Introduction

The Enschede Weaving Factory project’s aim is to showcase the conditions in which people worked during the 1920s-1930s in weaving factories. The project is being passed down from last year by Andreas Ioannou, Kevin Nijkamp, and Trim Vezveja as a part of the IMT&S program, providing our team with a solid starting point such as animated looming machine models, worker models, and research. Based on that, our team is expected to develop a VR experience for Museumfabriek. The final product will be featured at the museum to give visitors a historically accurate and immersive view of working conditions during that time.

The client for this project is Rob Maas who is acting as the primary point of contact between the team and the end client, Edwin Plokker, curator of the Museumfabriek.

The team consists of ten members:

Project management and setup

Setup

Notion

We had to decide on project management tools and went with Notion. It was highly recommended by most of the students and seemed like a very interesting option. There were some hiccups as the free plan was limited to 1000 blocks and we received the unlimited educational plan.

Using Pipederam, a webtool, Faried managed to link the notion calendar to a google calendar. Pipedream retrieves the events from notion and adds or updates them within the google calendar automatically. With this, everyone should have easier access to a calendar and not have to install yet another calendar app.

Homepage setup in notion.

Other management systems

• A gantt chart was setup to get an overview of the milestones that need to be achieved. Here, the team leads tried to define initial milestones and dates for the project.

• PowerPoint templates were created for the weekly meetings

• We had also setup a project proposal document to send towards Rob and confirm that our understanding of the aim of the project is the same as what the museum envisioned.

  Project objective - Enschede weaving factory.pdf

• Google drive structure was setup

• Perforce as version control

  Engineer version control setup

Gantt chart

Jenkins host setup

Research Methodology: Design Thinking

In the first phases of the project, we decided to settle for the design thinking research methodology to create structure and flow right at the start. The design thinking model consists of five stages: Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype, and Test. We began the Empathize stage by contacting the clients, Rob Maas and Edwin Plokker to better understand the problem statement and the desired outcome of the project. Once the project’s aim was in view, we began with the Define stage, which consisted of empathy maps, managing team roles, writing a MoSCoW model, and defining the scope. Moving forward, we got the team together to ideate concepts for the final deliverable, which we then filtered, voted on, and pitched to the client to decide our next steps. This consisted of prototyping, which proved challenging in certain points and caused delays in the development process. Lastly, there was the Testing stage, which consisted of a mixture of AB testing and normal feedback sessions with the target audience.

All of these stages will be described in detail throughout this devlog.

Concept Phase | Week 1.2 - 1.4

On the first day of the project, a meeting was held between the team and Rob Maas, in which he explained the project, his wishes as the client, and expectations from the final product. During this meeting, Rob made it clear that the aim of the project is showcasing the factory in a realistic manner with historical accuracy at the forefront of our minds. While the initial files of the project include an outside neighborhood around the factory, the focus for our contribution is to make the inside of the factory. An immersive atmosphere is expected, including the warm, loud, dusty, and dirty conditions in which people had to work.

Initial research

We began doing research quickly, with the Designers creating a research document, as well as a design document, to explain our target audience, main objective, mechanics, and primarily, historical facts to maintain accuracy. During this period, we all visited the Museumfabriek and did a guided tour with Edwin Plokker as our guide. He showed us the machines exhibit, showcasing how they function and providing more details on the conditions workers had to live in. We were given a booklet of gestures used by the factory workers during that period to communicate, as the machines did not allow for talking.

Booklet on gestures provided by Edwin Plokker and the Museumfabriek.

Tool exploration and documentation

For the first four weeks, the team spent time researching not only historical facts, but also the software we would use for the project. Our engineer got to work on setting up our project’s digital infrastructure, starting with git. However, Unreal Engine works better with Perforce, so the engineer started learning Perforce as a replacement for Git. The designers and artists alike learned how to set up and work with motion capture suits. Likewise, the entire team learned Unreal Engine 5, the engine used for the project. Additionally, Marvelous Designer and Wwise were programs learned during this time by certain members of the team.

An empathy map was created once the target audience was established based on average museum visitor ages. It was decided that the average age was 15-year-olds taken either by parents or on school trips.

Empathy Map made by Nataliia Sviridenko and Carolina Bertoncello Machado.

Design Phase | Week 1.3 - 1.5

Concept proposals

Once the concept for the project was made clear, the team began ideating. Collectively, we created ten different ideas for what to deliver to the client by the end of the project. We then discussed amongst ourselves the advantages and disadvantages of each idea, their feasibility, and how well they match with the client’s vision. By the end of the discussion, we narrowed it down to three “umbrella” concepts.

VR experience ideation.pdf

1. A narrative guided tour through the factory.
   1. The user follows a worker guide through the factory and learns about each machine and part of the job.
2. Open points of interest with storytelling.
   1. The user teleports from point to point, viewing machines and workers’ day-to-day up-close with narration.
3. A live environment of the factory.
   1. The user has free reign of the factory and can view everything as a spectator.

Pros and cons of each umbrella concept

After pitching these concepts to Rob Maas with a 1 pager document, he suggested we use elements from each concept and create a mixture. We then discussed the pros and cons of each one, ruling out the features that proved too complex for the time provided, or counteractive towards the client’s wishes.

1 pagers.pdf

The final concept consists of creating a live scene environment of the factory, using spatial audio to create immersion and subtly guide the user around. The user will have free reign over which point of interest they want to discover using VR teleportation system, and sound will be used to pique their interest towards different directions. Realistic 3D models of machines and other props will be laid out throughout the factory, with a number of diverse characters working on them and acting out microstories all throughout the factory. The user will take on the role of a worker within a reactive environment, where they will not interact with any of the machines, but will instead be acknowledged by the NPCs in the factory whenever approached.

To complete the concepting phase, we had to visualise how such a factory experience may look like

Mood board by Faried Elawady

MoSCoW Prioritization Method

For the 1st version of our prototype, we used a MoSCoW method to showcase, what has the most priority and what can be left for later.

◦ Teleportation | Realistic character animation | Dynamically built factory | Zeppelin |

| Spacial audio cues Use sound as a leading tool and point of attraction | Factory workers' sign language implementation | Detailed factory | Outside area | | Basic environment block out | Environmental immersion ◦ Volumetric fog and particles ◦ Noises ◦ Object details ◦ Basic lighting | VR motion sickness research implementation | User interactions Hero assets inspector | | Imported mocap recordings | Audio design ◦ Weaving machine layers ◦ Steam engine | Steam engine beat | Museum booth | | Imported Marvelous clothing | User interactions ◦ Trigger events | Minor human sounds (coughing, sighs, etc) | | | | | Museum exhibit design | |

Gate Presentation: Empathize & Define

On the 8th of October of 2024, the team had our first gate presentation for the empathize and define phases. For this, our two team leads, Faried Elawady and Carolina Bertoncello Machado presented for the team. The presentation went smoothly and the feedback was constructive. Questions were raised about the amount of time a user would have to spend in the experience, and how too much information might overwhelm them or lead them to spend more than 3-5 minutes within it, holding up the line for other visitors. A suggestion was made to create a single story for each experience so as to avoid this, however the use of spatial audio and trigger points for each event is sufficient for circumventing the issue of an overwhelming environment.

Additionally, concerns were voiced regarding controller usage, as the process of learning the controls and getting accustomed to them could eat into the time designated for the experience. This would turn a 3-minute experience into one that could take upwards of 10 minutes instead. To prevent this, the team proceeded to brainstorm different ideas for controls, including 3D-printing covers for the VR controllers to block unused buttons, or having movement depend on where the user is facing. Another suggestion was made to include tutorial videos for the sign language used by the factory workers in the waiting line, so other visitors can still learn from the exhibit whilst waiting for the experience.

All this being said, the presentation was well-received and progress is going steady.

To create an experience you have to experience the experience.