My previous development in the different competency area’s was already well divided and at the same level. This gave me the freedom to choose which competency area’s I would like to develop. My assessor gave me the following feedback on my showcase: "Coming from no vision to a weak vision, it is remarkable that somebody obviously talented and following his own course in life pretty early cannot be more lucid about himself. However, it's early, and there is time." I did receive a P however in B1.2, but in B1.1 I received a PC for the same reason. Because of this my main goals were to thoroughly develop my vision and identity because these were highly lacking compared on my overall development as a designer.
Past semester I made a Kinect game as project which was only 2D so for this project I wanted a more tangible and conceptual project. I followed the assignment Creative Electronics and wanted to put this knowledge to the test in this project. These arguments and my passion for music made me chose my current project.
In general I’m very pleased with the developments that I’ve made this semester. Especially thanks to my coach I now fulfilled my main goal to have a clear vision and identity which of course can be developed further. Again I made an even competency development. I’m becoming more excited to work on design projects in my spare time because I want to put my design knowledge to the test.
The result of the project is of a high quality and we went to a nice design process in which we came across all the different competency areas. It was the last chance to work as a team within my study. With my project team we found the most efficient way to work as a group at the end and I’m now confident that I’m ready to do a project by myself.
Because of my explorative identity, I learn whenever I need something to learn in order to proceed. MMy preferred way of learning is by directly applying the theory I learned on the project or assignment I am working on. The assignment Human Processes was a very theoretical assignment and we didn’t had much relevant assignment and we didn’t have much relevant assignments, making the theory hard to remember. On the contrary, for the assignment Sketching the only thing we did was making assignments, which got me really motivated and I still remember all the tips and tricks. Of course some subjects have to be taught more theoretically than others.
Now that I have made big leaps with my vision and identity I have a good guideline for future learning activities. For example, instead of working on the website in my spare time, I now also tried to work on more product related projects such as the Light Installation.
I’ve come across multiple design process methods and I now think that it’s not a matter of preference when it comes to choosing the method. It depends on the project and the type of client you work with. You can’t choose the process you go through, but you can choose how you present your process. Maybe that is why there are so many different theories about processes. Everyone undergoes a different process in their project and when a project turns out successful, they assume that the process was equally successful. My theory is that you can’t choose a process ,as this choice is highly dependent on the team, client and project. I came to this conclusion when comparing the theory of the BC Design and the book I read “A Designer’s Research Manual”.
I’ve never been in a group that didn’t work well together. This makes me question if it is just luck or that I’m good at guiding and leading groups. However, with my project group I did experience the way you can work the most efficient. We focused on dividing the tasks in a way that all team members always had something to do. Defining and visualising the right priorities helped a lot and allowed us to focus on what is important. besides ID I work a lot in groups for example: organizing conventions. Here I can experience working in bigger groups and with different layers of groups. For the Dutch Juggling Convention I’m part of the main organisers so I also have to guide people in a lower group. Keeping a clear schedule and overview is important to keep everyone working efficiently.
The assignment Sketching has thought me how I can communicate my ideas and concepts in a clear way. I can draw a paper full of concepts and then pick one and high-light it to make it communicative. I also tried to present my ideas as much as possible. Every week we made a small presentation about what you did on the project for our coach. I got feedback on how you could make these small presentation quick but professional for future to clients. I took every opportunity to present my projects for example I presented my winning BC Design project and a Marketing assignment for fellow-students. I also think that my explanation skills can be improved, so I gave several workshops in, of course, juggling, but also in HTML & CSS. I tried to give my "students" a little extra information in order to convince them that they’re a little bit more special. This was to keep them motivated, which worked quite well and it gave a more personal bond with the students.
At last I have transformed my 2D concepts into 3D forms. In the project I made a lot of 3D iterations and handed these forms to different people to see how they would interact with them. I shaped an abstract concept as sound into the shape of a pen that represented this sound. I really enjoyed working with materials and also made my own wooden design clock in my spare time. I’m starting to get more confortable to work with different materials and tools. Next semester, I want to especially develop in this competency. I want to become a real craftsman in different kinds of materials. Also I want to create forms that are based on more abstract ideas. My pen is now based on the shape of a violin, which is also the sound it makes. I could find a more abstract interpretation of this , this is because of all the abstract drawing assignments I did at high school.
The assignment Sketching taught me to quickly make a lot of concepts on paper. Now I’m not afraid to sketch even the most crazy and unrealistic ideas. Even these crazy ideas can be very valuable later, which I experienced at the Design Basic Course. Together with students from different studies we began with the most unrealistic societal unfriendly concepts. We tried to combine our 3 best concepts and came to one pretty good concept. After researching different papers and doing some user tests the concept became more and more realistic and ready to be implemented in the real world. As a realistic person I didn’t expect that these crazy concepts would become such a good winning concept. This has taught me the valuable lessons of brainstorming: you don’t say “yes, but…”, but say “yes, and…”.
In my PDP it states I would develop this competency by expanding my current Business Plan, but because of the USE-learning line I chose, this would give an overkill of development in this competency. The course New Product Marketing is about launching new products in existing companies. It wasn’t really about the product itself, but more about the influence it would have after the launch. All the basic theoretical marketing aspects were covered and had to be applied in different assignments. I already tried to apply a little bit of these theories into my design work. The chocolatier I work for as a designer, didn’t sell much products between Christmas and New Year’s Eve. We came up with an “Oil Boll” stand which was a huge success. They didn’t only sell a lot, but more people became aware of the chocolatier and bought more products in the shop itself. I will continue to keep thinking of new strategies together with them to see if marketing concepts also work as you think it will.
In the project I assisted in the user testing of our pen, however I didn’t really contribute as much as I wanted to. I did some user tests with my own concept of the rolling balls, but this quickly turned out to not work the way it was intended to do.
My assignment Human Processes taught me how people perceive certain information and how I can enhance the perceptibility of this information. With this assignment I know what aspects you have to keep in mind while designing instead of finding certain problems while user testing, it increased my expert evaluation capabilities.
Two series of three short films called Black Mirror show a cruel future perspective on society. I found these shorts films very interesting and shocking to see. It made me think more about what the impact of design could be. When creating new concepts it is important to keep this in mind.
I started to write down current developments in society or observations in my “Little Own Theories”. This are visions on current developments and consequences of these developments. I will continue to write this in order to see if my “predictions” come true. Next semester I want to write more of these theories to further develop this competency.
I developed this competency in many areas. In the project we already started to make prototypes after 3 weeks which was also the goal set in my PDP. I discovered how to properly use different sensors and make them more reliable. Both the electronics and programming came together and I now am able to easily and quickly build and test my concepts.
In the design basic course I was responsible for the final prototype. We were the only group that had a fully working prototype without “The wizard of Oz”-methods. Different ID-coaches were impressed by the high quality of the prototype considering the short amount of time we had. A proof that I’m now to an advanced level of creative electronics.
A new challenge was when I made the light-sculpture. Here I could put my programming knowledge to the test to create the letters from left to right. I’m really excited about the possibilities and power of electronics and am eager to use it more in my spare time in order to become even better.
The goal for this semester to not further develop this competency. However it is logical that you need it throughout the design process. In the project I created a formula that could calculate the position of the pen. I used different math formulas to construct this formula. Also in the programming of the light sculpture I used math cleverly to make it more efficient. So you could say I did fulfil my goal and for next semester I’m sure I’m going to develop it further because of the prototypes I’m going to make.
During the summer holiday I spent some time on a model that could calculate the difficulty level of juggle trick. It is some headbreaking mathematics and I left it rest for a while. I'm not quite sure what to do with it but I now I learnt that models can become very complex. When you change only one factor, the whole system will change.
Next semester I want to “fill in the gaps”, because of all the side activities I do, I tend to just work instead of learn of what I’m doing. I want to create more time for Product Design related activities. Especially the translation of concepts and becoming better at creating three dimensional shapes with different materials is something I want to spend more time on and incorporate with my project.
In my draft PDP I tried to find the gaps in my skills and knowledge and I will try to fill this in order to become an overall well developed designer. Also for the project I try to move to different contexts in order to get a better overview. Next stop will be a project with light, because I want to work with people with a psychosis that have to stay in isolations cells. My father works as an psychiatrist so I can come in contact with this target group that is highly unreachable for other designers. For them I want to research how I could make their stay in an isolation cell more pleasant.
The number one learning point for me this semester is to stick to your vision. In the future I have to keep this in mind a reflect often if what I’m doing represents my vision and identity. I see my future products as products that will be solving serious societal issues but with a playful and inspiring touch to it.
