In order to cast off the shackles of subjective judgment, I have developed this method for assessing product design visualization work done by students. It may read cumbersome now, but much of the information contained in it is unnecessary. This could be shorter for the student user.
DC3
Assessment of Sketches
chris ebbert
Student name:
Assessment criteria of our first presentation:
We want to create real designer grade sketches – think “documents”, things with a trade value. You are going to be billing for those before long – make them look the part.
They must be a documentation of our thought processes, and there is nothing flighty about them. They are clean, firm, elegant pieces of work with flawless perspective and delightful, artistic touches such as shading and highlighting.
These are our criteria; 100 points are possible, and your mark will be computed out of them:
A demonstration of breadth in exploratory sketching (20 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “Does this pile of sketches really show every possible way of addressing this design problem? Every imaginable facet of it, as in, what it is made of, what aspects of relevant human psychology for this project it reflects, and are there matches for everything the competition is making?”).
You have produced about 80 – 120 sketches to attempt to cover the entire range of possibilities (20 points/ 100): Yes/ No
A visual image that fits the brand and product you have chosen (15 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “Does this presentation look like something which almost could be a magazine ad by this company?”).
You have chosen a brand name (5 points/ 100): Yes/ No
You have created a successfully composed layout (5 points/ 100): Yes/ No
Your colour scheme is in tune with the brand (5 points/ 100): Yes/ No
A unified look to all your individual presentation boards (5 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “Is it clear that these all came together, for the same occasion, by the same designer?”).
It is visually obvious that all your pages belong together (5 points/ 100): Yes/ No
Proper labelling (14 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “If these documents were found by someone who has no idea about the project, would they understand so well what it is about just by looking at the stats that you would stand a chance of getting your cheque even if the person who ordered you to do the work doesn’t work there anymore?”).
name (6 points/ 100): Yes/ No
project name (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
company logo (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
date (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
variation name (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
Sufficient bulk/ commitment/ value impression to the client (6 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “If you had your own manufacturing company, and this work was brought to you by a designer, together with a bill over a few thousand dollars, how inclined would you feel to pay up? Does it satisfy you? Do you feel like you got your money’s worth?”).
sturdy materials or good resolution if on-screen (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
large enough format (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
filled with a satisfying amount of sketching/ imagery (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
Neat lines, possibly done in Illustrator or with French curves; no pencil (10 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “Does this look like something the layman is unable to do? Does it justify bringing you in? Is it neater than an average person could ever hope to depict something? Does this blow people away?”).
In exploratory sketching (4 points/ 100): Yes/ No
In presentation sketching (6 points/ 100): Yes/ No
Faultless perspective (10 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “Is there anything wrong at all with this perspective? Does this look absolutely right?”).
In exploratory sketching (4 points/ 100): Yes/ No
In presentation sketching (6 points/ 100): Yes/ No
Meaningful picture itinerary to explain how the object works and how it gets assembled/ what parts it is made of (configuration drawings would be good; 10 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “If someone who has no idea about this project found your work, would they understand what it is you have depicted just by looking at it, and without your explanation? Would they understand how it comes together, and what the different parts are made of?”).
10 points: Yes/ No
Well-chosen views of object (4 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “Would you actually see this object in that kind of perspective, in a realistic situation? Or would you need to be an ant/ bird/ space alien to see it in that kind of view?”).
Realistic views for depicted object (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
No key aspects hidden by perspective or viewing angle: (2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
Neat, written explanations and referencing on the sheets (no serif type font; 3 points/ 100 total):
(Ask yourself: “Does this writing reflect trust? Does it look like you actually believe what you have written? Will someone who reads it be able to understand your visualizations better?”).
(2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
3 – 5 neat presentation boards, complying with all of the above except point 11, of course (3 points/ 100 total):
(2 points/ 100): Yes/ No
Monday, November 2, 2009
Deconstruction
chris ebbert DCC4 workshop
Deconstruction
Deconstruction is…
… not a style, and not a movement. It’s an approach.
… how you get there, not what it ends up as.
… to ask ”who says it has to…?”
… to disagree on principle.
… to turn convention inside out.
… to find out what the rules are, and break them.
… to challenge common views, by providing a working solution that defies all expectation.
… wot r u doin 4 lunch m8?
Themes similar to deconstruction that affect our working lives as product designers:
• TRIZ – Genrich Altshuller’s problem solving system for inventors.
• Forced innovation
• Reverse Engineering
• Innovation Management
What other examples of deconstruction are we living with today?
What would you get if you deconstructed yourself?
Reflect in your workbook.
Deconstruction
Deconstruction is…
… not a style, and not a movement. It’s an approach.
… how you get there, not what it ends up as.
… to ask ”who says it has to…?”
… to disagree on principle.
… to turn convention inside out.
… to find out what the rules are, and break them.
… to challenge common views, by providing a working solution that defies all expectation.
… wot r u doin 4 lunch m8?
Themes similar to deconstruction that affect our working lives as product designers:
• TRIZ – Genrich Altshuller’s problem solving system for inventors.
• Forced innovation
• Reverse Engineering
• Innovation Management
What other examples of deconstruction are we living with today?
What would you get if you deconstructed yourself?
Reflect in your workbook.
Identity
DCC4 Workshop 3 chris ebbert
Identity
“Every time you buy a product, you cast a vote for the kind of world you want to be living in.”
Aspects of products we may use to build identity in a product:
• Brand – “Whose philosophy am I endorsing?”
• Colour – “What fruit might this be?”
• Continuity – “Who are this product’s parents, siblings…?”
• Culture – “Does it eat with chopsticks?”
• Designer’s name – “Whose guru’s credo does this carry?”
• Gender – “Is it a boy or a girl?”
• Graphics – “What mood is it in?”
• Logo – “How much self esteem does it have?”
• Materials – “Show us what it’s made of.”
• Nationality – “Which land’s exotic vibe does it give off?”
• Performance – “What does this measure up to?”
• Religion – “Has it got ethics of its own?”
• Shape – “Is it a predator, prey, pregnant, or attacking, etc.?”
• Size – “How much stuff do I get for my money?”
• Detail – “How much refinement do I get for my money?”
• Smell – “Is it in good health?”
• Sound – “Has it got poise?”
• Stereotype – “Does it take sides?”
• Technology – “Is it trying to be a weapon of mass destruction, or just a stick?”
• Touch – “Do you want to cuddle?”
• Value perception – “Will I be envied for it?”
In-Class Exercise:
Tell us about your shoes, using all of the criteria above.
Workbook Homework:
Pick an object of your choice and reflect on it in the same way in your workbook, using images and writing.
Identity
“Every time you buy a product, you cast a vote for the kind of world you want to be living in.”
Aspects of products we may use to build identity in a product:
• Brand – “Whose philosophy am I endorsing?”
• Colour – “What fruit might this be?”
• Continuity – “Who are this product’s parents, siblings…?”
• Culture – “Does it eat with chopsticks?”
• Designer’s name – “Whose guru’s credo does this carry?”
• Gender – “Is it a boy or a girl?”
• Graphics – “What mood is it in?”
• Logo – “How much self esteem does it have?”
• Materials – “Show us what it’s made of.”
• Nationality – “Which land’s exotic vibe does it give off?”
• Performance – “What does this measure up to?”
• Religion – “Has it got ethics of its own?”
• Shape – “Is it a predator, prey, pregnant, or attacking, etc.?”
• Size – “How much stuff do I get for my money?”
• Detail – “How much refinement do I get for my money?”
• Smell – “Is it in good health?”
• Sound – “Has it got poise?”
• Stereotype – “Does it take sides?”
• Technology – “Is it trying to be a weapon of mass destruction, or just a stick?”
• Touch – “Do you want to cuddle?”
• Value perception – “Will I be envied for it?”
In-Class Exercise:
Tell us about your shoes, using all of the criteria above.
Workbook Homework:
Pick an object of your choice and reflect on it in the same way in your workbook, using images and writing.
Research Methodologies and Product Design
Research Methodologies and Product Design chris ebbert, workshop 2, DCC4
Let’s work with the statement that our entire work process as product designers creates a trail of research activity, and can even be classified entirely as research. Here’s how and why – please reflect on it in your workbook, and illustrate it with examples:
• “As product designers, we are empirical researchers whenever we engage in a trial and error mode of exploring solutions.” Cue-words: Ideations, Study Models, Variations.
• “We are theory-based researchers whenever we work on the basis of existing solutions.” Cue-words: Incremental Innovation, Me-Too Approaches, Reverse Engineering, IP-Research.
• “We are quantitative researchers whenever concrete data are needed to complete our design work.” Cue-words: Benchmarking, Market Research.
• “We are qualitative researchers whenever perception plays a role in our work.” Cue-words: Haptics, semantics, semiotics, cultural considerations.
• “We are action researchers whenever we make our work available to further instances and participate in the ensuing proceedings.” Cue-words: Prototype Testing, Prototype Refinement.
• “We are engaging in reflective practice throughout the entire design experience.” Cue-words: “What does this solution do with me?” Be it your own, or someone else’s, at any stage of the design process.
IP Research for product designers
It is wise to get involved in Intellectual Property research (patents and copyrights) at an early stage of the design process. It helps establish the following aspects of direction for the project, and its early completion can save much time and money:
• Who? You must identify possible IP holders, and possibly interact with them.
• What? You must define the exact range of purposes and capabilities you wish to address with your project.
• Why? You must justify the introduction of your new solution.
• Where? You must identify your markets and your sources.
• When? You must time the IP process with its related obligations.
I suggest using your PDS2 project to practice answering the five “W”- Questions above in your workbook for DCC4. Introduce the project on a page in your workbook, and try to find answers to the questions as they might pertain to your PDS2 project. If you can think of other, even hypothetical projects to use for this exercise, feel free to use them instead, or in addition.
Let’s work with the statement that our entire work process as product designers creates a trail of research activity, and can even be classified entirely as research. Here’s how and why – please reflect on it in your workbook, and illustrate it with examples:
• “As product designers, we are empirical researchers whenever we engage in a trial and error mode of exploring solutions.” Cue-words: Ideations, Study Models, Variations.
• “We are theory-based researchers whenever we work on the basis of existing solutions.” Cue-words: Incremental Innovation, Me-Too Approaches, Reverse Engineering, IP-Research.
• “We are quantitative researchers whenever concrete data are needed to complete our design work.” Cue-words: Benchmarking, Market Research.
• “We are qualitative researchers whenever perception plays a role in our work.” Cue-words: Haptics, semantics, semiotics, cultural considerations.
• “We are action researchers whenever we make our work available to further instances and participate in the ensuing proceedings.” Cue-words: Prototype Testing, Prototype Refinement.
• “We are engaging in reflective practice throughout the entire design experience.” Cue-words: “What does this solution do with me?” Be it your own, or someone else’s, at any stage of the design process.
IP Research for product designers
It is wise to get involved in Intellectual Property research (patents and copyrights) at an early stage of the design process. It helps establish the following aspects of direction for the project, and its early completion can save much time and money:
• Who? You must identify possible IP holders, and possibly interact with them.
• What? You must define the exact range of purposes and capabilities you wish to address with your project.
• Why? You must justify the introduction of your new solution.
• Where? You must identify your markets and your sources.
• When? You must time the IP process with its related obligations.
I suggest using your PDS2 project to practice answering the five “W”- Questions above in your workbook for DCC4. Introduce the project on a page in your workbook, and try to find answers to the questions as they might pertain to your PDS2 project. If you can think of other, even hypothetical projects to use for this exercise, feel free to use them instead, or in addition.
The Story Of The Little Dustbin
The Story
Of the Little
Dustbin’s Batch Production
By Chris Ebbert
Once upon a tyme,
Not too far from the beer gardens of southern Germany, there was a product design consultant named Chris. This struggling consultant soon met a friendly, Turkish businessman named Hürriyett, who desperately wanted to have a product all his own. Hürriyett and his brothers, who ran a successful business selling frying pans at trade fairs under a franchise agreement, felt that a product of their own, whose exclusive rights they would hold, would enable them to break free from the tyranny of the big, evil frying pan franchise, and make them very, very rich.
Hürriyett and Chris went on to meet regularly over lavish, Turkish dinners in fine restaurants, and decided that the best product to create would be a little household dustbin. But it would have to be the most beautiful and amusing dustbin in the entire world. And it would have to be unbelievably clever, because otherwise, people might just ignore it.
It was agreed that Chris should work for a consultancy fee, and become co-owner of the patent later-on.
Chris then started thinking hard, brooding over piles of paper napkins from Turkish restaurants, which had been scribbled and sketched on profusely with pens borrowed from waiters and other guests. Hürriyett and Chris had soon produced a mountain of sketches, trying to come up with concepts for the little dustbin. Looking at them all with a comparing eye, it soon occurred to Chris that the best idea would be to create a dustbin which would clamp down the bin liner around the edges to prevent it from falling in, somehow including the inside of the lid. And it would have to have large, exchangeable caps on the lid, to allow for a customized look, and to make it look like a little monster which opened its mouth whenever someone stepped on the pedal. This all amused Chris very much, and he created 18 colourful drawings to present the concept to Hürriyett and his brothers.
Over a water pipe, the concept amused the three Turks just as much, and it was agreed that a study model should be built. Hürriyett gave Chris the equivalent of 50 pounds and the keys to the company bicycle to go and get what it would take to build a cardboard model.
Chris went and built the cardboard model, and it worked well.
This made the three brothers very happy, and they decided that a working prototype should be built. Hürriyett gave Chris the equivalent of 300 pounds and the keys to the company’s 500-year-old executive car to go and have the prototype built somehow, somewhere.
Chris drove the disintegrating BMW 750i to the shop of his friend Werner, across the border, in France, and instructed him to laminate a working fibreglass model of the little dustbin. Werner, a long-haired biker who lived on cappuccino and nicotine, and normally produced fibreglass cows and amusement park rides in his shop, set to work and produced a nice working prototype of the little dustbin.
The three Turkish brothers were by now incredibly excited and needed to smoke the water pipe a lot to stay calm. The dustbin was working, and it looked nice. Now they would have to get a patent, somehow find a way to produce the little dustbin, and open up marketing avenues. To make sure they would be taken seriously, they bought a big, black Mercedes 600 SEL with lots of frying pan money. Then they told Chris to somehow take care of the patent and the manufacturing, while they would go looking for suitable exhibitions, fairs, companies, and telemarketing ventures to sell the little dustbin, and smoke the water pipe a bit more.
Chris scratched his head a lot and realized that he had to produce some very specific information now, based on which any manufacturing company would be able to quote him a price for the production of the little dustbin, and to be able to apply for a patent. This meant he had to construct the production version of the little dustbin in great detail, on his computer, in a 3D-CAD program, to be able to say exactly what kinds of parts would be needed, and how many of them, and how strong they would have to be, and what exactly they would have to be made of. This took him two strenuous weeks. As he went, he soon realized that he would have to decide how the little dustbin would be produced, and exactly which processes he intended to make use of for the manufacturing process. He had it worked out after a while that there were two options: Either he would design the dustbin for mass production by injection moulding, which meant huge startup investments, but cheap, clean, and quick manufacturing, or batch production by vacuum-forming, which meant cheap setup costs, but lots of niggling problems and corrections during the manufacturing process. He designed two different versions of the little dustbin, one for mass production, and one for batch production. Then he started looking for possible manufacturers. Using the 500-year-old car, he drove to Italy, Switzerland, and Austria, to meet with mighty plastics moulders, who promised to give top quality at premium prices, be it batch- or mass production. Their prices caused the three Turks much despair, and no further they went with them. Being a careful sort of man, Chris had every single one of the mighty plastics moulders sign a confidentiality agreement, to make sure they wouldn’t turn around and steal the little dustbin-idea before it was protected by a patent. This now proved a wise idea, as none of them would enter into a business agreement with the three Turks.
So Chris turned east instead and invited an illustrious bunch of plastics moulders from China and India, who conjured up stories of varying credibility as to their capabilities, some of them a bit crazy. After much haggling, bragging, and wining and dining, a nice gentleman named Deepak, from Bombay, emerged as the one whose offer was favoured by the three brothers. He claimed to be able to bring the dustbin into production for one-third of the price of the Chinese competitors, and to be able to do this within only three weeks, making use of a seamless chain of excellent, cutting-edge technology he had command over due to the fact that he and his brothers were engineers who could simply build any machine they needed. This caused the three brothers so much joy that they immediately lit their water pipe, and they stayed connected to it for an entire evening, and there was much laughter and commotion, and it was decided that Chris should go to India and create a great manufacturing empire within a few days...
Meanwhile, Chris had found a patent attorney who set to work in writing the patent application for the little dustbin. In order to be able to lift his pen, this noble man required the equivalent of about 2000 pounds first, which the three brothers gladly gave him. The patent application the noble man was about to write would protect the concept of the little dustbin from copycats until the patent would be either granted or denied. The patent would be granted only if the attorney was able to prove that the little dustbin was entirely different from all other dustbins in existence, whether they were patented or not. And the patent would be denied if he failed to do so. If it was denied, the attorney would have to find a way to re-write the patent application until it differed so much from similar patents that the little dustbin’s patent would finally be granted. This could take years, and cost hundreds of thousands of pounds.
This is why the Turks were anxious to get the little dustbin onto the market quickly, to generate revenue to pay for the coming legal fees.
Thus Chris was bundled off to India to help bring the little dustbin to life. There, everything was very different from Europe, and even though Chris was allowed all the Chicken Tikka Masala he wanted, it took not 3 weeks, but 11 months until he was able to return home. It may have had something to do with the fact that the Indian brothers turned out to be breathtakingly clueless after all, and weren’t capable in the least of building anything remotely like they had promised.
This is what happened:
Normally, when plastic parts are developed, the product design consultant will painstakingly sculpt a plasticine version of the future part by hand first; as this is time-consuming, and expensive, only one-half of the part is normally sculpted. The other half is produced by scanning the half-part with a 3D-scanner, with whose data collection a virtual model of the half-part forms automatically on a computer; that virtual part is fed into a milling machine, which carves out a perfectly clean and symmetrical model of the full part, made of a material which is hard enough to be used as a mould for the first few parts to be produced with. All this normally takes around two to three weeks.
Unfortunately, none of this technology was available to Chris at the manufacturing plant in Bombay, and Deepak, the nice gentleman who owned the company, and his brothers were very surprised that Chris thought he needed any of it, and that it existed at all. They had thought Chris would be happy to accept the services of the company’s senior carpenter, a charming old man named Mistry, who spoke no English, but carved beautiful things out of wood on a balcony overlooking the palm tree-lined company parking lot in East Goregaon, while porters served glasses of hot tea with milk, and little stray dogs were licking his bare feet. Quaint though this prospect had seemed to Chris, he felt wild despair: How was he supposed to deliver a product which would stand up to the rigors of the European market’s requirements, under these circumstances, within three weeks?
It was obvious that Deepak and his brothers had good vacuum forming machines, but getting the moulds done symmetrically in an acceptable quality seemed impossible now. Chris consulted with his Turks, who understood the situation and conceded that they’d gladly pay Chris to stay in India until everything would be finished.
So, Chris, who tended to write steep bills, and who began to like India, shook his head in disbelief, arranged to stay for a long time, and started to improvise. He found that there was a kind of childrens’ plasticine in India which, even though it had the consistency of a shredded stray dog in tooth paste, and tended to run like ice cream in the tropical climate, could be made to perform reasonably well as a first mould in the vacuum former if cooled in the company’s refrigerator over night. Chris spent weeks modeling moulds from shredded stray dog with scissors and caps of pens, refrigerating the model in the evening, and usually ringing for the shop manager, who was waiting in standby-mode in front of the small office, on completion of a part in the morning. The wiry man would then hurry off with the ice-cold, ridiculously coloured mould, running fast across the hot workshop, in order to reach the moulding machine before the model could get soft. He then immediately took a plastic imprint of the model. Whenever this worked, everyone was very happy. Sometimes it didn’t work, which meant that everyone had to wait until the model had melted and been poured out of the ruined mould, and put back into the refrigerator to get hard enough for modeling again. Meanwhile, Chris would stroll off to have a tall glass of fine Kingfisher beer and play with stray dogs in the parking lot, and come back two hours later to carve the same part again, hoping that it would work this time.
After many weeks, all parts of the little dustbin had finally been moulded from ABS, using frozen models; hard, acrylic casts had been made from them to develop the aluminium production moulds. Understandably, the finish left much to be desired, and Chris had to oversee a small army of workers who were busy sanding down the acrylic casts, and later grinding down the aluminium ones with sandpaper and flexes, to make them smooth and symmetrical.
In the meantime, Deepak and his brothers crisscrossed Bombay in rickshaws, hunting down subcontractors who would be able to produce stickers and the necessary, small metal parts for hinges. Finding ways to communicate to the very relaxed factory workers that it actually did matter where exactly on the product stickers and drill holes were to be positioned proved a huge issue. In the end, putting depressions into the moulds in the appropriate locations, and offering a Swiss watch to the worker who would hit the right position most reliably did wonders for quality control.
In July, Chris flew to Istanbul for the first time to present the little dustbin to Hürriyett and his brothers. They were very happy, but thought that it should be just a teeny bit larger.
So Chris flew back to Bombay and started everything all-over again, just to make the little dustbin a teeny bit larger.
By October, this was done, and the little dustbin was produced in great numbers. Container after container arrived in Europe, Turkey, and the Arab Gulf States, and the three Turkish brothers and Chris went from one business meeting to the next, and smoked the water pipe a lot.
Amazingly, the patent had been granted without any difficulties. But the patent only protected the little dustbin in Germany and France, and the three brothers found so many wholesalers elsewhere, that they had to pay the noble patent attorney an additional 30.000 pounds to apply for patents for the little dustbin in other countries, as well.
This they did, and the little dustbin sold well for a while, and almost everyone lived happily ever after.
Of the Little
Dustbin’s Batch Production
By Chris Ebbert
Once upon a tyme,
Not too far from the beer gardens of southern Germany, there was a product design consultant named Chris. This struggling consultant soon met a friendly, Turkish businessman named Hürriyett, who desperately wanted to have a product all his own. Hürriyett and his brothers, who ran a successful business selling frying pans at trade fairs under a franchise agreement, felt that a product of their own, whose exclusive rights they would hold, would enable them to break free from the tyranny of the big, evil frying pan franchise, and make them very, very rich.
Hürriyett and Chris went on to meet regularly over lavish, Turkish dinners in fine restaurants, and decided that the best product to create would be a little household dustbin. But it would have to be the most beautiful and amusing dustbin in the entire world. And it would have to be unbelievably clever, because otherwise, people might just ignore it.
It was agreed that Chris should work for a consultancy fee, and become co-owner of the patent later-on.
Chris then started thinking hard, brooding over piles of paper napkins from Turkish restaurants, which had been scribbled and sketched on profusely with pens borrowed from waiters and other guests. Hürriyett and Chris had soon produced a mountain of sketches, trying to come up with concepts for the little dustbin. Looking at them all with a comparing eye, it soon occurred to Chris that the best idea would be to create a dustbin which would clamp down the bin liner around the edges to prevent it from falling in, somehow including the inside of the lid. And it would have to have large, exchangeable caps on the lid, to allow for a customized look, and to make it look like a little monster which opened its mouth whenever someone stepped on the pedal. This all amused Chris very much, and he created 18 colourful drawings to present the concept to Hürriyett and his brothers.
Over a water pipe, the concept amused the three Turks just as much, and it was agreed that a study model should be built. Hürriyett gave Chris the equivalent of 50 pounds and the keys to the company bicycle to go and get what it would take to build a cardboard model.
Chris went and built the cardboard model, and it worked well.
This made the three brothers very happy, and they decided that a working prototype should be built. Hürriyett gave Chris the equivalent of 300 pounds and the keys to the company’s 500-year-old executive car to go and have the prototype built somehow, somewhere.
Chris drove the disintegrating BMW 750i to the shop of his friend Werner, across the border, in France, and instructed him to laminate a working fibreglass model of the little dustbin. Werner, a long-haired biker who lived on cappuccino and nicotine, and normally produced fibreglass cows and amusement park rides in his shop, set to work and produced a nice working prototype of the little dustbin.
The three Turkish brothers were by now incredibly excited and needed to smoke the water pipe a lot to stay calm. The dustbin was working, and it looked nice. Now they would have to get a patent, somehow find a way to produce the little dustbin, and open up marketing avenues. To make sure they would be taken seriously, they bought a big, black Mercedes 600 SEL with lots of frying pan money. Then they told Chris to somehow take care of the patent and the manufacturing, while they would go looking for suitable exhibitions, fairs, companies, and telemarketing ventures to sell the little dustbin, and smoke the water pipe a bit more.
Chris scratched his head a lot and realized that he had to produce some very specific information now, based on which any manufacturing company would be able to quote him a price for the production of the little dustbin, and to be able to apply for a patent. This meant he had to construct the production version of the little dustbin in great detail, on his computer, in a 3D-CAD program, to be able to say exactly what kinds of parts would be needed, and how many of them, and how strong they would have to be, and what exactly they would have to be made of. This took him two strenuous weeks. As he went, he soon realized that he would have to decide how the little dustbin would be produced, and exactly which processes he intended to make use of for the manufacturing process. He had it worked out after a while that there were two options: Either he would design the dustbin for mass production by injection moulding, which meant huge startup investments, but cheap, clean, and quick manufacturing, or batch production by vacuum-forming, which meant cheap setup costs, but lots of niggling problems and corrections during the manufacturing process. He designed two different versions of the little dustbin, one for mass production, and one for batch production. Then he started looking for possible manufacturers. Using the 500-year-old car, he drove to Italy, Switzerland, and Austria, to meet with mighty plastics moulders, who promised to give top quality at premium prices, be it batch- or mass production. Their prices caused the three Turks much despair, and no further they went with them. Being a careful sort of man, Chris had every single one of the mighty plastics moulders sign a confidentiality agreement, to make sure they wouldn’t turn around and steal the little dustbin-idea before it was protected by a patent. This now proved a wise idea, as none of them would enter into a business agreement with the three Turks.
So Chris turned east instead and invited an illustrious bunch of plastics moulders from China and India, who conjured up stories of varying credibility as to their capabilities, some of them a bit crazy. After much haggling, bragging, and wining and dining, a nice gentleman named Deepak, from Bombay, emerged as the one whose offer was favoured by the three brothers. He claimed to be able to bring the dustbin into production for one-third of the price of the Chinese competitors, and to be able to do this within only three weeks, making use of a seamless chain of excellent, cutting-edge technology he had command over due to the fact that he and his brothers were engineers who could simply build any machine they needed. This caused the three brothers so much joy that they immediately lit their water pipe, and they stayed connected to it for an entire evening, and there was much laughter and commotion, and it was decided that Chris should go to India and create a great manufacturing empire within a few days...
Meanwhile, Chris had found a patent attorney who set to work in writing the patent application for the little dustbin. In order to be able to lift his pen, this noble man required the equivalent of about 2000 pounds first, which the three brothers gladly gave him. The patent application the noble man was about to write would protect the concept of the little dustbin from copycats until the patent would be either granted or denied. The patent would be granted only if the attorney was able to prove that the little dustbin was entirely different from all other dustbins in existence, whether they were patented or not. And the patent would be denied if he failed to do so. If it was denied, the attorney would have to find a way to re-write the patent application until it differed so much from similar patents that the little dustbin’s patent would finally be granted. This could take years, and cost hundreds of thousands of pounds.
This is why the Turks were anxious to get the little dustbin onto the market quickly, to generate revenue to pay for the coming legal fees.
Thus Chris was bundled off to India to help bring the little dustbin to life. There, everything was very different from Europe, and even though Chris was allowed all the Chicken Tikka Masala he wanted, it took not 3 weeks, but 11 months until he was able to return home. It may have had something to do with the fact that the Indian brothers turned out to be breathtakingly clueless after all, and weren’t capable in the least of building anything remotely like they had promised.
This is what happened:
Normally, when plastic parts are developed, the product design consultant will painstakingly sculpt a plasticine version of the future part by hand first; as this is time-consuming, and expensive, only one-half of the part is normally sculpted. The other half is produced by scanning the half-part with a 3D-scanner, with whose data collection a virtual model of the half-part forms automatically on a computer; that virtual part is fed into a milling machine, which carves out a perfectly clean and symmetrical model of the full part, made of a material which is hard enough to be used as a mould for the first few parts to be produced with. All this normally takes around two to three weeks.
Unfortunately, none of this technology was available to Chris at the manufacturing plant in Bombay, and Deepak, the nice gentleman who owned the company, and his brothers were very surprised that Chris thought he needed any of it, and that it existed at all. They had thought Chris would be happy to accept the services of the company’s senior carpenter, a charming old man named Mistry, who spoke no English, but carved beautiful things out of wood on a balcony overlooking the palm tree-lined company parking lot in East Goregaon, while porters served glasses of hot tea with milk, and little stray dogs were licking his bare feet. Quaint though this prospect had seemed to Chris, he felt wild despair: How was he supposed to deliver a product which would stand up to the rigors of the European market’s requirements, under these circumstances, within three weeks?
It was obvious that Deepak and his brothers had good vacuum forming machines, but getting the moulds done symmetrically in an acceptable quality seemed impossible now. Chris consulted with his Turks, who understood the situation and conceded that they’d gladly pay Chris to stay in India until everything would be finished.
So, Chris, who tended to write steep bills, and who began to like India, shook his head in disbelief, arranged to stay for a long time, and started to improvise. He found that there was a kind of childrens’ plasticine in India which, even though it had the consistency of a shredded stray dog in tooth paste, and tended to run like ice cream in the tropical climate, could be made to perform reasonably well as a first mould in the vacuum former if cooled in the company’s refrigerator over night. Chris spent weeks modeling moulds from shredded stray dog with scissors and caps of pens, refrigerating the model in the evening, and usually ringing for the shop manager, who was waiting in standby-mode in front of the small office, on completion of a part in the morning. The wiry man would then hurry off with the ice-cold, ridiculously coloured mould, running fast across the hot workshop, in order to reach the moulding machine before the model could get soft. He then immediately took a plastic imprint of the model. Whenever this worked, everyone was very happy. Sometimes it didn’t work, which meant that everyone had to wait until the model had melted and been poured out of the ruined mould, and put back into the refrigerator to get hard enough for modeling again. Meanwhile, Chris would stroll off to have a tall glass of fine Kingfisher beer and play with stray dogs in the parking lot, and come back two hours later to carve the same part again, hoping that it would work this time.
After many weeks, all parts of the little dustbin had finally been moulded from ABS, using frozen models; hard, acrylic casts had been made from them to develop the aluminium production moulds. Understandably, the finish left much to be desired, and Chris had to oversee a small army of workers who were busy sanding down the acrylic casts, and later grinding down the aluminium ones with sandpaper and flexes, to make them smooth and symmetrical.
In the meantime, Deepak and his brothers crisscrossed Bombay in rickshaws, hunting down subcontractors who would be able to produce stickers and the necessary, small metal parts for hinges. Finding ways to communicate to the very relaxed factory workers that it actually did matter where exactly on the product stickers and drill holes were to be positioned proved a huge issue. In the end, putting depressions into the moulds in the appropriate locations, and offering a Swiss watch to the worker who would hit the right position most reliably did wonders for quality control.
In July, Chris flew to Istanbul for the first time to present the little dustbin to Hürriyett and his brothers. They were very happy, but thought that it should be just a teeny bit larger.
So Chris flew back to Bombay and started everything all-over again, just to make the little dustbin a teeny bit larger.
By October, this was done, and the little dustbin was produced in great numbers. Container after container arrived in Europe, Turkey, and the Arab Gulf States, and the three Turkish brothers and Chris went from one business meeting to the next, and smoked the water pipe a lot.
Amazingly, the patent had been granted without any difficulties. But the patent only protected the little dustbin in Germany and France, and the three brothers found so many wholesalers elsewhere, that they had to pay the noble patent attorney an additional 30.000 pounds to apply for patents for the little dustbin in other countries, as well.
This they did, and the little dustbin sold well for a while, and almost everyone lived happily ever after.
Postmodernism and product design
Not only Alessi and Robert Venturi show an approach to object design that avails itself of contemporary means to employ flashback semantics. The Retro movement of the 1990s, in some cases still ongoing, shows a similar psychology of nostalgic adornment as postmodernism did.
Telltale signs in product design:
• Citing brand specific, historical styling references
• Nostalgic themes and names reminiscent of the brand’s past classics
• Adhesion to mainstream form while applying nostalgic accents
Homework suggestion for your workbook: Find images of products and vehicles that were designed in the last 20 years with a nostalgic, or retro attitude.
Telltale signs in product design:
• Citing brand specific, historical styling references
• Nostalgic themes and names reminiscent of the brand’s past classics
• Adhesion to mainstream form while applying nostalgic accents
Homework suggestion for your workbook: Find images of products and vehicles that were designed in the last 20 years with a nostalgic, or retro attitude.
Design in the 60s and 70s
The face of product design over the decades, and the return of the stylist
1930s:
Architects and artists begin to take influence in the manufacturing scene, creating objects suitable for, and expressive of, their times. On a lower level, stylists work in various industries for the purpose of achieving aesthetic results without aspiring to innovation on a conceptual level.
1940s:
Scarcity of materials and emergence of new technology infuse the world with new possibilities and solutions, inspiring architects and artists to utopian dreams of a better time after the war. Stylists still abound, but insight into new technologies displaces them in favour of technologically more informed, industrial artists – the designer as we know it is born.
1950s:
The onset of a middleclass society with strong consumerism breeds awareness of public focus in research and design, de facto turning the tables on the “great innovators”, and making them more attuned to listening to the public. Consumer-oriented development takes shape.
1960s:
Rising individualism fuels diversity in contemporary styles. Anti-conservative sentiment lends itself to the introduction of exotic aspects, both authentic and utopian. The consumer object begins to reflect its owner’s creeds and ideologies.
1970s:
Hangover sets in from the freewheeling effects of the hippie movement, and the oil crisis compounds a feeling of gloom and doom, which expresses itself in overly assertive forms.
1980s:
Idealism subsides as a driving force in society, giving way to a culture of fluff and indiscriminate consumerism, at times slanted towards environmentalism.
1990s:
The advent of computer technology allows for streamlined r&d processes and new shapes, inspired by the realities of using 3D modelling software. Neo-conservatism, at times culminating in retro approaches, and a new mannerism enter the world of product design toward the end of the 90s.
2000+:
Mannerism abounds in the world of shape. Incremental improvements in electronics and digital technology spawn new kinds of products, whose semantics are increasingly styling-heavy.
Homework: Reflect on the notion that product design is a sounding board of public sentiment, and the overall psychology of society. Find a few current products in a store or online, and consider in your workbook what their semantics are telling us about our society, and the way people think today.
1930s:
Architects and artists begin to take influence in the manufacturing scene, creating objects suitable for, and expressive of, their times. On a lower level, stylists work in various industries for the purpose of achieving aesthetic results without aspiring to innovation on a conceptual level.
1940s:
Scarcity of materials and emergence of new technology infuse the world with new possibilities and solutions, inspiring architects and artists to utopian dreams of a better time after the war. Stylists still abound, but insight into new technologies displaces them in favour of technologically more informed, industrial artists – the designer as we know it is born.
1950s:
The onset of a middleclass society with strong consumerism breeds awareness of public focus in research and design, de facto turning the tables on the “great innovators”, and making them more attuned to listening to the public. Consumer-oriented development takes shape.
1960s:
Rising individualism fuels diversity in contemporary styles. Anti-conservative sentiment lends itself to the introduction of exotic aspects, both authentic and utopian. The consumer object begins to reflect its owner’s creeds and ideologies.
1970s:
Hangover sets in from the freewheeling effects of the hippie movement, and the oil crisis compounds a feeling of gloom and doom, which expresses itself in overly assertive forms.
1980s:
Idealism subsides as a driving force in society, giving way to a culture of fluff and indiscriminate consumerism, at times slanted towards environmentalism.
1990s:
The advent of computer technology allows for streamlined r&d processes and new shapes, inspired by the realities of using 3D modelling software. Neo-conservatism, at times culminating in retro approaches, and a new mannerism enter the world of product design toward the end of the 90s.
2000+:
Mannerism abounds in the world of shape. Incremental improvements in electronics and digital technology spawn new kinds of products, whose semantics are increasingly styling-heavy.
Homework: Reflect on the notion that product design is a sounding board of public sentiment, and the overall psychology of society. Find a few current products in a store or online, and consider in your workbook what their semantics are telling us about our society, and the way people think today.
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