Silver Interface, Interaction and User Experience Design · 2020
Baseball Experience - Pitch Interactive Exhibit
- A' Design Award 2020 Silver Winner in Interface, Interaction and User Experience Design
- Awarded April 15, 2020
- CLIENT: Yogi Berra Museum & Learning Center
- Estimated Number of Design Views: 42,399
- Verification code 2499C3912F · Verify this award
About Baseball Experience - Pitch Interactive Exhibit
Yogi Berra was a baseball icon. The museum dedicated to his greatness in Little Falls, NY, was looking for a modern and fun sparkling way to deliver his spirit to young and old. Responsive Spaces provided an easy to engage with, interactive exhibit which presents the physics of baseball to all visitors. The goal was to be convenient enough for indoor use while at the same time deliver some ball whirling action. By combining stylized illustrations with high-tech sensor magic Responsive Spaces created an installation, which meets all prerequisites and most importantly, is lots of fun to play!
Press Kit
- Unique Properties
- The exhibit was created following a call for proposals from the Yogi Berra museum. The goal was to provide an easy to engage with, interactive installation which presents the physics of baseball to all visitors. It had to be convenient enough for indoor use while at the same time delivering some ball whirling action, while not marginalizing the myth of baseball and Yogi Berra himself. We developed a concept that would meet all this prerequisites and most importantly, is lots of fun to play!
- Dimensions & Packaging
- The pitching installation consists of a 3x2 seamless Displays matrix in a rig with a secure glass front in order to take hits from the baseballs. Mounted on top is a LMS laser ranger from Sick to track the balls position and a radar gun from Stalker Technology which measures the balls speed. All of this is interconnected via a specific hardware setup and the incoming data is processed in real time through our application. Everything is handcrafted specifically for this purpose. Last but not least there is a basket full of softballs eagerly waiting to be tossed around!
- Tags
- baseball, Yogi Berra, interactive exhibit, family-friendly, permanent exhibition, museum, tracking technology
- Production Technology
- The Installation utilizes a laser range sensor in order to track the incoming balls impact location on the screen while a radar speed sensor measures its impact speed. This data is being processed in real time into the game logic and drives the game mechanics. These two system are top mounted onto the Display grid which shows a stylized version of a batter platform, whose players react accordingly to the speed and hit location of your pitch while giving you feedback about your performance.
- Design Challenge
- The creative challenge was to simplify the physics of baseball to an absolute bare minimum while preserving a maximum joy factor for 4 to 104 year old visitors. It should be self explanatory and accessible from the first second you encounter it and still deliver an entertaining and memorable experience of playing a game about a wonderful game. It should be for anyone at anytime while being durable enough to withstand heavy usage without a scratch. We wanted to cast smiles on the faces of amateurs and professionals alike.
- Project Duration
- The installation went live in June 2018 and is still part of the exhibition (as of August 2019), Yogi Berra Museum and Learning Center in Little Falls, NJ, United States.
- Operation Flow
- Visitors take one of the soft baseballs provided and throw it as hard as they can towards the animated Pitcher on the display-wall. When the ball hits the glass, its digital twin is transferred into the game and continues his original trajectory in slow-mo while the batter tries to hit it (or the catcher catches it). Standard baseball rules apply. The different stages of the game are thoroughly animated as are the statistics of your throws. If you strike the batter out, you get rewarded with legendary quotes from Yogi.
- Research
- We put a lot of research into the topic of tracking fast moving objects like baseballs. The challenge was to get an accurate position and speed rating every time a ball was thrown either by a child or even a professional. In order to acquire the highest precision possible with minimum to none false positives, we had to experiment with the technicality and calibration of motion based field scanners in order to detect a super fast and hard hitting baseball within fractions of a second correctly.
- Inspiration
- Our inspiration for this project was to merge the playfulness of the popular sport of baseball with its importance for American pop culture. We wanted to create a game about a game itself and capture its magical fascination, addressing all people young at heart, regardless of age and constitution. Ahead of everything else the exhibit needed to capture the cult of Yogi Berra himself, one behemoth of baseball history with his memorable quotes, his success and influence on sports culture.
- Image Credits
- photos & video: Eyup Kuş
photos: Yogi Berra Museum & Learning Center
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G0E23 ShopGrand Interview about Baseball Experience - Pitch Interactive Exhibit
The details of the technical solution really came to life during the progress of the project. We did not think technology, we thought experience. The goal was, to create a very simplified, but entertaining way, to create a media installation that embodies the core elements of baseball. We then simply needed something to measure the speed and the hit-point of the soft balls on the display surfaces.
To keep it as simple as possible from a "player" point of view. Take a ball and throw it .. That's it!The harder you hit and the more accurate .. the higher the chances to get Yogi Berra deliver one of his famous quotes.
Again, same answer. By keeping it as simple as possible ;-) There is really not much more to it. While developing an installation like this, you should never forget the simplicity of the original goal that was set out in the beginning.
We just knew, we need to be able to track fast thrown balls. The slow ones were easy from the beginning of the prototyping process. The fast ones were the challenge. Luckily we could find a sensor, that runs on a high enough frequency to really "catch" the position of the hit of balls that are thrown at even rocket-speed.
We developed a unique illustrative style that allowed us to stay playful, to stay flexible for animations and to not hurt the overall image and memory of the icon that is Yogi Berra.
By being able to keep everything pretty simple, we were also able to create a very stable system. But nothing would have been possible without the really great support of the stuff of the museum. They - for years now - do really take care of the installation.
There is no other way, to our mind, to create a game that feels real, if it is not built as a real-time application. Interaction design is a very unique discipline because it happens on the intersection of so many fields of speciality: graphic design, technological possibilities and limitations, human-machine interaction aspects, game play and experience design as well as the fact to not forget, that Pitch! should make fun to use!
There was always the goal to draw a strong connection to Yogi Berra. The museum is full of his sport accomplishments. Therefore we thought it might be fun to bring in his quotes, because they were also a big part of him and supported his status as sports icon as well as a person, that is part of American popular culture. "It ain't over 'till it's over" is a quote, for example, that is simply bigger than sport.
Interactivity and engagement is key to successful installations in museums and exhibition. The people of today, more than ever before, do not just want to be told stuff, they want to be entertained.
Do not think about technical limitations or stuff that might not work too soon. Start with the core idea, the core goal of whatever you want to achieve. And then go from there ... The technologies that are available to all of us nowadays are so capable, that usually, every idea can be brought to life. And if the core idea is good, the final thing will be good as well.