EARLIER DESIGN PROJECTS
A selection of other Interaction Design projects from my first two years of university:
In 2029
(Individual Project)
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“How might interaction design relate to sustainability in 10 years’ time?”
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This would be a piece of design fiction, speculating on what the future could look like. From the brief:
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"By designing objects, experiences and interactions that show how things might be in the future, designers can can ask questions about it, or even warn us about what it might be like if we don’t change direction.
So look forward to 2029, and use your skill as interaction designers to explore what might be. A better future? A warning from the future? Or something much more ambiguous? Approach this with a light touch. This is an opportunity to go beyond the safe and obvious to produce work that provokes, engages and amuses."
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My deliverables for the project were a prototype and a piece of creative writing about the idea.
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My idea was an interactive service called 'PlasticWear', where a user could take their unwanted plastic bottles to a shop and have them made into clothes. This would be both an incentive for recycling and a way to get something back. It would turn unwanted plastic bottles into something that could be used over and over again.
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With PlasticWear, there would be less polyester made from scratch, something that uses double the amount of energy and emitted double the amount of carbon. These instore-produced garments would come without the large carbon footprints of those that travel from abroad to our stores.
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The experience would involve:
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The user feeds plastic bottles and caps into a machine that registers them on an account.
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They choose clothes from a rack of example products with the prices marked in bottles (roughly the number they would take to make).
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The user can try on the example items to decide which one they want produced. They would scan their chosen example garment and account card at a selection screen and assuming they have enough bottles in their account, it would go into production.
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The customer can see through windows into the production factory and watch the process: Machinery washes the bottles, flakes them into pieces and melts these pieces into short fibres. The fibres are then spun into yarn and woven into clothing.
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Once the item of clothing is finished, the customer would receive it through the final window, in a potato-starch bag, with an optional clothes hanger made from recycled bottle lids.
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Music Experience
(Group Mini Project)
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This was a mini group project with the duration of one afternoon. The brief was something along the lines of designing an interactive experience for older people to listen to music, and to create a video showing the experience. (It was not expected that the prototype would work; it just needed to look like it might in a video).
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The concept my group of three came up with was a light-up music box, controlled by a 'conducting' stick. The music box adds a visual element to the experience, and the controls would be kept simple to play/pause, skip between tracks and adjust the volume.
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In this same time period, we were working on our own app concepts. My group (of three) took the five wellbeing ways - Be Active, Give, Learn, Connect, and Take Notice - and created an app design that would encourage the user to connect with the wellbeing challenges through creativity. The creative experience focused on developing animations in response to the challenges, which forces an active response. The completed animations would then allow the user to reflect on their experiences.
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Storyboard I created to plan the video:
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MIND TO MATTER
Video produced by my other group members using my storyboard to show our app prototype and its use.
Design for Health
(Group Project)
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This brief was to develop a mobile experience that relates to the 'five ways to wellbeing' set out by NHS Fife. The mobile experienced would be aimed at high school pupils, and focus on caring for mental health as an active (doing) rather than passive (thinking) activity.
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During the project our class planned and ran a workshop with a group of school pupils, where we did an activity about 'the five wellbeing ways' and led this on to a bit of app design, where we asked them to, “Come up with an idea for a mobile app which will help improve your school life.” This consisted of brainstorming what areas of school life could be improved (e.g.- bullying, studying) and thinking how they could make an app to help with this.
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Main app prototyped as a group:
The user enters how they're feeling today and chooses one of the wellbeing ways to be given a task.
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A task for Take Notice involves taking a picture so it opens a camera capture screen.
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Once task is complete, the app gives a positive affirmation and asks how the user feels now.
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Using the media created by doing the tasks, the user gets the option to build an animation or slideshow.
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In the slideshow builder the user gets the option to put together photos, videos and text from the activities, with animations, transitions and filters.
Slideshow builder prototyped by me:
HABLAB: HeadSpace
(Group Project)
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The HABlab project was a first year design project, with groups formed of Product, Interior and Interaction Design students. We were to design an experimental space for work, home or play using a 6'x6'x6' frame provided.
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Additionally each team member was to create an intervention specific to their discipline within the HABlab. My Interaction was an Aruino based sound system which added the option of relaxing music to the space.
My Arduino-based sound system, in a hexagonal control box which reflects the hexagon theme throughout.
HeadSpace is a think space for users that explores the theme of work and productivity. It is designed to incorporate elements of the outside world and be a faraday cage, blocking out phone and internet signals. The idea was to create a digital blackout, a space people could use to think and do work without the distractions of the internet.
As “we spend 85% of our lives inside,” we felt it was important to bring elements of nature into our HABlab, bringing the outside inside. This was
also in response to research showing that office workers had a significant improvement in wellbeing and productivity when plants were brought into their office space.
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A changing work environment can also increase productivity, allowing the user of a space to change their space based on the sort of work they are doing. This is reflected in our furniture, which is hidden away in the walls, but can be brought out and assembled when required.
For more detail: