Research
My main research area is processes to improve the workflows around project-documentation in the area of personal and digital fabrication, especially hobbyist crafters and makers.
The maker community relies on process documentation and sharing knowledge to get inspired for new projects and reduce the repetition of errors within the community. However, process documentation can interrupt the crafting workflow and feel tedious. To help makers optimize their processes to document, I want to understand the documentation selection process and provide guidelines and templates based on observations and interviews to improve the documentation quality. Additionally, I want to create systems and interfaces that support the maker during the crafting process by tracking what they are doing and generating a template of used materials and tools to include in a documentation where the maker only needs to add their personal touch in the end.
The end goal is a system that acts as a supportive guide without distracting or interrupting the crafting workflow which is at the core of the maker hobby while improving the quality of the resulting documentation as a benefit for all stakeholders of the maker community.
Thesis Supervision
Fortunately, I am close to finishing my PhD studies. Unfortunately, this means that I will not be able to supervise any further theses. Thank you to all the students who entrusted me with being their supervisor in the past! I am grateful for your trust and the great collaborations.
Theses
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Bachelor Thesis about exploring augmented reality visualisations for physical indoor search Supervisor: Nur Al-huda Hamdan with Co-Supervisor Christian Corsten |
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Master Thesis about Modeling Reachability on Curved Mobile Touchscreens Supervisor: Simon Voelker and Christian Corsten |
Projects:
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Video capturing and editing Programmierung für Alle (Java) '13, iPhone Application Programming WS 13/14 |
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Mobile conference App The mobile schedule of the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST) 2012 in Cambridge, MA, USA. (in collaboration with IKA) |
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prodUSER Interdisciplinary Project to develop future interfaces of computer aided manufacturing and to improve the quality of future working environments in this area. |
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Student Volunteer at Mensch und Computer 2016 German Conference about Human Computer Interaction and Usability Professionals |
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Fab Academy 2016 Graduate Fab Academy 2017 Instructor The Fab Academy is a fast paced, hands-on learning experience where students plan and execute a new project each week. Each individual documents their progress for each project, resulting in a personal portfolio of technical accomplishments. (Source) |
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Maker Faire Rome 2016 Staff at the Media Computing Exhibition Booth Maker Faire is the Greatest Show (and Tell) on Earth—a family-friendly festival of invention, creativity and resourcefulness, and a celebration of the Maker movement. (Source) |
Teaching
| Winter 2022/23 | Designing Interactive Systems 1 Lecture TA |
| Summer 2022 | Current Topics in HCI Lecture TA |
| Winter 2021/22 | Designing Interactive Systems 1 Lecture TA |
| Summer 2021 | Current Topics in HCI Lecture TA |
| Winter 2020/21 | Designing Interactive Systems 1 Lecture TA |
| Summer 2020 | Proseminar: Human-Computer Interaction Seminar Organizer |
| Winter 2019/20 | Seminar: Post-Desktop User Interfaces Seminar Organizer |
| Summer 2019 | Current Topics in HCI Lecture TA |
| Winter 2018/19 | Proseminar: Human-Computer Interaction Seminar Organizer |
Workshops
| Fab:UNIverse Zukunftsvisionen der Maker Bewegung Workshop organized by the VINN:Lab at TH Wildau about the future of Fab Labs with a university context. Discussed topics:
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Supervised Theses
| 2022 | Mark Christy George | Using Machine Learning to Enable Material Substitutions in Maker Projects | (Master Thesis) |
| 2022 | Ricarda Rahm | Automating User Skill Evaluation to Provide Matching DIY Tutorials | (Master Thesis) |
| 2021 | Michael Assad | Magora: A live maker process documentation platform | (Bachelor Thesis, co-supervised with René Schäfer) |
| 2020 | Lia Schulze Dephoff | Why are you using a screwdriver? Exploring virtual process documentation assistance agents in the maker community | (Master Thesis) |
| 2020 | Vivian Huff | "Why is the Parts List Missing?" Understanding User Parameters for Hardware Documentation Selection in the Maker Community | (Master Thesis) |
| 2019 | Tanja Golinski | Understanding Hardware Documentation Processes in the Maker Community | (Master Thesis) |
| 2018 | Reding Jeff | Don’t Touch Me:Communicating Immovability of Tangibles on Interactive Tabletops | (Bachelor Thesis, co-supervised with Christian Cherek) |
| 2018 | Frederik Menke | Tracking Manufacturing Workflows in Makerspace Environments | (Bachelor Thesis) |
Supervised Theses (Second Supervision)
| 2022 | Anika Flocken | Anforderungsanalyse an ein Tool zur Studienverlaufsplanung aus Studierendensicht | (Bachelor Thesis, first supervision: Prof. Dr. Ulrik Schroeder (i9)) |
| 2022 | Yasmin Döhner | Activity Completion Tracking in Learning Management Systems. | (Master Thesis, first supervision: Prof. Dr. Ulrik Schroeder (i9)) |
| 2019 | Hong An Nguyen | Die Auswirkung von ästhetischem Empfinden und Benutzerfreundlichkeit auf den Erfolg in Multi-Touch-Lernspielen. | (Master Thesis, first supervision: Prof. Dr. Ulrik Schroeder (i9)) |
| 2019 | Yasmin Döhner | Guideline zum Lernen mit dem Gerät über das Gerät für verschiedene Zielgruppen. | (Bachelor Thesis, first supervision: Svenja Noichl (i9)) |
| 2019 | Prudhvee Nalluri | Improve basic Computer Science competences using Video Infographics | (Master Thesis, first supervision: Svenja Noichl (i9)) |
Publications
- Marcel Lahaye, Ricarda Rahm, Andreas Dymek, Adrian Wagner, Judith Ernstberger and Jan Borchers. How’s Your Sewing? Investigating Metrics to Automatically Assess Sewing Expertise. In Extended Abstracts of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI '24, pages 7, Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, May 2024.
- Marcel Lahaye, Vivian Isabel Reinartz, Sarah Sahabi and Jan Borchers. Towards Authoring Tools For DIY Tutorials: From Tutorial User Strategies to Guidelines (Free Template Included!). In Mensch Und Computer 2023, MuC '23, pages 380–386, Association for Computing Machinery, September 2023.
- Jan Borchers, Anke Brocker and Marcel Lahaye. Lernkarten-Set 3D-Druck. Bombini Verlag, December 2021.
- Iris Bockermann, Jan Borchers, Anke Brocker, Marcel Lahaye, Antje Moebus, Stefan Neudecker, Oliver Stickel, Melanie Stilz, Daniel Wilkens, René Bohne, Volkmar Pipek and Heidi Schelhowe. Handbuch Fab Labs. Bombini Verlag, August 2021.
- Christian Corsten, Marcel Lahaye, Jan Borchers and Simon Voelker. ForceRay: Extending Thumb Reach via Force Input Stabilizes Device Grip for Mobile Touch Input. In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI '19, pages 212:1–212:10, ACM, New York, NY, USA, May 2019.
- Marcel Lahaye. Modeling Reachability on Curved Mobile Touchscreens. Master's Thesis, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, April 2019.
- Nur Al-huda Hamdan, Marcel Lahaye, Christian Corsten and Jan Borchers. Presentation Strategies for Micro-Navigation in the Physical World. In Extended Abstracts of the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI EA '16, pages 3062–3068,May 2016.
- Marcel Lahaye. Augmented Reality in Hierarchical Micro-Navigation. Bachelor's Thesis, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, March 2015.