Sonic Interaction Design in Immersive Theatre

Immersive theatre has two vital features: immersion and interactivity. Immersion has two types: one is physical immersion, and the other one is mental immersion. Interactivity happens between audiences and immersive theatre production, such as props, installations and actors. Audiences have chances to interact with sets, installations and actors. Besides, immersion and interactivity are not two distinct features. Interactivity can help lower the barriers to the immersive experience, but it cannot guarantee immersion in the audience. This thesis shows the result of three professional sound designers’ interviews and a case study of immersive theatre – Sleep No More in Shanghai to analyse sound design methods. From interviews and the case study, we can learn that sound is an important component in immersive theatre, as in other theatre performances. Sound design approaches have some similarities and differences when compared to traditional theatre. Looping sound is a main technique for the sound designer. Besides, they will also create a different audio system for immersive theatre, which happens in different spaces. In this thesis, a sonic interactive system flowchart was provided. It compares two types of gesture recognition technology, analyses the possible ways users can manipulate this system by using software design methods and uses the audio engine to design the system flowchart. Considering the concept of the sound zone in Sleep No More, we can combine scopes of camera-based gesture recognition devices with the sound zone in immersive theatre.