Category: weekly design discussions

Write a blog post about your learnings and understanding of Industrial design prototyping. Do some research on the future of prototyping and give examples of where you think prototyping will go in the future.

A year ago I didn’t know that prototyping in scale is that important, I guess I have imagined prototyping process as the following: idea -> sketches -> CAD (or other digital platform) model

and at this point people could imagine with the power of their mind how successful product is and rethink its appearance/functionality

-> manufacture.

however, as I was getting more acquainted with prototyping, I grew more and more fond of it and its ability to reveal flaws (or benefits) that could be only discovered by directly interactive with a full-scale object. 

the only thing that kind of bothers me is the material. in most cases substituting materials or finding ways to reuse old stuff that has the needed bits of material might work, however if, lets say a person is designing something that, ideally, is going to be made of glass. what then? if it has a complex shape there is no way you can make prototype that could be representative of the actual interaction with a glass object as, for example, plastic is way lighter, along with cardboard or paper or even some light metal (last two have drastically different texture). so, i guess, sometimes rapid prototyping per se might not be useful at all and as a high-fidelity one. 

as for the future of prototyping, I believe as good User Experience design is valued more and more, prototyping that involves getting qualitative feedback from a pool of testers will advance. this stage  prototyping, as far as I understood, is called “Live prototyping” and, according to this article it gets more valued every day. indeed, if you think about it, in a such saturated market as we have now, the most important thing for a product is to be easy and comfortable to use, along with being visually appealing. Before it was mere functionality that could sell. 

Review the links attached and write a blog post about your thoughts on the ideas and products. Include possible other applications for the concept of cardboard products. 

While cardboard furniture raises a set questions:

• people are messy and I highly doubt that no one will spill anything or in the winter, come in wet shoes or something that might actually sabotage the furniture over time. The same thing happens at home, especially with kids. I really don’t think that cardboard is easy to clean. However, it might be interesting as, for example, kids could actually draw on furniture (boosts creativity) and create a playful environment. But if no kids and no creative people there that also would want to paint their cardboard furniture, I am not sure how it would work out, even though it would be probably very easy to replace. Not sure, mixed feeling about that one, but it is truly fascinating how stiff and flexible this material can be.
• Plus, texture is not the same (i would prefer using less scratchy material to put my hands on while working). Also, everyone gets dust in their wardrobe, right? How long will the wardrobe last if it is cleaned at least once a week?

The toys from Nintendo and the bike, however, are very interesting. As far as i understand, the durability in the bike is achieved by applying some kind of water-proof paint (could actually solve some issues with the furniture). But the thing that I found most interesting is mechanics of those things, especially the Nintendo’s piano:

I believe it is fairly interesting that you can actually interact with that thing, just as it is made out of a more conventionally durable material. With the bike is the same thing. 

Also, I liked how in the video Izhar Gafni said that no one would actually want to steal the bike (as it doesn’t cost much + even if stole, could be bought again for not very much). I wonder how cardboard reacts to different humidity levels (should it always be kept at the garage? or home? for it to face less humidity. Or should the paint be reapplied from time to time (maybe for the public use these bikes are not as good as the metal ones as they might need much more care).

The same thing with Nintendo cardboard toys: kids spill things, and in case the toy is made of plastic, it could be cleaned (even if it has some mechanics to it, usually it is inside and unreachable for the water). And even if we apply the waterproof paint or something, wouldn’t that be toxic? And as kids like to lick things, might actually be a problem.

But a lot of useful techniques on how to bend cardboard in the bike video! Also a lot of inspiration from furniture and very cool things about everything is that it is much more eco-friendly, recyclable and cheap! 

Carry out some research on other unconventional materials used in surprising ways. Include comments and pictures of examples in your blog.

I found this website that lists homes that were built with unconventional materials. Some seem familiar: the glass and aluminum one is very trendy now, plus I saw a video advertisement of the NY hotel that is basically a bunch of shipping containers that people rent out for one night to sleep with an ocean view (turns out it is pretty cheap).

https://www.upnest.com/1/post/homes-built-with-alternative-materials/ 

Also this website that lists possible materials (not very much relevant to what we are going to be doing, however I found it quite interesting):

https://www.ta-daan.com/7-alternative-materials/ 

So, the materials we can use are pretty much anything. Don’t really know what else to say here. 

Watch the video and read the articles about the Crystal Palace. Give a written account of your thoughts on the industrial revolution, the Crystal Palace and how it has impacted the modern world.

I believe that the Crystal Palace is truly amazing not only in terms of it’s appearance, but in terms of the way it was constructed. It surely introduced a new approach to building construction, which is utilizing standardized pieces (if they are easy to make, bonus points follow) to assemble a grandiose piece is architecture. I believe it influenced the way architects looked at the building construction process and uplifted it to another level, perfectly reflecting how a lot of things that we use in our day-to-day life are made.

In our current challenge of building a spaghetti bridge we will use techniques to produce parts for our overall structures. Can you identify similarities in your process and how the Crystal Palace was created? 

I am planning to use standardized-sized pieces to construct the bridge, which will make the re-build or add-ons much easier and efficient (just like it was with the Crystal Palace). Even though I use spaghetti instead of iron rods and withhold from glass, I believe the bridge that I will build still has some similarity in the method of combining the materials as the construction should be as balanced as possible to maintain the shape under as much pressure as possible. 

Do some research on mass production and give 2 examples of techniques or processes used to mass produce products or components for products .

Almost everything we use now is mass-produced at some level. The assembling of our phones, our writing supplies, water bottles and even cars. And there are many techniques that emerged to optimize the process of the production:

• Cellular Manufacturing – This concept separates the factory floor into different sections (cells). Machines are placed in a certain order so that materials flow naturally toward the completion of a product.
• Machine Flexibility – This concept refers to the capacity of a factory’s machines to adapt. Can they be changed to manufacture different products? Will they allow for slight variations in design that customization requires?

source: https://www.manufacturing.net/home/article/13239976/a-guide-to-modern-manufacturing-methods

Listen to the podcast and read the article about the history of the drinking straw. What is the most surprising thing you have learned about the straw and its history? Can you think of any other products that started out life to meet a specific need but evolved to be used by everyone? Answer these questions in this week’s blog post.

For me, the most surprising thing about the drinking straw was “created” so long ago. I would never guess that as I always seen straws kind of modern “quirk”.

Although, I am curious about why people several hundreds ago would even use them, did they use them to drink altogether from the same bowl or something? Not sure.

Also, the fact that it took the bendy straw to gain popularity so long seems counterintuitive to me as it is, in my opinion, so much more convenient to use than the straight one. 

As for the products with similar story, I believe a while ago I read that Coca-Cola was invented to help people overcome their morphine addiction (that they usually acquired after being medically prescribed to take it during treatment after a war (i don’t remember which was)). It originally had cocaine in it (extracted from the some leaf), which was later removed.

P.S. found the source https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Coca-Cola-Company  interestingly enough, of the Coca Cola website they don’t say anything about the cocaine 🙂 

also, I found this website, while searching about Coca Cola, that lists 10 other inventions: https://www.businessinsider.com/successful-products-that-were-originally-intended-for-a-completely-different-purpose-2016-3

including Bubble Wrap, 7UP (spoiler: also was a drug), Frisbees, Chainsaws…

Hey again! 

How origami is being used by designers to create engineering solutions. Can you think of anything in your life that may have been influenced by origami?

I have watched this video on how Origami can be used basically everywhere. The most fascinating thing was about how it is already used in modern medicine practices. And, of course, the idea that a sheet of a material has so much potential to transform into something so beautiful and, often, useful. Also, I really liked the lamp thing 🙂 As for the things in my life that were probably influenced by Origami, I could make a list from the top of my head:

1. Water bottles (I believe that the curves on the water bottles are used to make the bottle more rigid and maybe even but less water in the bottle (for the business)). 

2. Umbrellas. Kind of self-explanatory. 

3. my iPad case (the upper part folds from a plane in different directions that allows flexibility when the nearly-vertical position is required). 

4. Lamp at home. (it resembles the lamp shown in the video, however it is much more simple in the shape (just a sphere). However the cool thing is that it came in a thin package so I was even considering taking it with me to Shanghai (as it takes very little space), however decided that I don’t want to buy light bulbs all year for that).

Moreover, I believe I could use this origami inspiration when prototyping the protection for the egg in the Egg Drop experiment. I will surf the origami internet more and find some shapes that could help me build mine model.