Flux of Opera Dance Development and Digitization Construction in the Context of Big Data---Taking Xiangbei Region as an Example
Published Online: Mar 19, 2025
Received: Nov 05, 2024
Accepted: Feb 10, 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/amns-2025-0424
Keywords
© 2025 Miao Zhou, published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
The stage art of opera is characterized by attracting the audience with the storyline, impressing the audience with the characters’ emotion, and combining singing, reciting, composing, playing and other means to convey the emotion to the audience [1–2]. In this sense, opera belongs to the dynamic art, but the dance shows the static beauty, because there are no lines in the dance art, relying entirely on the physical performance of the actors to impress the audience [3–4]. Dance in theater performance art can make the infectious force of opera performance art itself richer, make the overall performance with hierarchy, and also make the expression of the character image more three-dimensional and vivid [5–7].
With the development of modern society, opera dance, as an important part of traditional Chinese culture, is also constantly seeking integration with modern elements. Through the Internet and digital media, opera dance can better reach young groups and attract more people to participate in it through online performances [8–10]. The application of virtual reality and augmented reality technology can also inject new creativity and expression into opera dance [11–12]. Through the use of modern stage technology, such as projection, lighting and special effects, opera dance can visually present more colorful images and artistic effects, increasing the audience’s viewing pleasure and immersion [13–15]. In the process of present-day development, opera dance gradually presents diversified dance forms to meet the needs and aesthetic concepts of modern audiences.
This study analyzes the fluctuating process of opera and dance development in northern Hunan at different stages, and investigates the local demand for digital construction of opera and dance culture through investigation. Based on the needs of the local opera and dance culture management department, this paper designs a digital museum of opera and dance in northern Hunan. The museum mainly uses virtual reality technology, including the design of opera and dance performances, to provide users with practical experiences of opera and dance and to promote the digital construction of culture. Before and after the museum application, feasibility analysis, immersive interaction test, and satisfaction survey are conducted to further analyze the comprehensive evaluation of the museum by users.
Oral communication, as the most important and basic form of communication of northern Xiangbei opera and dance, fits the social reality of the development of northern Xiangbei opera and dance and is mainly embodied in two aspects: stage performance and skill transmission.
Stage performance Opera dance in northern Hunan mainly relies on stage performances for dissemination. The stage serves as a platform for communication between the actors and the audience. Opera performances are “present”, so the audience can visualize the actors’ demeanor and movements and have a cultural experience, while the actors can give full play to their autonomy of performance and make unique exchanges. Stage performances and oral teaching work together to create a synergistic effect. Skill transfer Xiangbei Opera Dance mainly teaches skills through teaching and practice. Through oral transmission between masters and disciples, the classic repertoire is preserved. Oral transmission plays a great role in the dissemination of Xiangbei opera and dance, and becomes the basis for the transmission of national culture from generation to generation.
Books about Xiangbei opera are mostly recorded from the perspectives of music, script, history and overview, involving a wide range of subjects and types, and the contents can be said to be all-inclusive, with high historical and cultural value. However, in terms of the time distribution of their publication, most of them were concentrated in the 1950s to 1990s, and there have been fewer books systematically researching Xiangbei opera and dance since the 21st century. On the one hand, the theoretical research of Xiangbei opera has been more perfect and gradually turned to practice and field investigation, and on the other hand, the popular culture has brought about diversified research perspectives, which leads to the gradual lack of heat in the research of Xiangbei opera and dance.
Radio and Film
Radio cleverly combines the language of characters and sound effects to create an atmosphere similar to stage performances, mobilizing the audience’s imagination, bringing a sense of “presence” in the hearing, and acting as a link between the audience and the opera. The film medium has the characteristics of reproducibility and visualization, changing the viewing mode of the traditional stage and making the art of opera more storytelling and life-oriented.
Television Programs
Television, as a family-oriented medium of communication, is characterized by intuition and comprehensiveness, and its form and content are more flexible and rich. Xiangbei has also created a number of opera programs and opened a number of opera channels. In the program mode, the zero threshold is used to attract opera fans to perform on stage and satisfy the audience’s secondary creation of repertoire. In the form of the program, another way to combine opera and square dance organically is to use square dance music as the musical accompaniment to create an entertaining effect.
The openness of the Internet constantly triggers the audience to share and exchange, blurring the boundaries between transmission and achieving identity transformation between transmission, which in turn changes the user relationship and communication mode, making communication more autonomous and personalized.
Website resources Traditional opera, empowered by the Internet, expands diversified functions and rich content. In the radiation promotion of core audiences and the continuous interaction of social circles, a large number of opera cultures have been excavated and can be disseminated to more audiences by combining cloud computing and big data. Network Video Network video integrates audiovisual elements, which can maximize the user’s sensory experience, and has become the most acceptable and easy-to-use communication method nowadays. Most online videos also have a pop-up culture, which facilitates users’ real-time interaction and self-expression. Based on watching the same content, through the pop-up communication can produce emotional resonance, attracting a large number of users with the same interest to gather, and enhance the attractiveness of the opera content. And big data will further recommend opera videos that may be of interest to users based on their behavior, subconsciously influencing their aesthetic experience of Xiangbei opera and dance.
In this section, we conduct a field survey in northern Hunan using on-site observation, visits, recordings, and videos, among other methods. to observe and understand the user group, predict the target, observe their hobby habits, initially grasp the user’s real needs, and analyze the user’s demandability of the digital museum of theatre and dance by designing a questionnaire.
The questionnaire survey includes four levels: user experience, technology demand, content demand, and educational value. Five survey items are set for each level, and a 5-level quantitative scale is used to evaluate the user’s demandability, with ratings 1-5 representing different degrees of demand levels in turn, and 100 people from the local theater and dance cultural management departments are extracted for the questionnaire survey and analysis. The results of the demandability survey of the digital museum of opera and dance are shown in Figure 1.
Digital museum demand survey results
As can be seen from the figure, the management of Xiangbei opera and dance culture has a greater demand for the use of digital museums for the development and construction of opera and dance culture, with most of them scoring more than 3 out of 10 on the demand scale, and the overall degree of demand is about 3.80 out of 10. Specifically, the neediness ratings for user experience, technology needs, content needs, and educational value were 3.714, 4.034, 3.648, and 3.81, in that order. The demand for technology is higher than the other three indicators, indicating that the management of opera and dance culture wants to change the dissemination of local opera and dance culture through digital technology in order to achieve the effect of digital construction.
VR technology [16–18] takes full advantage of modern computers’ increasing computational performance and image display capabilities to create digital three-dimensional models with a high degree of realism. For digital museums of history and culture such as opera and dance, virtual reality technology can guide visitors to break through the constraints of space and time, and realize interaction with the surrounding environment in the constructed three-dimensional virtual world in a way that is infinitely close to the perception of the real world.
Multi-sensory Multi-sensibility is the ability of multiple perceptions to convey information at the same time, and the goal of virtual reality technology is to fully mobilize all the perceptions that can be utilized to accomplish the task of information transmission in an all-round and multi-dimensional way. Interactivity In the scene of virtual reality, users can participate in the interaction with the surrounding scenery through various behavioral commands, and the interactivity includes motion capture, haptic feedback, line-of-sight localization, gesture tracking, direction tracking, voice interaction and so on. Non-sequential As an open interactive environment, users have great freedom in it, and their thinking and behaviors are highly random and jumping, i.e., they show a non-sequential character. Spatial Extensibility The component composition form of virtual reality technology is depicted in Figure 2. With the help of multi-dimensional information transmission and network communication technology, virtual reality technology overcomes the spatial and temporal limitations of information exchange. Divided according to the realized functions, it can roughly be divided into three main components: the measurement system, the simulation system, and the performance system.
Components of virtual reality technology
Utilizing Unity 3D engine technology for VR scene design of the digital museum of opera and dance, Unity 3D engine itself contains a variety of functions that can strongly support the graphics, sound, and physical effects required in the development process of the digital museum platform, and it is also compatible with a variety of editing software, such as C#, Java Script and Boo. Analyzed from the scene design aspect, Unity 3D mainly includes the following views and components:
Project View The project view displays to the user the directly associated details of every file in the object project, which enhances file resource management efficiency. Monitoring View Online monitoring is carried out for a certain object or function in the interactive scene and is shown through this window. In the process of debugging and modifying the scene. Scene View This view is the realization platform of all interactive functions, and all model resources are designed and perfected in this scene, and at the same time, the adjustment of the camera and the constraints on the behavior of visitors are also completed here. Mono Developer: The most obvious advantage of C# technology is its large class library, which provides great convenience for developers, removes a lot of code writing work, and improves work efficiency. Therefore, this paper also uses this technology as the core development technology when designing interaction scenarios. The designer can modify or rewrite the methods inherited from the Mono Behaviour class in the script to easily determine the timing of the logic code. Figure 3 depicts the life cycle of Unity3D scripts, and the digital museum of opera and dance designed in this project is based on the life cycle of the scripts corresponding to each interactive scene in the system to complete data collection and and analysis.
Life cycle of the Unity script
The framework of the display interface design for the digital museum of opera and dance is shown in Figure 4. After determining the objectives of the digital opera and dance museum and the specific user groups, the museum and user needs are determined in the museum scope layer. Lay the data foundation for the interaction method and information architecture in the later structural layer. The specific expression and layout design of the information in the digital museum of opera and dance has been designed, and the display interface design includes a strategy layer, scope layer, structure layer, framework layer, and performance layer.
Digital museum display interface framework
Museum digital display breaks through the limitations of time and space, expanding the physical museum display space, using panoramic roaming, augmented reality and other latest digital technologies, can make the user visiting experience more immersive and interactive. The museum can realize the diversified presentation of its purpose through the use of digital technology, and at the same time, it can reduce the cognitive burden of the users in the diversified display form, thus promoting the management, research, education and knowledge sharing of opera and dance culture.
This paper argues that digital museums should include information such as textual descriptions of opera and dance culture, audio explanations, collection displays, and video playback in the design of the display function.
Text Information In the digital display, the designer can add the text display form of the content for the introduction text, which enhances the user’s knowledge of opera and dance culture. Audio display In the digital display of the museum, the designer can promote the user’s access to information on opera and dance by adding audio information transmission. Collection display The construction of museum collection data mainly involves the construction of collection databases and collection library databases. It enables users to have a more systematic grasp of the age, production process, historical background, and other information about the opera and dance collections in the scene.
Based on the strategic and scoping layers of the study, the design of the interaction of its digital museum was studied. The specific embodiments are as follows:
Sensory layer In the exhibition design, human vision, hearing, smell, touch and taste and other senses can be combined to enable users to perceive museum information in an all-round and multi-level way in the exhibition hall scene, and obtain a richer experience in the process. Behavioral layer In the design of user interaction behavior, it is necessary to give full consideration to the user’s behavioral posture when performing interaction behavior, so that it can achieve the feasibility, comfort and aesthetics of the action in the operation process. Reflection layer The feedback of the reflection layer interaction design is based on the designer’s design of the trigger interaction design, the feedback content interaction design, and the construction of the feedback form, based on the above to complete the optimization of the interaction of the reflection layer of the museum display.
The layout stage of the museum framework structure is mainly for the structure and layout of the display interface of the digital museum, as well as the analysis of different navigation design types of the interface, which is reflected as follows:
Interface structure The interface area structure can be divided horizontally by using geometric shapes, colors, images and other elements of the interface, and it is divided into two types of regular area structure and non-regular area structure according to its presentation form. Regional Layout Digital museum in the display interface layout design, can be used in the law of formal beauty of symmetry and balance method, to achieve the overall interface symmetrical layout form of the effect of the presentation, which symmetrical shape of the use of people can bring proportionality and balance, coordination, trustworthy, reliable visual aesthetics. Visual flow For the user’s visual perception of the information presented by the perception process, by the visual information of the strength of the direction of the induction, graphics, text, color and other elements of the impact of the user’s visual movement to follow a certain direction and procedures of the regular visual movement. Interface color According to this characteristic, the overall color of its interface is carefully designed so that different people have different color perception for the same color or similar color system.
As the most intuitive expression of human senses, vision can captivate people’s attention through the narrative of its display information and vivid expression of elements. In the digital display of the most intuitive way of user experience is the visual experience, followed by auditory, after determining the museum information display mode, the layout of the page, text size, color matching and other visual factors can be re-designed to achieve the enhancement of the user’s visual attention to the visual experience.
The main objectives of this development work are to design a digital museum with virtual interactive functionality, combining the cultural characteristics of opera and dance with the landscape. The second goal is to implement reliable monitoring technology to monitor the museum’s operation status and analyze user behavior, in order to provide accurate references for subsequent system operation, maintenance, and upgrading work.
The overall design of the digital museum is divided into three main parts, as shown in Figure 5.
Scene Development of Opera and Dance Digital Museum The VR interactive scene is used to depict the stage effects of opera dance, etc., and the helmet-type display system HTC Vive is used to provide users with immersive experience services. VR Monitoring SDK It is responsible for real-time collection of various performance parameters of the VR application during operation, including equipment information, user behavior information, and so on. After collecting the data, the system transmits it to the data analysis center through the HTTP protocol on the internet. Data Analysis Center The center summarizes the collected VR performance data, uses mathematical algorithms to cluster and analyze them, and finally presents the conclusions drawn from the analysis to the user in the form of visual charts.
Overall block diagram of the system
A total of 10 users aged 20~40 were invited as subjects for this usability test, with a male to female ratio of 1:1, and occupations including designers, students, civil servants and freelancers. The subjects were all proficient in the use of cell phones, and the test environments were chosen to be quiet and undisturbed environments such as schools, offices, and homes.
After the end, using the USE scale, 10 subjects were asked to score the effectiveness, ease of use, and satisfaction, respectively, to obtain the average score of each item, and to comprehensively analyze and evaluate the usability of the Opera and Dance Digital Museum in ten aspects, such as the interface prompting information, the interface icon design, and the increase of cultural communication in the museum. Table 1 displays the precise description and number for every evaluation index.
Specific description and number of each evaluation index
| Primary indicator | Secondary indicator | Serial number |
|---|---|---|
| Validity | The information is useful in the interface | 1 |
| Improve the efficiency of the exhibition | 2 | |
| Meet user requirements | 3 | |
| Increase the cultural exchange of opera dance | 4 | |
| Ease of use | Simple operation | 5 |
| Be skilled | 6 | |
| The icon is clear and understandable | 7 | |
| Satisfaction | Rational architecture | 8 |
| Recommend to friends | 9 | |
| The logarithmic word museum is very satisfactory | 10 |
The survey scale is based on a 7-level Likert rating scale, with a minimum score of 1 point of very disagreement and a maximum score of 7. The average score is summed to obtain the final score for effectiveness, ease of use, and satisfaction, and the results of the 10 user USE scale survey are shown in Figure 6. From the questionnaire completion results record sheet, the score rate of the questions is between 5 and 7 points, the test users are generally satisfied with the experience of the digital museum.
Users use scale survey results
According to the analysis of the results, among the overall “effectiveness”, “ease of use” and “satisfaction” of the 10 tested users, the “effectiveness” has the highest degree of recognition, with an average sum of 6.03, followed by “ease of use”, with an average sum of 5.90. In the sum of “effectiveness”, the highest recognition degree of “increasing the cultural exchange of opera and dance” was 6.27, which was manifested in increasing the cultural exchange of opera and dance> improving the efficiency of Chinese opera and dance exhibitions> meeting the needs of users’ cultural learning> and the prompt information in the interface was useful.
The experiments in this section are based on eye tracking technology, and the eye movement data such as hotspot map, trajectory map, and area of interest are extracted from the real test results to obtain the statistical results, so as to assess whether the interaction design positioning of the digitized museum of opera and dance in the northern part of Xiangbei is matched by this paper’s design practice.
The area of interest involves selecting different blocks on the test interface as the key elements of the interface. The data analysis is carried out by extracting the time scale of the first survey of the area of interest. This test evaluation is intended to divide the interest zones of the digital museum phase I and phase II platforms according to the user’s visual flow and to explain the order of these interest zones respectively.
The interest area elements are divided into logo, client download, collection display, opera list, list slider, navigation bar, pavilion list, and opera culture information. The first gaze time of the subjects in Phase I and Phase II digital museums is shown in Figure 7.
The first time of the digital museum
The first gaze time can be used to explore the discoverability of the area of interest, and the smaller its value is the more it shows that the area has gained more attention, which is a very important usability indicator.
Through the Phase I and Phase II digital platforms, the statistics of first gaze time show that the first thing that subjects gaze at is the opera culture information and the navigation part of the interface, and the first gaze time is 2.89 s and 4.05 s. According to the analysis of the visual order of subjects based on the first gaze time, e.g., in Phase I of the digital museum platform, the visual order is in order of the opera culture information, the client downloads, the list of the pavilions, opera list, navigation bar, Logo, collection display, list slider.
In addition, this section extracts statistical indicators of the average pupil diameter of users for data. It is used to analyze the user’s cognitive level of the visual interface, the difficulty of information extraction, the degree of interest, the degree of attention devoted to the area, the degree of demand for information, and the sense of immersion. The folded line of the user’s pupil diameter change is shown in Figure 8.
The diameter of the pupil diameter changes
Normal people’s pupil diameter in the emotional state of pleasant, excited state pupil diameter will increase compared to the calm state, but in the negative emotional state pupil will be smaller than the calm state such as surprise, pain and other emotions. As can be seen from the figure, the user’s pupils continued to fluctuate during the 300s of the survey, and the maximum change in pupil diameter was 5.23 mm, which usually indicates that the user is interested in the information content presented, and that the depth and breadth of the thought dispersion is stronger, and the immersion experience is stronger.
User satisfaction is the expectation of the digital museum, and all factors that affect user perception and user action behavior lead to differences in satisfaction levels. The lower the user satisfaction score, the lower the user experience and acceptance of the product.
In this paper, 16 items related to user interaction experience are set up as a way to test the user satisfaction of the Digital Museum of Opera and Dance. The evaluation of the user satisfaction of the Digital Museum of Opera and Dance is based on the completion of the usability test above, and 100 users are found again to conduct a satisfaction survey and analysis. The test items are “Design Style”, “Icon”, “Page Layout”, “Color Matching”, “Text Layout”, “Process Operation”, “Structure Level”, “Collection Function”, “Repertoire Function”, “Drama Performance”, “Virtual Interaction”, “Cultural Topic”, “Ticket Registration”, “Live Broadcast”, “Visit Reservation” and “Cultural and Creative Products”. A total of 100 questionnaires were collected in the satisfaction survey of the Digital Museum of Opera and Dance.
The results of the digital museum satisfaction statistics are shown in Figure 9. After filtering the data from the satisfied and very satisfied questionnaires among them and counting the weight of all the option data under each item, the user satisfaction rate of each design element of the Opera and Dance Digital Museum is obtained as shown in Figure 10.
Statistics museum satisfaction statistics
User satisfaction rate for each design element
The satisfaction statistics show that users are highly satisfied with the projects of the digital museum, and there are no “very dissatisfied” users. The average satisfaction rate of “Design Style”, “Icon”, “Page Layout”, “Color Matching”, “Text Layout”, “Process Operation”, “Structure Level”, “Collection Function”, “Repertoire Function”, “Drama Performance”, “Virtual Interaction”, “Cultural Topic”, “Ticket Registration”, “Live Broadcast”, “Visit Reservation” and “Cultural and Creative Products” was between 4.04~4.55.
User satisfaction rate statistics show that the user satisfaction rate of each design element is distributed between 71% and 89%, and the users of the Digital Museum of Chinese Opera and Dance are more satisfied as a whole. The design elements with relatively low satisfaction rates, such as “page layout”, “color matching” and “architecture hierarchy”, have more room for further design optimization. In summary, the design of the Digital Museum of Opera and Dance has met the expectations of most users and achieved its intended purpose.
This paper explores the development trend of opera and dance in northern Hunan using big data. Through the framework of digital museum display design, coupled with virtual reality technology, a digital museum platform for opera and dance was developed. And tests such as credibility and satisfaction surveys were carried out to assess the digital construction effect of the digital museum constructed in this paper on the opera and dance culture in northern Hunan.
The demandability ratings of the management department of opera and dance culture in northern Hunan for user experience, technical demand, content demand, and educational value were 3.714, 4.034, 3.648, and 3.81 in that order. The digital museum constructed in this paper has the highest recognition of 6.27 in the “effectiveness” summation average of “increasing cultural exchanges of opera and dance”. In the first and second phase of the digital platform, the user’s first gaze time on the cultural information and navigation part of the opera was 2.89s and 4.05s respectively, and in the process of virtual experience, the pupil diameter of the user’s eyes will increase. Satisfaction statistics show that the average satisfaction of users for each item of the digital museum is between 4.04 and 4.55.