For week 4 we had another special guest speaker Michael Hansen, a U of I alumnus and industrial designer at EarthSense. EarthSense is a startup that decided to change how data is collected from land. While some companies are utilizing drones to collect from above EarthSense is using a robot to collect data below. Michael worked on numerous prototypes for the newest edition of the robot, TerraSentia. From altering the design of the robot to accommodate for easy access of the battery to redesigning the camera assembly to make it easier to assemble correctly, Michael shared that the prototyping journey was not short of failures. In fact, there are parts of the new robot that Michael wishes he could have changed before the release. Hearing that reminded me of companies like Apple. New products get released every year because there is always something to improve about the last product.
Constantly changing and improving is ultimately what makes a company strong and impactful.
The remaining time left of the class was spent designing and printing our logo/team name. This is the first time that we got the chance to be hands-on with the equipment in the maker lab. We utilized TinkerCad to design the logos and after a brief tutorial on Cura, a slicing software, we were able to print out our designs on the 3D printers. The adrenaline that I’ve received from being more hands-on has made me even more excited about what’s in store for the rest of the semester.
After meeting with the team for another week we all decided that we wanted to refine the project to be of a smaller scope. One idea that we generated was focusing on children. Since we are leaning towards designing a product for aesthetic purposes, we decided that a good focus area would be kids. It is important that everyone can feel as if they can represent their individualism, and childhood is a popular time in which people start to explore ways to express themselves. After someone in the team mentioned the sketcher sneakers for kids that light up we got the idea to create something similar. After a little researching, I found out about the Arduino POV display and thought that would be an interesting topic to explore. I believe that there are many analogous inspirations that we can find if we decide to go in this direction. Even though the scope of the project will be smaller it won’t be easier to think of ideas that we can produce. In spite of this, I am excited to see how our project will continue to evolve over the semester.
Brianna,
I really like your teams logo. I think it really fits your idea. The fact that you guys are focusing on childhood further validates your idea. I found a few cool articles on instructables that shows the process of creating a POV display. https://www.instructables.com/id/Huge-POV-Display/
Another article is on the importance of aesthetic development in early childhood. It gives a very detailed overview of various theories behind teaching aesthetics.
https://study.com/academy/lesson/aesthetic-development-in-early-childhood.html
These could potentially help with early preliminary prototyping and research. Keep up the good work. Looking forward to seeing what you guys come up with! Hope this helps.
Hi Brianna,
One part of your post that stuck out to me is your comparison of EarthSense to Apple. I never would have thought of this, but it makes sense. As an Apple consumer, I wouldn’t think of Apple’s product launches as prototypes. I found an interesting article on Apple’s Design process if you want to take a look: https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/apple-s-product-development-process-inside-the-world-s-greatest-design-organization.
Additionally, I also like your thought process regarding the prototype your team is creating. I think it is a great idea to choose a more specific target market initially. I look forward to hear more about your project throughout the next few weeks!
Hi Brianna! I really enjoyed your presentation and found it to be really interesting. I think you did a great job summarizing the week as you really hit the key points. I like the direction your product is heading and cannot wait to hear more about it. My advice would be that even the scope of your project is small don’t let it limit your imagination.
Hi Brianna,
That is such a cool idea to think about a prosthetic that could light up like a kids sneaker. That would bring so much joy to the lives of so many kids who have prosthetics! Does anyone in your group have any experience using Arduino technology? They are pretty difficult to figure out how to program (at least from my experience), but there are many knowledgeable people who work in the Fab Lab that know all about them. That will be a good resource for your group if you choose to pursue that idea!
I love your team’s logo. I notices most groups designed logo’s that were in a 2D planar space. This means the logo could lie flat on a surface. I know my team designed our logo this way and we didn’t even realize it was still in a traditional 2D plane. I like how your team took full advantage of the software and designed a logo that was 3D. To understand more about the benefits of 3D vs. 2D design I have linked this article I found! Specifically, the article mentions Solidworks as a helpful tool for CAD. https://www.javelin-tech.com/3d/going-from-2d-to-3d-design/
I think you did a fantastic job on your team logo. It really does a cool job making consumers want to know more. I also really liked how you and your team wanted to redefine your scope. It’s very important in the early steps of a project to have a defined and realistic scope of your project. I think it takes a lot of intelligence on your teams end to understand you needed to readjust your scope to better align with what you want to accomplish.