An experimental collaborative experience powered by movement, awareness and communication
I designed this experience as a tribute to the power of collaboration. I believe that humanity reaches its greatest potential when we join forces, recognizing that every individual plays a vital role in achieving a common goal. Drawing inspiration from my background in music, improvisation, and cooperative games, I’ve crafted “4-Collaboration” to be an experience where movement, communication, and collective problem-solving are at the heart of the journey.
Background
4-Collaboration is my Master’s Thesis project at the ATLAS Institute at CU Boulder. This project premiered in the ATLAS B2 Black Box on March 24th, 2025 where 40 participants reached outside of their comfort zone and collaborated with strangers in this immersive experience.
The participants only input into the 4-Collaboration experience is the motion capture system natively integrated into the black box. Each participant holds a “color wand” and are told that the position of this wand in the room is tracked via motion capture. To demonstrate this, each color wand also has a light with its corresponding color tracking the participant.
Through exploration, participants soon learn that their position in the room isn’t what directly matters, instead the relative position between themselves and their teammates. The distance between each participant is represented using a “colorful squiggly line” shown on a large projector screen.
Survey
Participants of the experience took a brief anonymous survey about “4-Collaboration.” The results of the survey showed that most participants barely knew each other and that almost all of them felt that it was a collaborative experience where each of their voices mattered and communication improved throughout the experience.
| Mean | Std Dev | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Group Acquaintance Level | 2.17/5 | ±1.19 | Most groups were not well-acquainted |
| Collaboration Rating | 4.35/5 | ±0.71 | Overall collaboration was highly rated |
| Communication Change (Growth) | 4.09/5 | ±0.95 | Strong sense that communication improved throughout experience |
“I really liked the embodied puzzle experience”
“I loved that there were so many ways to solve the puzzle”
“I started working with people, strangers really, toward a common goal”
“Even though it was such an abstract visual, it made a lot of sense”