Sensus Pond: Exploring Water as Sensing Medium for More-than-Human Observation

Abstract

We introduce Sensus Pond, an interactive system that reconfigures water not merely as a static natural element but as an active sensing medium for registering more-than-human traces. In response to the limitations of anthropocentric approaches in interaction design, we propose a methodological framework of observation without translation, resisting the tendency to stabilize, decode, or humanize nonhuman presence. Drawing from critical theories of more-than-human design and ecological entanglement, Sensus Pond is a materially embedded and site-specific system that employs Swept Frequency Capacitive Sensing and an Artificial Neural Network to detect ephemeral interactions between the pond's surface and surrounding life forms. Rather than classifying or interpreting these events, the system visualizes temporal accumulations of overlapping traces, producing a layered archive of spatial and temporal entanglements. This approach emphasizes attunement over control, shifting the designer's role from interpreter to facilitator of open-ended, multispecies encounters. Sensus Pond invites reflection not only on what is sensed, but on how design itself can remain responsive to ambiguity, contingency, and the aesthetics of shared ecological life.