Finger Food.

Tags

ergonomic, feel, haptic, product design, tactile, the five senses, touch, why not plastic?

I have an obcession with the feel of things.. Touch is defiantly my favorite of the five senses.

Recently at a lecture given by a candidate for the new head of the school of Industrial Design at Georgia Tech, I heard this  “Touch is the aspect of design most ignored by product designers.. It is alsoa sense does not deteriorate as you age. ” It is also not subjective to trends and cultural influences like sight and sound. This notion created a more articulated link between my fascination with user interactions and my explorative (mostly reactive) material choice in product design.

Buzz words like tactile and haptic often find their way into my project (product) descriptions, even though they should theoretically be present in all product design. People have to touch products. The idea that ergonomic looking products address tactile concerns in product design to me is a misguided notion. Why does something that is designed for your fingers need to be so easy to spot with your eyes? Touch is a very subtle sense, it does not need the same dynamic design treatment required for vision. Design for touch addresses the subconcious fidgeting and exploration that fingers do, and is intially assisted by vision, but ultimately self guided…

I want to touch that. What is that made of? Can I feel the fiber of your fabric?

* Kiss Me I’m Irishish *

Tags

boys, design, drunk, florian, irish, kisses, merit, presenting my brains out, st. patrick's day, Studio, tactile, talking

‘ello world!

~ My favorite holiday is here again, and I am not enjoying it nearly as much as I would like to be. It just isn’t the same if your not in Savannah..

~ I have been designing my little butt off this week, and Spring Break cannot come soon enough.

~ Random silly projects:

~ what my brain has been up to:

* Research *

Tags

ambient devices, computers, design, interaction methods, interaction types, mood board, people, Studio, tactile

~ Project Update:

one company is developing products in the same vein of objectified information

>> their website. They are an off shoot of the MIT Media Lab. They actually developed the wireless system off of which all of their products operate. Their device information that they offer is fairly limited news, weather, stocks, etc.  It is also still primarily visual information.

~ these are a few visual attempts to figure out/explain where/how my product will interact with people:

This is a visual exploration of touch. textures, colors, and their impressions on touch-ability and tactile interaction

Random Amazing..

Tags

florian, industrial design, info retail, input, interaction design, isolation, jack johnson, loneliness, mood, output, product ecosystems, Studio, tactile

~ Hello! Mum has been the word on my new project, but that because I have been trying to nail it down a bit prior to telling you (plus I have been a busy bee, but that is sort of a given these days).

~  This new project is being run by Florian Vollmer of Info Retail. It is being run pretty much like an independent study (- – which feels amazing by the way).

~ The Brief.  Product Ecosystems. Contextually aware objects. Products that are designed with an advanced consideration of how they will exist/thrive within a ubiquitously digital society. Cool right?

~ My idea inspired by robots, stars, and a physical separation from your favorite people.  Distilling interaction from a hybrid of auditory, visual, and tactile(ity?) that is common with current technology, into individual techniques of input and output.  This simplifies the information that can be transferred, but also changes the level of knowledge and thought required to use it.

~ Social link between two people. Techniques for solving the problem: remnants, motion, editable physicality, reactive object pairs…

~ Ok thats enough of that for now. Capturing a mood. Listening to Jack Johnson always evokes exactly the same mood in/to me. He is one of the few current artists that listening to does not evoke the visual of him sitting in a isolated recording studio.  Why for? Transcending situations. Trick.

by the way – happy march!

Lamp Update

Tags

fabric, lamp, led, light, linen, organic, seam, silk, tactile

Fabric Discoveries/Intentions:

- Coarse linen has the best texture when illuminated, very organic. Need to   also test silk.

- Linen also will be the best choice if the lamp is going to be self-supporting in all orientations –with/against gravity.

- Seams are very important, they are very visible with illumination and they need to be tight, but also stragetic, and not just for structure.

- Color is still up in the air, the green was just the best scrap I had..

Design Goals:

Need to make/appropriate a “soft bulb” that affords for touch and provides an interesting How come…. Leds wired into a hanging  fabric unit might do the trick.

No support structure.

Needs a usage. How much touch? Where would it pop? How can it be versatile and still kick..