Postal Presents: instructions to receiver

Remember that the receiver of your Postal Present should be able to decipher how to transform the 2D sheets which came in the envelope into the 3D object that you would like to give him/her. Thus you should include a sheet inside the envelope which shows how to do it. A series of step-by-step images would be useful. For next week's assessment, if a random receiver of your package (such as your tutor or classmate) cannot understand what to make of the envelop contents, then your design will be considered less successful. Instead of bringing a smile to the receiver's face, you'd be delivering a frown! Of course good design is intuitive and needs little instructions to use, particularly if it is visible or obvious from the design how it is supposed to be operated. There is a good book in the library with lots of graphical examples on the art of instructional design: "Open It".

Peer Comments on Project

It's great to see students giving constructive comments to each other and supporting each other's work.

Unfortunately there are still some students whose blogspots are up to now inaccessible or unavailable for comment. If you are one of those, you need to change your settings ASAP and upload your work as soon as the project has been presented; if this situation continues you will be penalized for making it difficult for your peers to do their task of commenting. Also some obviously didnt put much to comment on (unclear images, no textual explanation, no poster, etc), making it difficult for the peers to give any feedback.

When commenting -- aside from praising -- please dont forget to give feedback on how the design could be improved. There's no such thing as a perfect design, everything can benefit from improvement.

Presentation Room Layout

The layout for the studio for Friday's Project One Experience Enrichment presentations as shown at the left.

Note that many of you wouldnt be able to mount your posters or drawings to a wall or to a glass panel. It's OK to have your works flat on the tables, but I suggest you put each of them inside an A3 plastic sleeve and insert some rigid cardboard to support, so that when you are presenting they are not floppy. That would make it look more professional too. DO NOT mount on foam core!

Another option is to get an A3 display book, or better, an A3 easel display book which can stand up by itself.

Project Two: Postal Presents

The handout for the Postal Presents lecture this morning can be downloaded here.

The brief for Project Two is here.

Modelmaking materials

In Marrickville there is a shop which sells industry offcuts, rejects and scraps at bargain prices. There are plenty of materials are useful for modelmaking: EVA foam sheets, PVC, polystyrene, wood, aluminium, etc. Check them out: www.reversegarbage.org.au

Some tips on Hand Tool Design

Here are some useful illustrations showing some principles and guidelines on hand tool design. These were extracted from standard industrial design references on human factors:

Etienne Grandjean. Fitting the task to the man: a textbook on occupational ergonomics.

Barry H Kantowitz + Robert Sorkin. Human factors: understanding people-system relationships.

Stephen Pheasant. Bodyspace: anthropometry, ergonomics, and the design of work.

Mark Sanders + Ernest McCormick. Human factors in engineering and design.

Four Pleasures Analysis

Here's an example of a design experience analysis using the Four Pleasures framework (one of the slides shown in class in Week 2).

1.Video of Dr Patrick W Jordan explaining the Four Pleasures framework
2. Open University article on the Four Pleasures
3. IEE Review article on "Putting the Pleasure into Products"

Experience Enrichment + Excursion

Click here for today's lecture on Experience Enrichment and here for the Project One brief.

For next week's excursion remember to bring your A4 copy paper sheets (several!), black pens and some rigid surface to support your paper as you sketch. We meet at 945am outside the Powerhouse Museum next week (the museum opens at 10am, I need to check attendance before we go in). Don't be late! If you get lost on the way call me on the FBE mobile number (0407 385 135). I suggest that you exchange mobiles with at least 5 of your classmates so you can let them know if there is a problem with you getting to the Powerhouse on time. I also suggest that you do a bit of practice with your sketching, and have a look at the handout provided on examples of good product sketching. Look here for the requirements for Task 3: Product Sketching.

For those of you who havent submitted your UNSW Fieldwork Authorization and Medical Certification, fill up the form and submit to me early next week, as well as your payment for the Powerhouse Museum admission fee for students of $5 (I'll be paying for the class in advance by credit card).

Detailed Course Timetable

Hi all, please find here a link to a detailed chart of the 2008 course timetable. It shows in colored cells activities or requirements that you need to accomplish outside of studio hours and which you have to either present to class on that week or post on your blog site as a submission for that weekActivities in non-colored cells are in-class that you don't need to prepare for. I hope this visual representation helps you keep track of our studio activities and requirements.

Task 1: Shape of a Scent

In your blog site, post images of your plasticine scent representation as well as the official poster (shown here) describing the scent so readers can understand which scent or sensations you were trying to depict in your shape embodiment.