Together with Envida’s residential care center Grubbeveld, I developed the Op.Pepper assistance dog system for older adults living with dementia.
During the Interfacing Tomorrow minor at CMD at ZUYD University of Applied Sciences in Maastricht, I spent ten weeks immersing myself in researching a single problem faced by elderly people with dementia, with the goal of developing an interface to help address this issue. I chose the issue of “wandering behavior.”
Through several visits to the residential care center, I gradually got to know the elderly residents and their needs. So I decided to develop an assistance dog that is available virtually 24/7 to accompany the elderly. After several playtests, an interface was created that offers three activities the elderly can perform with the dog. Using an Arduino and TouchDesigner, a projector was controlled to display the dog on a wall.
The dog is able to do three different activities: petting, giving a bone and tossing a ball.
The “buttons” on the interface correspond with these activities:
a piece of fake coat represents dog hair; by petting it, a button underneath gives of a signal to activate a response. The same thing happens with tossing a ball: by rotating a tennis ball on the interface, a reaction by the dog is being initiated. Pressing the bone gives the virtual dog a bone too.
However, the specific reaction of the dog differs each time.
Every activity consists of four different reaction outcomes. Most of the time, the dog reacts “neutral” or “happy”, but it is also possible that the dog doesn’t want to play at a certain point. These scenarios are all initiated by a probability system within Touchdesigner, developed in collaboration with my teacher Tom Luyten. These so called “fuzzy interactions” suggest the dog actually responds naturally, making the whole interface less alienating for the elderly people, given they did not grow up with these type of technologies.
It was absolutely heartwarming seeing the interface in action. It motivated me to use the power of animation for these kind of issues in the future again.
Text: Thorsten Sassen
Updated on 05/30/2026 10:43.