardless
of light, angle or distance. The brain
is acting with efficiency and reducing the amount of information
that needs to be remembered or
recalled to recognise a face or a
banana in changing conditions.It has been argued that art exposes
this constancy because it allows us
to capture the essence of an object.Constancy represents a primordial
function of the visual brain.
abstraction
Abstraction is different to constancy
and requires hierarchical neural
coordination. Therefore, general
representation can be applied to
many particulars. So in the case of
art it externalises the functions of
abstraction in the brain. However,
the actual processes involved with
abstraction are currently unknown
to cognitive neurobiology.
“the particular is subordinated to the general, so what is represented is applicable to many particulars.”
ZekiThe quote by Zeki indicates the
limitations of our memories and how
abstraction operates to allow the
brain to behave efficiently within the
need for storing and recalling every
detail.
Memory is reconstructed after all.
ambiguity
Like abstraction and constancy,
ambiguity can be considered a
fundamental brain behaviour that
can operate at different levels.
Let’s look at a definition for
ambiguity.
... a neurobiologically based definition of ambiguity is the opposite of the dictionary
definition; it is not uncertainty, but certainty - the certainty of many, equally plausible
interpretations, each one of which is sovereign when it occupies the conscious stage.”
Zeki
Essentially, the brain is very good at
producing many different
interpretations.
A classic ambiguous object is the
Necker cube.
A visual illusion discovered in 1832
by the Swiss crystallographer L. A.
Necker whilst observing crystal he
noticed changes in the depth of the
crystals, yet, the crystals were not
changing.
It presents an great example of a
physically unvarying stimulus and
how our brains produce 3 possible
interpretations which all are equally
valid.
3939
The Mona Lisa by Leonardo Da Vinci
c.1517
What does her smile mean?
It could mean a great many things
and has been described as
enigmatic.
It certainly will have more than one
interpretation.
How can we use insights from neuroaesthetics in design?
So, what insights can we use from
neuroaesthetics?
Three areas to explore:
- Patterns and pleasure;
- Mental Models;
- Cards.
A great image from Iron Man 3 film
showing Aldrich Killian showing his
brain to Pepper Pots.
pleasure and patterns
We have long known about the role of the
limbic system in the perception of pleasure.We could consider aesthetic perception as the
processing of the visual centres in the brain
such as V1 in the visual cortexWe also know that the brain processes
patterns in its continual quest for knowledge.We also know that the more quickly and more
accurately we can represent a pattern the
more enjoyable it is, e.g. we recognise the
face of a mother, father or child more quickly.Patterns that are ambiguous will increase the
number of interpretations we generate. The
more interpretations the more information we
need to process as well as the potential
uncertainty we feel.Patterns include:
- visual layouts, such as pages, and therefore
a pages overall symmetry;- elements within visual layouts (recognition of
detail e.g. a specific feature or function such
as the carousel);- the flow or interaction between pages.All these elements have an aesthetic that
needs to be considered when designing them.
The aesthetic is not just the colour or
arrangement, and it is also more than the
total combined elements. Aesthetics have a
Gestalt-like effect.
mental models
Maybe brain concepts are the
building blocks of mental models?
We could be synthesising both
acquired and inherited brain
concepts into mental models.
Understanding the link could help us
to design better systems, objects
and experience because we can
assure greater alignment of the
design properties to reflect not just
our mental models but how they are
constructed by the brain.
design patterns: cardsAnother design pattern that is emerging in the digital world is the
use of cards to present and control
the flow of information.All the major digital players are adopting cards and I believe one of
the benefits of using cards is that
they embrace future-friendly thinking. We have mental models
for using cards. This means cards
can naturally support responsive
design and the fashionable flat design aesthetic.
Cards are not new and have used to
present information over along period of time e.g. Top Trumps.Let’s look at two twitter examples of
cards.
The iPhone and iPad version of
twitter showing the discovery
option.
You can see how the information is
compartmentalised and works very
well on devices with smaller screens
than desktop or laptop computers.
I think designing using
Neuroaesthetics insights and
understanding requires a much
broader more holistic approach. It
requires a polymorphous design
thinking attitude - no single
perspective is right or wrong.
The user interface in the recent
Oblivion movie have lots of cards!
Hollywood movie user interface
designers obviously believe they are
the future. However, whilst the
image is beautiful I think the idea of
big physical screens may not
represent the technology trajectory
we are headed on. The user
interface does not utilise many of
our senses and it certainly does not
combined them to augment how we
use information.
micro-macro perspective
We need to adopt a micro-macro
perspective.
Neuroaesthetics is teaching us that
everything is important and a micro-
macro practice considers both the
atomic elements of the design that
can be reduced, as well as, the
design from an holistic (ecological)
perspective.
Everything matters and therefore
everything should be considered.
beauty/style/aesthetic
So beauty, style, aesthetics -
whatever we call it we know they
are all very important.
Yet beauty is much more than
appearance. We aspire to beauty in
all that surrounds us from
architecture, to fashion,
products...well everything we
design. Beauty is meaning. We
don't just see beauty, we feel it.
The more beautiful something is the
likely we are to share it!
Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.
ConfuciusWe need to see the beauty in
everything and heed the wisdom of
Confucius.
Thank you for your attention