Sprint week a heavily intense week of working together making a prototypes understanding design and the market. My experience was very intense but enjoyable and I learned allot.
Before sprint week there was a day were we had to experience what it was like through a workshop it was called “Rappid Prototyping” were it was literally what it says on the tin were you make a prototype but really fast. This was different to what I am used to as for me ive always known rapid prototyping as using 3D programes such CAD and printing it off in a 3d form. So to get us started the task was we had to bring in a yogurt and basically watch them….yeah …. thats what happened it was very bizarre and then we had to take notes on how people ate it and even if they liked it o not it was so strange and weird how people eat yougrt and watching them lick the spoon oh god this blog is ment to be about design and im wasting time talking about yougurt ok moving on. Anyway we were givin the task to invent a couple of yogurts and this was literally from the top of our heads and we would go round and pick the best idea from each cluster and basically make that product we ended making yougurt for pets and there also for humans but seperated in each section. That idea of sharing with your pet.
We then went onto researching what older people would want so the concept of older people feeling very lonly and isolated especially when they cant talk talk to a love one and cant use skype we created this new technology were they can talk to there loved ones on tv during tea like a specific channel with a camera installed on the tv all they need to do is switch on the channel and they can instantly talk its was that easy. However doing this i felt very cold as we had to quickly get this information we didn’t talk to anyone or any older people to question if they would even like this but i guess that us what comes out of this is learning to fail if the product does not work!
So onto the REAL Sprint week we all had to report to one building in Scrymgeour building were Sprint week took place so firstly on the tables there was different themes in order to sort the groups the theme was to basically make aging not a bad thing so on the table the themes were:
“Making aging fun and normalizing elderly sociability.”
“Changes in Society”
“Reflection on the past experience and memories”
What drew me was reflection on the past and memories but altogether there was six of us 3 jewelers 2 textile students and one Interiors student. So together we reserched facts on aging and pre- existing orginisations that make a service to old people to support them and combat loniness and isolation. Day one we felt really productive we got asked alt of hard hitting questions on these topics to make us think or rather re- think ageing by design and how people perceive it and also increasing everyday behavior.
So Day 2 we had no clue what our product was gonna be as we were advised to make Culture probes that are protypes to test what the marke is looking for just start making so a series of things just splilled out of us such as a creative board for the elderly to draw things on, bracelet to measure heart rate which n turn can tell if there having fun, an activity dice, some “fun” cards and a bucket list idea which came out the strongest. So then we thought what if we made ourselves into a service instead of making a product were we can help people.
Day 3 of sprint week we name our service “EVERDREAM”were it is a Bucket list/ Charity app for kids when they grow older so that they can fulfil there wish. We came up with this as we kept thinking back to this theme of making aging a good thing so the question was asked “Have you ever had a passion or interest you never pursued?) so we made the concept of this bucket in order through time it would be something for the elderly to look back on and you would be a regular subscriber and every so often a smal donation is made ever year until you reach 60 were you are legible to do these activities you set out when you were 12
However during day three we realized the idea of Culture probes threw us as we never researched this in depth and felt we had to re-think our idea as we kept on going on the path of culture probes which felt very forced and unnatural just to find out what the elderly wanted. However, we ended up sticking with a gut feeling of this charity service website as we felt yeah in a way this is a product and we all believe it will work. I guess this process is all all about learning and failing and using initiative.
Day 4 we did our mock up website since im a “photoshop Wizard” my job was to make a fake website on Photoshop now I do like doing this but i realized after the process how long I was at that computer like it felt like 4 hours or so ouch! But I felt good about it as I wanted to contribute something more to the team but we were all hard working we made a computer for the pages to be printed out on the laptop doesn’t sound like alot on day 4 but trust me it was alot and we even went to the libary to rehearse what we are gonna say for the presentation on the last day safe to say we were a dedicated bunch!
Lastly in day 5 we did our presentation of our bucket list site were we had to present it in a Pecha Kucha Style to Some lecturers guests product designers, textilers and the rest of our peers. Safe to say i was really out of my comfort zone but i felt doin this made me waant to keep doing this in order to build more of my confidence in presenting.
In conclusion our focus for this project was originally on two themes, fun and memory. Half of our team explored fun, the other half memory. The goal was to find a link between them both. Initially we were designing what we thought would be fun for the elderly. We soon realised that everyone has a different idea of fun, so our design would have to be tailored to individuals.
In the end we decided to focus on fun – and that’s what gave us our team name – Trigger Happy.
Our goal was to change perceptions, so like our name – which normally has certain connotations – It means something completely different to us.
Its about causing a joyful reaction – triggering happiness
In the initial stages of website prototyping we made a small “ipad” type simulation to demonstrate how it works, upon peer testing we found it was a little difficult to navigate, so we reformed the prototype to make it clearer and easier to navigate and used photoshop to make our vision come to life.
Trial runs would be carried out with both younger and older demographics being tested. We would then refine our website and process of information gathering so that it would be almost seamless. We would of course continue to update this regularly and welcome all feedback from users.
The charity would then be set up and funding would begin as soon as the website went live. We could even try and get backing from the government for further integration into care homes and schools.
If successful this could be a uk widespread initiative that could even be introduced to schools with an app and even go global in theory.
From this experience we have not only learned a new way of design thinking but through this project we have ourselves also changed our own perceptions of how we define age and all that comes with it.
so to finish off we ask you this
“have you ever had an interest or passion you didn’t pursue? But wanted to?”
Till next time peeps
Kimmy xxx