The big decision

So overall, and after sleeping and expressing my ideas to family, I think I would like to go with my rounded design. I feel that this touches on the universal idea I was thinking, and mimics both a lens and shutter curtain. I also think that the roundness throws off any one who uses it because they wouldn't be expecting a camera to be on the inside, and then the lid and rounded shape will make sense. I also think it will keep the camera safe inside with the divot that will hold it in place. Now it's time to work in the big bad wood shop…. if I lose a finger, I just hope it isn't a pointer. I don't want to be a photographer that has to flip everyone off in order to take a snap shot. Below are my first cuts of wood…ever.

Another 2nd Attempt

Okay so this design didn't work out too well in terms of expressing it through cardboard. Cardboard that hates to bend might I end. I had talked to Margie about the way you hold a camera. So I held it and looked at how my fingers sat around it and wanted to design a vessel that curves the way your thumbs and palms do when they are holding the camera. However….trying to express them with the cardboard was very unsuccessful and it doesn't really express what I had in my mind. I tried to include where your thumbs curve into the body of the camera on the backside, and how the inside of your palms curve the sides of the camera in. But like I said, this isn't clearly illustrated in the model.

2nd attempt to brainstorming

I was thinking about photography more on a universal spectrum. Everywhere you go, cameras mean the exact same thing. I wanted to try to include this idea in my design. I went a little crazy and wanted to make a globe shaped vessel, but let's be honest, I have NEVER worked into a workshop before. So with my big vessel dreams crushed, I started thinking more simply. I came up with the design of a  round shape(it doesn't have to be a perfect circle since that is impossible) that mimics both the world and a lens. The lid then mimics a design of a shutter curtain that you can find in some cameras. Then when you open the lids, the camera sits safely inside in a little divot. I didn't expect the model to be so big, so I would take away some of the negative space for me actually vessel.

First three models

When brainstorming ideas for the vessel for my camera, I first came up with the idea of building a wooden case around the camera itself. You would place the camera in through the lid in the back and the wood would simply act as a wooden casing that mimics the shape of the lens and camera body, looking like a camera itself. My second idea was to some how include storage for film. I came up with the design to have the camera in a bottom section, have a lid on top that holds film, and then a final lid to top it all off. For my third design, Margie had mentioned that I seemed to stick with square shaped designs and suggested maybe making a vessel that was shaped like a film canister. It would have different color wood to show the slots of the negatives. When thinking about all these designs, I wasn't exactly happy with any of them. I decided brainstorming some more would be the best next step.

Vessel Introduction

When I was told that I needed to bring in 3 items that hold significance for me, I went into my room and found my own vessel I already had. In it are my important jewelry and small knick knack items that I have collected over the years. From it, I chose a ring I was given the day my 3 year old sister was born, and a noah's arc bracelet my grandmother gave me when I was around 6. Knowing I needed another item, I started to look around my room. I collect antique and toy cameras so from here I chose the first antique camera my mother had bought me. When deciding to choose which item to make a vessel for, I thought the camera would be best. I already have a vessel for the smaller items and thought it would be nice to work with something bigger.

Bringing the Wayfinding project to an end

As a user, and even designer, wayfinding was something that mostly went unnoticed for me before this project. Sure I noticed when I would be in a place and was confused on where to go, but I never realized how effective of a design it could be. During the project, I enjoyed the lectures that showed all of the different wayfinding techniques around the world, and now I find myself really paying attention to signage as I am in unfamiliar places. If we had more time for the project, I think we could have done a lot more with the signage. However, with the amount of time we had, we focused more on the location of the signs and simplicity of them so that the user could get to the destination easily. 

Ted Brown

Ted Brown starts off his presentation by saying that maybe what passes as design isn’t as important, that it doesn’t matter if it is pretty or desirable.  He states that the importance is less on the object itself, but more on the design thinking which would perhaps have a bigger impact. We as designers should solve problems to reach greater results. There is a balance within design of desirability, visibility, and feasibility. Brown believes that the world of design used to be a bigger canvas and has seemed to reach a much smaller one. However, design is getting big again by the use of design thinking. Overall, design starts with humans and what they need. Designers need to understand these people’s needs as well as their culture and context. Ted also discussed the effect prototypes have in the design process. He said that they speed up the overall process by allowing designers to get their ideas out, tested, and then seeing the strengths and weaknesses of them, which result with a final product. This relates to the wayfinding process in the way that we are using prototypes to test something that will hopefully make people have a better experience within a certain location.

What is Ethnography?

  Ethnography is a way of understanding. The article discusses that good ethnographers study people, go beyond the obvious, and dig for a deeper meaning. They look for the norms people have and the effect that they have on them. They also look at the processes people go through which allows them to design the right points in their journey. People make sense of the world around them by assigning meaning to their lives, which is what designers need to study. The article states that the steps to ethnography is to define the problem, rethink the problem, define the contexts, define the sample, make a game plan, enter the field, analyze and interpret, share the insights, and define opportunities. The design process can be achieved successfully if we as designers observe, converse, and capture data. This article relates to the wayfinding process because we need to study people in order to fix their problems of successfully getting to one place from another. This article helps us think as humans living in this world, not just as designers. Overall this helps us design something that is meaningful. 

An Ethnography Primer

  Design is about finding a problem and fixing it for the user. It is very important for designers to understand their users and to think in their shoes. Ethnography is the overall importance of designers understanding the relationship between what they produce and the meaning of the product. We as designers need to go beyond our perceptions of what we think people want and actually observe what they want in order to do our best in fixing their problem. The article discusses the importance of designing things that are meaningful to the user. This is relevant to the wayfinding project because wayfinding is entirely for the people. We are observing people and fixing something solely to benefit them and make their tasks easier and more enjoyable.

Poggenpohl Article

The design process should begin with problem identification and then build from there. Poggenpohl discusses the importance of this in his article along with the usage of conceptual, behavioral, procedural, and appearance based prototypes. Him and his partner took a design job for Chicago’s Field Museum and before starting the actual design process, observed how users interacted with the museum in its current state. They took these observations and created prototypes in which they tested and then altered them again to truly reach overall success. This is very important in wayfinding design because it is all about how a user interacts with a space in means of getting them from one place to another. In our projects, we first had to find a problem. We then came up with a solution, tested it, saw how it was interacted with, and then fixed it again to re-test and reach maximum results. The projects wouldn’t be nearly as successful if we didn’t see how users react with the situation. Just like Poggenpohl and his partner, we came up with a problem, observed it, made prototypes, and then altered our prototypes in order to make sure the user was successful in getting from one place to another.

Kevin Lynch Article

Kevin Lynch discusses the 5 classifications of the studied elements within city images, these being elements, paths, edges, districts, nodes, and landmarks. Paths within a city serve as a channel in which the user uses to move within it. People use paths by observing the city as they move through it. To further the guiding of observers within a city are edges. Edges serve as linear elements that act as a path, but are not. They can also serve as barriers by closing off one section from another. Districts are commonly seen within cities, which serve as different sections within a city. These can be used as exterior reference if they are viewable from the outside. There are certain points within a city, known as nodes, that are spots within a city that the observer can enter and can be seen as the concentrations of that specific city. A similar point-reference are landmarks. Every city has their landmarks that are prominent and known by most and serve as a location finder. Reading Kevin Lynch’s excerpt is helpful in this way finding project by helping us to better understand the different elements that help us get from one destination to another. Most of the time, we see and use these 5 elements without even noticing it. Unfortunately poor directional devices are noticed more than when it is easy to get from one place to another. Every city has landmarks, nodes, districts, edges, and paths that allow us to easily, or not so easily, get from one place to the next. 

Re-test

For our re-test we designed the overall graphics of our signage, added a map to catch the users attention in the main entrance, and created a prototype to show which path to take in the courtyard. We then brought a different test user through. He didn't have any problems getting to the music library from the main entrance.  

First Test

As a group we decided the first step we needed to accomplish was to establish key directional points that would help the user get to the music library from the main entrance of Murphy. We placed simple red arrows that read "music library" in the points that we thought necessary.Our tester only came across two issues. One being that the main entrance needed something more to catch the users eye and then the split path in the courtyard came as confusing because she wasn't sure which path to take.