1.
Design and Processes
Dr. Clifford Choy
Assistant Professor, School of Design
mccliff@polyu.edu.hk
23 Sep 2017

2.
STEM, STEAM, Make, Design

3.
STEM Education (1)
• Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics
• According to EDB (2015, Dec):
• We aim to further develop among students a strong knowledge base in step
with the latest changes in these disciplines, and strengthen their ability to
integrate and apply knowledge and skills, so as to nurture their creativity and
innovation, collaboration and problem solving skills, which are essential
skills and qualities required in the 21st century. The learning activities of
STEM education also help students develop the essential qualities associated
with an entrepreneurial spirit.
Educational Development Bureau (2015, Dec) On-going Renewal of the School Curriculum – Focusing, Deepening and Sustaining: An
Overview. Retrieved from http://www.edb.gov.hk/attachment/en/curriculum-development/renewal/Overview_e_2015Dec.pdf

4.
STEM Education (2)
• Creativity and Innovation
• … creativity as the capability or act of conceiving something original or unusual,
while innovation is the implementation or creation of something new that has
realized value to others
• Creativity isn't necessarily innovation
• Entrepreneurial Spirit
• … is a mindset. It’s an attitude and approach to thinking that actively seeks out
change, rather than waiting to adapt to change
• … is also associated with taking calculated risks, and sometimes failing
• Problem solving
• What about problem identification?

5.
http://all-that-is-interesting.com/mankinds-most-useless-inventions
http://www.imore.com/iphone-6s-plus

6.
STEAM
Yakman, G. (2008). STEAM education: An overview of creating a model of integrative education. In Pupils' Attitudes Towards
Technology (PATT-19) Conference: Research on Technology, Innovation, Design & Engineering Teaching, Salt Lake City, Utah,
USA.

7.
STEAM
• STEM + Arts
• Arts - “ How society develops,
impacts, is communicated and
understood with its attitudes and
customs in the past, present and
future “
• Society, culture, belief, religion,
politics, …
http://www.petronastwintowers.com.my/facts

8.
http://artofislamicpattern.com/resources/educational-posters/
http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/geom/hd_geom.htm

9.
Making
• Turning ideas into tangible/perceivable form
• “Vision” to “execution”
• Driven by intrinsic interests, not extrinsic rewards
• Fun? Needs?
• Materials, Tools, Processes
• Not merely about production and fabrication, but also involves self-learning,
problem-solving, exploration, experimentation and critical thinking
• Learn, create, share
• Through making, students explore and apply STEM/STEAM knowledge

10.
“making”
The Experiential Learning Cycle [Kolb and Kolb, 2005]
Kolb, A., Kolb, D. (2005, May 15) The Kolb Learning Style Inventory – Version 3.1 2005 Technical Specifications. Retrieved from
http://learningfromexperience.com/media/2010/08/tech_spec_lsi.pdf

11.
What is Design? (1)
https://designshack.net/articles/graphics/8-rules-for-creating-
effective-typography/
http://www.creativebloq.com/graphic-design/pro-guide-logo-design-21221
https://designschool.canva.com/blog/poster-design/
Communication Design

12.
What is Design? (2)
http://www.businessinsider.com/new-crutch-design-2016-4
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-edge-desk-folds-up-in-seconds-2016-3
https://gearpatrol.com/2014/06/02/10-best-automotive-designs/
Product Design
Industrial Design

13.
What is Design? (3)
http://www.architecturaldigest.com/gallery/best-of-frank-gehry-slideshow
http://www.archdaily.com/505374/jockey-club-innovation-tower-zaha-hadid-architects
http://www.lifestyleasia.com/474122/10-hong-kong-interior-designers-you-need-to-follow-on-instagram/
Architectural Design
Environmental and Interior Design

14.
What is Design? (4)
https://store.playstation.com/#!/en-us/games/overwatch-game-of-the-year-
edition/cid=UP0002-CUSA01842_00-OWGOTYBUNDLE0000
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/final-divergent-movie-relocates-summer-849888
Digital Media Design
Interactive Media Design

15.
What is Design? (5)
https://www.engadget.com/gallery/the-iphone-family/
https://www.iphonelife.com/content/apple-wants-rule-world-new-ipad-pro
http://audiotronics.com/apple/
https://www.apple.com/apple-watch-series-2/gallery/
http://maccrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/apple-inc-icloud-security-features-still-not-foolproof.jpg
Interaction Design

16.
What is Design? (6)
• Design is the competence to change existing situations into preferred ones. Design then, is the
human capacity to serve the needs of people and give meaning to life through objects,
communications, environments and systems
John Heskett
• Design is what links creativity and innovation. It shapes ideas to become practical and attractive
propositions for users or customers. Design may be described as creativity deployed to a specific
end.
Sir Charles Cox
• Design is about understanding users and finding elegant solutions to meet their needs

17.
What is Design? (7)
• “Design could be viewed as an activity that translates an idea into a blueprint for something
useful, whether it's a car, a building, a graphic, a service or a process. The important part is the
translation of the idea, though design's ability to spark the idea in the first place shouldn't be
overlooked.”
• “Most people make the mistake of thinking design is what it looks like,'' says Steve Jobs, Apple's
C.E.O. ''People think it's this veneer -- that the designers are handed this box and told, 'Make it
look good!' That's not what we think design is. It's not just what it looks like and feels like. Design
is how it works.”
Rob Walker (30 Nov 2003). The Guts of a
New Machine. New York Times.
UK Design Council

18.
What is Design? (8)
• As Discipline:
• Explores relationship between the user, product and contexts in which the
product is used
• As Process:
• Intentional, iterative problem solving process that converts ideas into systems
or products
• As Product:
• Outcome of a design process such as specifications, sketches, models or
shape of the products
Cross, N. (2006) Designerly Ways of Knowing. London: Springer-Verlag.

19.
What is Design? (9)
• Translate thoughts and inspirations into tangible/perceivable form
• Focus on users, discover their real needs, create solutions which meet their real
needs
• Collaborative, cross-/multi-/inter- disciplinary
• Must involve people coming from different disciplines working together (collaborating)
• Not simply about style and fashion, but also about how it works

20.
Attributes of Designers
• Curious, Inquisitive
• Willingness to work across disciplines
• Attention to details
• Design through making
• Interest in understanding users

21.
How to make?
What can be made?
What to make?
Why to make?
STEM, STEAM, Make and Design
• Knowing possibilities with personal and
digital fabrication technologies (strength
and limitations with each ”technology”,
what can be done by combining multiple
of those)
• Develop tacit knowledge in using
different materials, tools, processes
• Understanding “users”, identifying opportunities
• Evaluate, identify issues and improve
STEM/STEAM
Design

22.
Meaning in Making
• “Making” should be based on intrinsic interests
• How to make it meaningful to students when making?
• How to develop their abilities to “empathize”?
• Four Levels of Making:
• Making for self
• Fun, self-use, solve your own problem, …
• Making for someone you are familiar
• For your best friend, for your parents, …
• Making for others
• For your classmates, for your neighbors, …
• Making for social good
• For disadvantaged group, for local community, for sustainability, for change, ….
• “Making” provides an engaging way for individual to learn and apply STEAM knowledge

23.
Design Thinking
• Design thinking is a collaborative process by which designer’s
sensibilities and methods are employed to match people’s needs with
what is technically feasible and a viable business strategy
IDEO
• Design thinking is based on taking a human-centered approach to
problem-solving. It starts with what’s desirable and then moves to
what’s possible from a technology perspective and what’s viable from
a business perspective.
Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO

24.
Design Thinking as a Mindset
• A mindset worth developing in students before entering university
• Suitable for all students, not just for those who want to be
“designers”
• Help to develop the attributes:
• Curiosity and inquisitiveness
• Care about people and their needs
• Integration of knowledge from multiple disciplines
• Attention to details
• Communication

25.
Processes

26.
What is Process?
• “A set of interrelated actions and activities performed to
achieve a specified set of products, services or results”
• “Who do what by when through how”
• Specifically on design and creative processes, not just the
engineering one
• Many different processes, but conceptually similar

27.
Double Diamond Model
http://www.rachelreynard.com/design-process/
The design process (n.d.). Design Council. Retrieved from
http://www.designcouncil.org.uk/designprocess on 3 Jun
2013

28.
Design Thinking Process
https://sheilapontis.wordpress.com/2015/06/04/design-thinking-revised/

29.
Aspelund (2014)
• Inspiration
• Identification
• Conceptualization
• Exploration/refinement
• Definition/Modeling
• Communication
• Production
Aspelund, Karl (2014). The Design Process. 3rd Edition. Fairchild

30.
Moggridge (2007)
Bill Moggridge (2007). Designing Interactions. The MIT
Press. Pg 730

31.
The Experiential Learning Cycle
Kolb, A., Kolb, D. (2005, May 15) The Kolb
Learning Style Inventory – Version 3.1 2005
Technical Specifications. Retrieved from
http://learningfromexperience.com/media/2010/0
8/tech_spec_lsi.pdf
“making”

32.
Reflective Journal
Gray, C. and Malins, J. (2004). Visualizing
Research: A Guide to the Research Process in
Art and Design. England: AshGate Publishing.
Pg 58, Fig 2.9

33.
Persona
• An invented person for representing a type of user who goes through your
usage scenarios
• Examples:
• Joe, 19 years old, lives with three friends in a shared apartment. Currently attends
college full time. Likes to watch movies every night. Majors in history and doesn't like
computers.
• Mary, 45 years old, works part time and has two kids. Watches movies by herself on
weekends and has the kids watch during the week while she deals with family
matters. Has used computers for many years.
• Not a real person, but generalization of your target
users/audiences/customers

34.
User Scenarios
• Define user’s goals and motivations
• Describe the journey has to go through to fulfill the goal (attraction,
entry, engage, exit, extend)
• Describe tasks to be carried out in each stage, and interactions with
other persons, products/services, and environment

35.
Stakeholders
• An individual, group or
organization who may affect, be
affected by, or perceive itself to
be affected by a decision,
activity or outcome of the
project.
• More general then end-users
(persona)
https://4squareviews.com/2013/01/28/5th-edition-pmbok-guide-chapter-2-stakeholders/

36.
Brainstorming
• For generating many different ideas, not a single winning idea
• Reference: http://www.criticaltosuccess.com/best-practice-
brainstorming/
http://www.hotstudio.com/thoughts/no-more-brain-bashing

37.
Brainstorming Trial: “How to kill time?” (1)
• Objective: “How to kill time?”
• Steps:
• [5min] Each student write three ideas on Post-It notes
• Individually, no talking, no discussion
• [10min] in group of four, discuss ideas from the Post-It notes and pick “best 50% of
notes”
• Rewrite to make an idea clear or more concise if necessary
• No need to throw away any notes

38.
Brainstorming Trial: “How to kill time?” (2)
• Steps: (con’t)
• Pass out the “best
50%” notes
• Group pairs of notes
which are similar into
categories
• Pass out the remaining
for categorization
• For each category,
create a title with
three to five words
http://www.criticaltosuccess.com/best-practice-brainstorming/

39.
Example on Material Exploration:
Design Process of a Foldable
Stand for Raspberry Pi

40.
Background
• Purchased a Raspberry Pi 3 and a 7-inch LCD panel with touch screen
• <Need and core concept> I would like to make a stand, out of sheet
metal (0.3mm aluminum sheet) through folding

41.
Contextual Review (1)
https://www.modmypi.com/raspberry-pi/screens-and-
displays/hdmi-7-800x480-lcd-screen-capcitive-touch

42.
Contextual Review (2)
http://www.alsrobot.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=883

43.
Contextual Review (3)
• Summary:
• Many flat-pack design for stand
• Seems like none using folding
• Note:
• May be fun to explore what folding can do
• A foldable stand may give a new experience to its user

44.
First Iteration (1)

45.
First Iteration (2)
• Reflection for action
• Fold with straight line crease and with cuts
• Consists of 3 parts, joined by hinge
• Adjustable angle
• Prototype with scrap papers
• Big square hole for different ports from RPi
• Reflection in action
• Quite a lot of materials are folded inside, especially in creating the square hole to
allow for access to ports on RPi, hence seems to be quite wasteful
• Reflection on action
• Good to have adjustable angle, but not sure how well it performs when using
aluminum sheet, though expect to be quite strong due to the many folding
• Looks complex
• Does not look good

46.
First Iteration (3)
• Generalizing
• Folding with straight line crease looks boring and can lead to complex
structure
• Adjustable angle further complicates the design
• Why not try curved folding?

47.
Second Iteration (1)
• Reflection for action
• Explore curve crease line for
making a stand

48.
Second Iteration (2)
• Reflection in action
• Not all are curved crease
• Only try to create half of the structure to explore how its shape changes in
accordance to position of creases
• Reflection on action
• Structure looks ok, and seems to be able to support a flat structure (like the
RPi + LCD panel)
• Very simple to fold
• Generalizing
• Creases can be mirrored to the other side to create a stronger structure

49.
Third Iteration (1)

50.
Third Iteration (2)
• Reflection for action
• Mirror creases onto the other side and fold
• Reflection in action
• Need to explore width of the top part – too narrow will make the panel
difficult to balance, and hence must be broader
• When a load is placed on the stand, the weight moves the two sides of the
structure further apart, and hence needs some way to hold the two sides
• The load tends to slide down, and hence needs some way to stop it from
sliding down

51.
Broadening the top part of the structure

52.
Load on the structure pushes the two sides further apart

53.
Third Iteration (2)
• Reflection on action
• Broadening the top part of the structure to offer more stability to the load
• Two sides of the structure have to be held together to withstand weight from
the load
• Have to find a way to avoid load slipping down
• Generalizing
• Structure with curve folding conceptually working, but needs more
refinement to increase its strength and stability

54.
Fourth Iteration (1)

55.
Back and bottom, with a fastener for holding the two sides together in place

56.
Fourth Iteration (3)
• Reflection for action
• Apart from modifying the structure to cater for those issues in last iteration, a
curve crease is added to the top (and front) part of the structure to provide
two contact points to the load which can increase its stability

57.
Fourth Iteration (4)
• Reflection in action
• The curve crease on top and front part of the stand seems to provide stronger
structural strength
• The two contact points seem to increase stability of the stand
• Reflection on action
• The base tends to be not flat and curved out, which makes it not stable
• Generalizing
• Adding more creases appropriately can increase structural strength
• Folding makes the base not flat and hence makes it unstable

58.
Fifth Iteration (1)

59.
Fold line in base to avoid bulging out

60.
Fifth Iteration (2)
• Reflection for action
• Add creases to base to avoid bulging issue
• Reflection in action
• Add creases to the tip of the stand to increase strength of the structure
• Adjust position of other creases to adjust shape of the structure for better
stability
• Reflection on action
• The added creases at the base increase substantially stability of the stand
• Can be folded by leather instead of sheet metal
• The stand looks like a shoe

61.
Notes on the Example
• Explore possibilities from folding
• Form from straight fold and curved fold
• Strength through structure
• Explore possible uses of some possibilities
• A stand
• A shoe ?

62.
How to Apply?
• Any starting problem? Any theme?
• Should provide reasonable “space” for problem identification

63.
Example: Design a New Electric Vehicle (1)
• “Design is the competence to change existing situations into preferred
ones”
• What is the ”existing situations”?
• What do you want to be in the “preferred ones”?
• What to improve?
• Electric vehicle as the artifact to design (and create)
• Aspects
• Production
• Sustainability
• Usage
• …

64.
Example: Design a New Electric Vehicle (2)
• Production
• Modular, customizable, local
• Sustainability
• Low carbon footprint (production and while in operation)
• Reuse/recycle
• Maintenance
• Usage
• Who: individual, family, mass, disabled, elderly, adult, kid
• Why: last mile/km, leisure, business

65.
Other Problems/Questions
• Electric vehicle in smart city
• Electric vehicle as a system
• How does it interact with people, environment and organization?
• Share drive?
• Improve transportation in city
• Not only restricted to electric vehicle
• Possible for a “walkable city”? Possible to encourage use of bike?

66.
Outcomes and Dissemination
• Process book on design process
• Research, concepts, sketches, prototypes, simulations, user evaluation, …
• Dissemination
• Show-and-tell (in Maker Faire, science fair, innovation fair, ….)
• Presentations on design process
• Exhibitions

67.
Questions?
Thanks