Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Other Classes

Kelsey's Blog was similar to my own. Making a far off link between design and real world applications. Marketing seems to be a mixture of economics and design. Good merchandising requires proper design and marketing....

Robert wrote about how he never thought about negative design aspects, especially usability. Before reading Don Norman's epic novel, I too never really thought about usability. Like Robert I was more concerned with where i was going and whats going on for dinner. Its interesting that after being in seminar for a couple of weeks, Robert has payed more attention to the world around him.

I enjoyed reading Spencer's blog about Mac OS Leopard. It is essentially a increasing the "supply" of the operating system without giving anything up. It is efficient. The features of Leopard are both easy to use and visible, making them user friendly.

Sunday, October 28, 2007

Retail Merchandising

Merchandising is a broad desgin term. According to the internet legend, wikipedia:

"Merchandising refers to the methods, practices and operations conducted to promote and sustain certain categories of commercial activity. The term is understood to have different specific meanings depending on the context."

Merchandising can be the use of a brand in order to sell another. Ranging from Superman to the legendary Boston Red Sox. It is also used for promotion and trade. But to me, the , well at least, most entertaining aspect of merchandising is..... retail merchandising.

Often in department stores, the merchandising once done by in store employees is now dictated by vendors, brands, corporate, regional visual teams, store visual teams, mangers, vendor specialists, and associates. It seems that everybody has their fingers in the pot. The higher powers decide what products are to be sold, where they go in the store, and the visual team that will decide the look of the floor for the moment. once clothing is on the floor, vendor reps and specialist produce an image that the brand is trying to achieve.

Working in the Juniors department at Macy*s Southdale, and the former Marshall Fields, for over two years, I have a pretty good grasp of merchandising my product. I merchandised, re designed, the entire "Free People" shop last September. Within days, pieces that were not selling, began flying off the shelves.

Retail merchandising is the design of a shop to make it most visually appealing for the consumer and most profitable for the retailer.

Thursday, October 25, 2007

blog reviews

I read an interesting article on Kelsey's blog. The selection of the article within Kelsey’s blog attracted me to the link. It was both eye catching in writing style as well as content. Common, everyday items that we take for granted as design mistakes. Well push my buttons and call me a monkey’s uncle, I’m intrigued.

The article discussed major players and ideas in innovative design. Using technology, like computers and video games, to make difficult tasks user friendly. The thought of using a video game as a training device for medical students is outstanding.

It relates to my freshman seminar, Design Intelligence, because both the class and the article are about creating a product that is user friendly, aesthetically pleasing, and forward thinking.




Kelsey's blog
is just a click away.





i will write about it before class on fri



The second blog I found interesting
was Mr. Naufal Waffle's.



The comical idea of pulling a tab from the “tail” of a toy grasped my attention. Nevertheless, it made sense. Often one has no idea how to make something work due to a design flaw.

The website was interesting because it was a slide presentation of different design mistakes and possible solutions.

The link relates to class because it about how to make things work, and how to design something that feels right.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Design Website

'Béhar's ability to anticipate--and incarnate--consumer lust routinely brings executives to his door, saying, "We want to be the Apple of our industry." And Béhar has an impertinent question for them, too: "Do you have the guts?"'

The above passage is extremely relevant to class. We discuss about design innovations and making products user friendly. Apple is a standard of innovation and forward thinking. Behar is the Apple of designers. He revolutionizes society with his improvements in design. The article quotes, "His holistic view of design is rare in the business world." More should have this view, then everything would be usable.


This is a link to the "Fast Company" website.




This text
is a link to the "Fast Company" website.

Sunday, October 21, 2007

"What if we stopped making the docs we give away for free SO much nicer than the ones the user paid for? What if instead of seducing potential users to buy, we seduced existing users to learn?"-- Kathy Sierra

To me, this is on the same page as customer service. If I already have your product, make me like it even more through manuals and service, so that I will become a life long customer and refer all my friends and family. The newest, trendiest car may have free, flashy brochures, but they often die young. Why are classics classic?

A lot of it has to do with how happy the consumer is. I love the notion of keeping current customers happy.

Its kind of like college. Sure the shiny, propaganda, mailings make any institution seem fabulous. But, if the college is not what it looks like to be on paper, then potential students will not enroll or transfer. if the same energy of enticing a student to a school was put into making the student happy, a lot less negative actions would take place on campus.



This text
is a link Kathy Sierra's blog.

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

A well designed product

There are a lot of well designed products. Other than the obvious Apple creations, several objects are outstanding. "Seven for all mankind" jeans are well designed. They are cut perfectly to my body type, they are made of a rich looking, yet soft feeling fabric, and they are easy to use. No belts required.

http://www.7forallmankind.com/pl/c/3.html

Love it.

But pertaining to Norman's "The Design of Everyday Things," pointe shoes are the perfectly designed product. It is impossible to make an error putting on the shoes, because they are interchangeable right and left. They take advantage of natural mapping because they simply cover the shoes. There are many different types of pointe shoes, able to fit any foot, anywhere. Knowledge that one must keep in the head is how to tie the ribbons around the foot, but wait! Using the foot, there are only a couple of ways to tie the ribbons correctly! The knot of the ribbons must be tucked away in the inner ankle, or a forcing function will give you a blister!

Monday, October 8, 2007

A flawed product

Everyday we encounter things with design flaws. It is hard to pinpoint a single item with a flaw because after the multitude of bad design, we use knowledge in our head to simply learn how to cope, so poor design does not stand out horribly. Nevertheless, a product that has design flaws is my desk lamp. The lamp was designed by a designer, not a common person. conceptually, it is thoughtful, and organized. A desk lamp with a tape despenser, pencil holders, and other goodies.



But in the real world, many frustrations exist.

The most important aspect of a lamp is to provide light. But the round knob at the top of the light makes it unclear whether the user should push it in, or turn it, to produce a sunny glow. The knob does depress, and turn both to the right and left. The lamp only works when one turns the on swich to the left (if one is staring dead on at the object), but do not forget it clicks no matter which way you manipulate the knob.

Secondly, it is impossible to put tape in the tape holder. The round, plastic holder that a spool of tape sits on does not come out of the lamp no matter how the angle, pressure, or what have you, while trying to extract it.

Three other compartments do not really old anything except post-its. They're too small for writing utensils, rulers, pretty much anything bigger than post-it size. And they're too shallow for paper clips or rubber bands.

I have a big desk lamp that can hold 3 pencils, a pen, and a pair of scissors that can be turned on some of the time.

Thursday, October 4, 2007

The egg drop.

We were told that we needed to create something for an egg to survive a three story drop. After much brainstorming, Kelsey and I decided that we must build something with many layers to protect the egg. With limited time and resources, we went digging in the recycling bins by Hoben Hall. We came up with a seven, count them, seven layer contraption to hold our egg. The egg was surrounded by cotton balls, in a cup, surrounded by plastic bags in a Kleenex box. The box was centered inside of a large box filled with balled up newspaper and plastic bags. The egg, little Robert, was not going anywhere. In the design we wanted to include a large surface area so all the impact of crashing would be less intense on the delicate egg, and layers of loose padding to allow for movement within the box.

The building of our super structures was simple, easy, and efficient. All of our supplies were free, thanks again to the recycling bins, and simple. It was a matter of putting the layers in the correct order, and poof, we have an invincible egg container!


I was not worried about testing our egg container. There was no doubt in my mind that it would not succeed with flying colors. After several successful tests, as a class we minimized our contraptions to see if we over designed our projects. Little Robert lived. We took the Kleenex box out of the big box, tossed it down three flights with no causalities. But just the cup and cotton balls proved to be too much for lil’ Bobby…