Weekly Learning
Week 1:
absent
Week 2:
A narrative environment involves designing a space that tells a story or creates an interactive experience, blending aspects of architecture, technology, and art. The main goal is to make the space engaging and interactive, not just functional. This approach draws ideas from fields like interaction design (making tech user-friendly), UX design (focusing on user experience), and co-design (involving users in the design process).
A key focus is changing the audience from passive observers into active participants. By involving people directly, the aim is to create more meaningful and memorable experiences.
There are several ways to create these environments: using the space itself to tell the story (environmental storytelling), adding hidden clues or interactive elements, making the environment react to user actions, letting people build or modify parts of the space, using multiple senses, and building immersive installations for exploration. The central idea is that the space isn't fixed; it transforms and evolves based on how people interact with it, turning the space itself into a kind of performance.
This week's tutorial focused on precedent studies, which means looking at past design projects to learn from them. It's not about copying but about understanding what worked, what didn't, and why, so we can get inspired for our own designs. Studying precedents helps us understand space, materials, and user experience better.
A good precedent study looks at projects that had a real impact or were innovative, perhaps using new ideas or materials. The chosen project should also have enough design depth, meaning it's well thought out in terms of concept and how people experience it. We need to pick projects that we can really analyse from different angles and learn something valuable from.
The process involves researching the project, looking at both primary sources (like original drawings or interviews) and secondary sources (like articles or critiques). We should gather visuals like photos and plans and organise our findings around themes like the concept, spatial analysis, materials, and user experience. When analysing, we need to ask "why" things were designed a certain way – considering the purpose, how space is arranged, material choices, lighting, and any technology used. It's important to think critically, identify any weaknesses, and reflect on what we can apply to our own work.
Finally, presenting the study should be very visual, clear, and analytical, explaining why the design choices matter. The tutorial note also included detailed checklists for the precedent study assignment, including one specifically for researching retail shops, reminding us to analyse, critique, and suggest improvements, not just describe.
week 3:
This week, we learnt that storytelling is key in design to make people feel emotionally connected to a space or experience. It's not just about looks or function but about creating memorable feelings. Organising a space around a theme helps guide users and build this emotional connection.
It's also important to give users control, which we can do by offering choices, allowing free exploration, making navigation easy, and giving clear feedback (like sounds or visual changes) when they interact with things. We touched on using the "Hero's Journey" as a story structure and tools like user personas and journey maps to understand and design these emotional experiences.
Week 4:
no class
week 5:
presentation day
week 6:
Today's tutorial focused on the specific production process of Assignment 2. The teacher broke down the entire project into several clear stages and emphasised the key points of each step.
Week 7:
In class 2, there is the most important user persona and user journey map. The theme of assignment 2 is “retail design—user research, storytelling, and concept development”, which accounts for 30% of the total score. The deadline is the 9th week. My main goal is to use storytelling and user research to design a functional art installation that encourages audience participation in a retail environment. According to these studies, I must create 2-3 detailed user images and draw their emotional and spatial journey maps in order to find opportunities for interaction. Then, I need to develop at least two concepts for this experimental art piece (such as a sculpture or a sense cabin) and make sure to use discarded or recycled materials. I also have to make a scaled-down model of the original model. A key part of the whole process is to show my ideas, get feedback, and improve my design based on the feedback. My final submission must include user images, user journey maps, at least a 10-page concept board, my original entity, and a report.
Week 8:
This week's task is to design a device. The premise is that the user's image and the user's journey map have been completed. First, you need to list the emotional keywords that describe the brand's feeling, such as "interesting" or "calm". Next, convert these keywords into design elements; for example, "interesting" can be turned into "round shape". Then, choose a main purpose and three functions for your device, such as rest, interaction, or health, and add a sensory detail, such as sound or texture. Finally, you need to create three slides, which are used to show the emotion and concept of the project, the title and concept description of the device, and the detailed explanation of the function of the device.
Week 9:
Homework in class
Week 10:
In class, we will discuss the homework and analyse how to complete the design of our installation in project 2.
Starting from real user research, we grasp their core emotions, translate these emotions into abstract design language (shape, light and shadow, material), and then combine these abstract forms with functions that solve users' real needs. Finally, we create a functional artwork made of recycled materials that is both artistically appealing and interactive.
Week 11:
In today's class, the teacher explained the requirements of the final project. The core is to integrate the user research, storytelling and concept development we have learnt before. The key point is that this device cannot be just a good-looking sculpture. It must have two core characteristics. The teacher emphasised that our "abstract" design is not imagined out of thin air but must be based on the user's stories and emotions. This is the foundation of design.
Week 12:
About homework in class
Week 13:
In class, we were guided in making models, mainly focusing on the proportion of the models.
Week 14:
In the class, we explained the requirements for modelling and the subsequent presentation board production.
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