Class today was quite speaker heavy. Amongst everyone who presented a PowerPoint of sorts, we had 4 different speakers… lots of information to take in, however a few ideas really stood out to me. Initially, I would love to start off with the idea of diverging and then converging. I like to think of this as ideation then analysis. Our readings labeled this process synthesis. We capture our learnings, discover the significance of them, and ultimately create actionable takeaways to move forward with.
One of our TAs presented this concept right before our group activity. It is crucial to let ideas out, having them free-flow and generate one after another. Nonetheless, it is then necessary to analyze these ideas and converge your choices to be able to make a focused decision. Overall, today’s session was an epitome of that. The 4 speakers presented countless ideas and insights, which we then had to prioritize and analyze within the scopes of our projects within the DRES community.
Accordingly, the two ideas which I converged on by the end of class were customization and accessibility, which yes does seem like the recurring theme for me and my group. John Hornick initially mentioned customization as one of the pillars of 3D printing. Customization allows for individuality and personality to be expressed through utilitarian design, which is an extremely rare combination. Until now, wheelchairs have been viewed as a means to an end, with limited ability for the user to inject his or her own ideation into it.
3D printing encourages individuals to take matters into their own hands and solve problems with an initiative – their own initiative. This individual empowerment is what the final speaker, Jeff Ginger from FabLab honed in on. We were shown the plethora of the design spaces available, however merely 7 were available to the general student population. The rest required some sort of special access. He dubbed this rather useless and inefficient, and frankly I agree. What good are resources if they are not accessible?
Our team looked at this within the scope of wheelchair accessories and creating something which the target community that they will actually want. We want to make it accessible through not only price point, but also desire. This will require analyzing consumer product trends and created marketing campaigns to increase the product awareness once we launch. Design is insignificant if there is not a user desire.
Hey Michal,
Really great post! I wasn’t able to make class this week your post really helped me understand what we went over. One comment that I really liked that you made had to do with the reasoning for 3D printing. You said, “3D printing encourages individuals to take matters into their own hands and solve problems with an initiative – their own initiative.” I truly understand what you’re saying here and it is the reason I wanted to take this class. people can move from an idea to a product in less than 24 hours. I think just giving smart driven people the opportunity to make changes like this can only exponentially increase innovation world vide! Great Job!
Hi Michael,
You made some interesting points in your reflection, but two stuck out to me in particular. As a senior in Industrial Design, I have spent all four years here thinking and learning about the importance of design and design thinking. You were right when you talked about how important it is to keep the ideas flowing and let them out as they come to you. However, it is so much more than just thinking of ideas and deciding right then and there what your final plan will be. Design is about trail and error, as discussed last week when Mike Hansen came to speak to the class. Fail early and fail often means that is it important to not only think of many ideas, but also to try many ideas to see what works and what doesn’t. When I do a design project for class, I am always required to show several iterations of an idea along the way before I reach a final design. Trial and error is one of the most critical parts of the design process and absolutely cannot be looked over.
Another thing that stuck out to me was one of your last statements about design being insignificant without user desire. Design is a lot more than just focusing on trends and user wants. But it is about addressing what the user actually needs, whether or not the user knows it. Creating something the user wants or something that is trendy is a plus. A really good example of this is the company OXO. They saw that users who had arthritis or limited mobility of their hands had a lot of trouble using a vegetable peeler. Their solution after seeing a user need (not necessarily a trend or want) was to create a peeler with a thick rubber grip so that it was easier to use. This in turn became a product that worked better for everyone – thus becoming a desired product. Hopefully we will learn a lot more about design thinking and the process in this class so everyone can get a better grasp on its importance and truly understand what design means and how it is so much more than aesthetic or a trend.
Hi Michal,
I think the way you mentioned about the link between the ideas coming out from the activity in design thinking with the ideas that were presented by John Hornick is very interesting. I think the benefits of 3D printing – customization and accessibility – are definitely something that we would need to keep in mind when we think about the design of our products. However, these are just the benefits that we need to keep in mind. In design thinking, I think the things we need to consider are more than just ideas. I think they need to be focusing more on the problems and insights that we can think of. Something that I would suggest is trying to be outside of your comfort zone and thinking out of the box. When you just try to bring storm as many ideas as possible toward the problem as well as later in the process, toward the solution, you will find yourself in a better position in understanding the problems and the needs. You may later find a solution that best fit your identified problems and needs.