Date the Artist is a video based interactive website that presents people with the opportunity to date a virtual character (VC). Each webpage represents a stage of the relationship. In each page, the user has 2 to 3 choices leading to different videos. By the end, all the videos lead to the same final video representing the end of the relationship. The goal of this paper is to explain the design process, the main metaphor behind the project, as well as highlighting the overall user experience.

•Human-centered computing ~Interaction design ~Interaction design process and methods ~Scenario-based design •Applied computing ~Arts and humanities ~Media arts •Information systems ~World Wide Web ~Web interfaces.

Interaction design; Virtual dating; Video Art; Web design

ACM Reference format Hanae Hmimid and Matthew Mosher. 2020. Date the Artist: A Virtual Date with a Virtual Character. In Proceedings of ACM Hypertext conference (HT’20). July 13–15, 2020, Virtual Event, USA. ACM, New York, NY, USA. 2 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3372923.3404803

INTRODUCTION Date the Artist is an interactive website containing the experience of a virtual date with a virtual character. The project was created from a desire to imagine the possible future of dating. Nowadays, especially with the expansion of virtual dating, people are drawn to meet potential partners and communicate on an intimate level virtually. On one hand, among many reasons virtual dating allows people to express their “true self” defined as the qualities that someone wishes to acquire[1]. On the other hand, there are attempts to create AI’s that look and behave like humans. Therefore, AI could potentially engage in romantic relationship

Orlando Florida USA matthew.mosher@ucf.edu

with humans in the future. Date the Artist is a combination of these ideas embodied in a VC. It visualizes what the future of dating could look like, and it highlights the issues that might arise from it in a fictional scenario. Date the Artist is available at https://hanaehmimid.wixsite.com/datetheartist

RELATED WORK Conceptually, the project is similar to Mystic Messenger a Korean dating simulation video game. Like Date the Artist, the primary aim of the video game is to pursue a romantic relationship and cultivate intimacy with a virtual character [1]. The Aesthetics of Date the Artist is inspired by Max Headroom one of the first virtual characters, he looks and moves like a human and speaks with an electronically sampled voice, the character exists in a graphical environment [2]. The commonality between the two characters is that they both exist in a virtual world and communicate with audiences using video, as well as using the same montage technics to simulate disruption and non-linearity. Lastly, the narrative in Date the Artist is partly inspired by romantic Science fiction movie Her by Spike Jonze[3]. Similarly in Date the Artist the main goal of the narrative is to create attachment between the VC and the user.

Figure 1: Screenshot from website Date the Artist: You erased the Artist NARRATIVE &CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT The narrative is based on a short-term relationship. It focuses in particular, on the first dates and the decline of a relationship. The character’s speech is written in a way to bring the user closer, especially at the beginning through whispering. Throughout the videos the artist implemented elements that predict the end of the

relationship and the potential reason of that outcome. The main motive of the character is to find someone “real”. While most people would interpret “real” as someone “genuine”, the character actually uses it to refer to someone virtually real who would fit in her virtual world and not in the real world. Once she realizes that the user is not a virtual being as she had hoped, the VC and her environment start to breakdown. The lack of physical virtual interaction jeopardizes the whole system, eventually causing it to fail as seen in figure 1.

USER EXPERIENCE The project focus is not to make sure that the user understands the purpose of the website on an intellectual level, but to create different sets of emotions ranging from curiosity, excitement, attachment, attraction, intimacy, and confusion. Date the Artist hopes to trigger questions in the user’s mind about virtual dating and the nature of intimacy in dating simulation games. There are many elements both technical and conceptual used throughout the project to trigger these emotions, such as the narrative, color composition, image, speech, videos, characters, etc. The idea is to push the user to ask questions such as; what does it mean to be real in the real world and in the virtual world?

Figure 2: Screenshot from website Date the Artist: I am not hungry

Figure 3: Screenshot from website Date the Artist: Let me take out to dinner

The artist’s aim is to trigger an underlying feeling of guilt due to deceiving the VC. She also hopes to blur the line between the real

Poster Session - I HT ’20, July 13–15, 2020, Virtual Event, USA

and virtual world by triggering strong emotions of empathy and attachment.

WEB DESIGN The contextual design is as important as the character design. The website serves as an outer layer of the story environment. The interactivity happens on two levels: when the user makes choices and also when the characters interact with each other through the use of speech bubbles. Statues, background images, and all the data from the previous videos symbolizes memory, and spatial relationships create a non-verbal channel of communication with the user, as seen in figure 2. In the last two videos where the system breaks the design is empty and blurry, the environment elements and characters get captured inside of the video.

VIDEO & MONTAGE & MUSIC Certain technics of filming were used to communicate important aspects of the story, such as placing the character in different corners of the frame or showing only half figure of the character to create suspense. The use of different scale shots, varying from medium close ups to extreme close ups, create a feeling of intimacy with the viewer. It was important to keep video backgrounds almost empty in order to erase any resemblance between real and virtual environments as seen in figure 3. Color grading plays an important role in externalizing how the character feels, e.g. Pink symbolizes innocence and playfulness, and blue technology. Jump cuts were used to disrupt the body movement, challenging the viewer to analyze what is happening to the character and how the story is unfolding. Glitch, image and sound distortion as well as non-linear editing was used to create an energy and rhythm to the videos. Lastly, music drives the pace of editing and solidifies the idea conveyed in the videos and the overall project.

CONCLUSION

Date the Artist presents a web design project that may be of interest to storytellers and filmmakers who want to extend their stories to more interactive interfaces. Similar techniques could be implements in bigger transmedia projects like video games and interactive fiction. The project also encourages independent videographers and filmmaker to work on small scale projects while enjoying the freedom to generate content of their choice with few resources.

[1] John A. Bargh, Katelyn Y. A. Mckenna, and Grainnes M. Fitzsimons. 2002. Can you See the Real Me? Activation od expression of the “True Self” on the Internet. Journal of Social Issues 58,1 (2002), 33-48. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1540-456000247 [2] Rosanna E. Guadagno, Jim Blascovich, Jeremy N. Bailenson & Cade Mccall (2007) Virtual Humans and Persuasion: The Effects of Agency and Behavioral Realism, Media Psychology, 10:1, 1-22. [3] Niklas Luhmann. 1995. Art as a Social System: The function of Art and the Differentiation of the Art System (Frankfurt am Main, 1995); trans. Eva M. knodt (Stanford University Press,2000)133-83 [4] Morales Rodriguez, Maria Pavard, Bernard Barbosa, Juan Javier.2009. Virtual Humans and Social Interaction. 158-163. DOI:researchgate.met/publication/220758037VirtualHumansandSocialInte raction