This blog post is just an update for my final project. The community has already received the materials and started making my soft toy, which may take one week or longer. I have finished everything else except for the soft toy.
Category: Toy Design & Prototyping
Week 12 – Toy Design & Prototyping Assignment
For project 04, I will use both knitting and sewing. The main part of Star and some decorations in Star’s home (quilt, pillows…), and a few clothes will be sewed, the heart wrap will be knitted. I will also use other digital techniques including laser cut and 3D-print for its room and the heart.
I am still refining my design and thinking about the fabric I may use. I am also designing the box, especially the outside part. Since both the laser cut/3D printed parts need to wait for the exact size of the toy, I haven’t fully decided the size/thickness of the box so now it is only an example. I also want to add patterns on the outside part of the box.
What’s more, I am also designing components that are playable for children, for instance, a book with encouraging words like “Trust yourself. Be assertive. You are not Wrong. Never blame yourself” or some measures they can take. Other accessories include a phone that tells kids/people they can always keep a record of what they suffer. I am even thinking of designing a small knife as the best people who can protect you is yourself, but I am worrying if that’s too aggressive for kids. I want to make them through laser cut/cardboard cutting.
What I need to do:
-Soft star, clothes, and quilt, pillows, knitting heart (community)
-Design and laser cut of the room
-3D-printed little heart
-Accessories making (laser cut/cardboard)
Blog Post Project 03
Project Name: The Wonderful Universe Adventure of No.17
Video Link: https://drive.google.com/open?id=16oE9ZE3w65IjdknsbHTu3GQTkqD4ctYB
Story:
The turtle can never stop climbing until he finds the meaning of his life.
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The turtle No.17 finds his life really boring, so he leaves his warm home planet and tries to find other things he could do except for breeding. He keeps climbing on the ladder in the universe, trying to collect answers from other turtles. When he arrives at the first, bluish planet that looks similar to the earth, he talks to the turtles there: “what do you think you can do except for breeding?” The turtle lives there answers, “to find my parents and grandparents and grand grand parents in the ocean, and wish all my family and friends won’t be eaten by tiger sharks.” No.17 nods his head and shows his agreement. He thinks that is meaningful, but cannot be the complete thing that fills out his life.
No.17 keeps climbing. He arrives on a purple planet with a bumpy surface. He asks: “what do you think you can do except for breeding?” The turtle lives there answers, “to achieve my personal life goal – realize my dream!” No.17 shows great interest in the answer, he leans over his shoulder and asks: “then what is your dream?” That turtle hesitates for a moment, says : “Well… there are a lot, you know. Turtles never get satisfied. Now I want to get married to the most handsome turtle on this planet!” No.17 nods his head and shows his agreement. He says, “Good luck!”
No.17 keeps climbing. He arrives on a planet red like fire. He asks:“what do you think you can do except for breeding?” The turtle there answers, “I don’t know! All I want is just leave this awful planet and go anywhere else! I have no time to consider this meaningless question at all!” No.17 notices the turtle’s face is filled with anger and sorrow. No.17 feels sorry for that and apologizes to that turtle, then turns back to his climbing journey again.
No.17 keeps climbing. He still feels lost, and all he can do is to climb to find the next planet to ask. Maybe the rest of his life will be filled with climbing the ladder, to see what is going on in the universe.
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Initially, I was a little confused about what story I should write about, so I came up with a fable. I have a tortoise, and always feel lost during this period of time about my future. I have also seen videos of people in Liberia having nowhere to go – outside is the coronavirus, but inside is the bomb, which makes my worry ridiculous compared to their dilemma, which was the reason I created the story. The turtle is called No.17 because I created the story on Apr.17th and I am terrible at thinking about names.
Challenges:
The first difficulty I met is laser cut. I forgot that the paddle is 5mm thick, so the rolling ellipse is too big to pass the paddle. I found a steel file and shaved off a large part of the stick. What’s more, when I tried to create the turtle/ladder, the paper was so soft that it would bow down by itself, so I needed to use the discarded cardboard to put behind the paper. This also adds difficulty to stick them, where glue doesn’t work anymore so I had to turn to transparent tape.
Further improvements:
As I mentioned in my presentation, initially I wanted to make a super long ladder where the effect of climbing will be more realistic, and maybe it can be controlled by a gear (I thought I could only use one mechanism so I gave that up). It would also be better if I can carve some little stars on the box like how Samantha made her circle with stars and moon, to create the atmosphere of a universe.
Week 11 – Toy Design & Prototyping Assignment
Project 4 Proposal
I plan to create a soft, bright yellow, human-like star with a red heart. Star’s red soft heart can be opened, and I will put a 3D-printed hard heart into it. I will also create a warm home for her, with a pillow, quilts, a small light (and some books) in. Customers can choose to make beddings/clothes/scarves for Star by themselves.
The users are mainly female. At first, I did some interviews with a few friends/classmates and figured out that boys usually don’t prefer soft toys. So I started to think about making something for females. However, when I think about females, what popped up in my mind is the unfriendly situation we are facing. I don’t know what society is like on earth in other countries, but Chinese society is not tolerant of females, from all kinds of perspectives – looks, careers, morals, even to your gender. I chose the star as the representation because recently in Yantai, China, a 14-year old girl called Li Xingxing has been sexually assaulted by her so-called “adoptive father”. Xingxing means “stars” in Chinese. What’s more, stars don’t have any sex, looks, moral representation, they are only stars, they don’t have to be judged by anyone. All they have is a hard, tenacious heart wrapped by the soft surface. I created the house because that represents Star’s own room/nest/shelter, somewhere independently belongs to her, warm and soft. I definitely want to say females are independent and strong, but what I also want to emphasize is that there is always a warm and soft place we can go back and rest, no matter what that place is for everyone. People who own Star can also dress up Star and decorate the room as they want. In conclusion, the concept of empathy here first refers to the feeling of warmness and security, second refers to the consciousness, strength, and independence of ourselves. Star’s target users will be females, but other people won’t be excluded either.
I got my inspiration from different toys. The first one is from Trousselier. The rabbit inspired me of how I should design the general looking of Star – the simplest eyes and smile without using other materials will be fine. My second inspiration is from Main Sauvage and a soft bear toy, where I decided that people can design beddings/clothes for the toy by themselves. I also did some research on Taobao, figuring out that many people love DIY clothes for their toys. Sebra inspired me on how I should arrange the body of Star, and the sheep toy from Taobao inspired me the idea of box packaging, which works as a home.
The technique I will use includes knitting and sewing (for the main body of Star and beddings), knitting (the soft heart), modeling and 3D-printing (heart, books, etc.), and laser cut (the frame of the room).
Related News about Li Xingxing:
Reference:
https://www.mainsauvage.com/en/
https://www.petit-bazaar.com/collections/trousselier
Week 10 – Toy Design & Prototyping Assignment
I choose Crank B for project 03, and below is the screenshot of my AI file. I created two identical versions in case I ruin some parts.
Because the thickness of the cardboard is 5mm, I need to consider whether for some parts I have to increase/decrease the size of the hole. Marcela helped me to revise my file. However, I forgot that with the thickness of the paddle (the thing under the two moving planks), the rotating ellipse should be 5mm shorter. So I have to shave that off by myself after receiving the laser cut. The similar problem is that due to thickness, the fingers on the box are slightly bigger, so I need to sand it too. Other things worked well. I added some text on the bottom of the box. It would be better if I added more patterns, like stars on it.
