How is ethics shaped by the particularities of a design? Through a detailed video analysis, we explore how ethicality is shaped in interaction between a choreographer, a performer and a choir of five drones, performing together on the opera stage. We pinpoint how movements enabled by the human-drone assemblage may limit or liberate artistic expressions vis-à-vis the norms of operatic performance. From a somaesthetics perspective on ethics, we show how the process of crafting rich experiences together with drones can deepen sensory appreciation skills, leading to an increased understanding of underlying somatic drivers and imposed norms. Somatic awareness thereby enables a richer repertoire of movements, expanding the ability to freely choose how to act, and cultivating empathy towards others. This shifts our understanding of ethics in HCI as solely about abstract rules or policies 'out there' to also concern the specifics of how technology informs or dictates movement and experience.

Somaesthetics has been adapted as a theoretical foundation for explaining the aesthetic experience of interaction. However, the practice of somaesthetics remains relatively unexplored in HCI, and it has potential to improve the ideation process of interactive product design by improving designers and developers' sensibility of haptic, dynamic, and invisible qualities of movements. We introduce somaesthetic reflection, a somatic introspection method in pragmatic somaesthetics, and explore its impact on the ideation through a practical workshop. This study revealed that somaesthetic reflection helps the participants experience and recognize unconscious movements and coordination of movements, which further contributes to discovery of design issues in the ideation, and more effective experience prototyping of interaction with moving products. The characteristics of the design approaches found in this study are discussed.