Concept Proposal

CONCEPT # 1

Problem: Oil Spill

Solution: Hair from Salon

Background Research:

•  7 Oil Spills occurred in Australia occurred between 2001 – 2012 (max 4,75 tonnes)

(http://www.amsa.gov.au/marine_environment_protection/major_oil_spills_in_australia/

• Oil Spills damage Beaches, Marshland and Marine Wildlife that are essential in global foodchain, destroying ecosystem

• Hair Clippings from Salon left on the floor after cutting customers’ hair stuffed inside Nylon can be used to effectively absorb oil. After collecting the leak this is then can be pressed, releasing the oil altogether in 1 go.

(http://www.styleicons.com.au/2010/05/25/article/Recycled-hair-clippings-aid-oil-spills/XEGWWTLQOG.html)

Proposed PSS:

1. Encourage Salon to do such thing by a nationwide campaign
2. Product is delivered by government to participating salon. The product will be of a large container & tool for a more convenient cleaning and getting hair off the salon floor and right into box. (Product still need a lot of development) 
3. Hair clippings is then collected in the box, with the box collected weekly. The box is then collected and another empty box given.
4. After collection, all boxes are brought to 1 location in which each boxes can be just placed and get the lid / with a press of a button can just transfer all the hair  into 1 machine in which it will be processed and turned into a mat. 
5.  Finished product will be then given to the oil spill cleanup committee, in which it will then get to be used to cleanup oil spills.

CONCEPT #2

Problem: Food Shortage, Waste Disposal

Solution: Grow Veggies & Fruits by using Composter (Product)

Background Research:
• Food shortage in Indonesia (http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/10/21/indonesia-still-vulnerable-food-shortages-boediono.html)
• Waste Disposal problem in Indonesia (http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/346749/indonesian-garbage-helps-save-environment)

Proposed PSS (Location: Indonesia, for people living in poor areas): 

1.  With aid from government, a composter is given per family (or per community) for the ones living in poor areas. A small land is also spared for the project with seeds being given in exchange for an amount of garbage collected off the street / other area.
2. An instructor will be sent to the area to teach how to use composter / grow veggies + fruits and where etc. 
3.  Kids to elders both can join and an inspector will be sent once a month to inspect, if system works good then for the next cycle more seeds along with more tool loans will be given.

Still yet to be researched for this concept:
• Security Measures
•Whether should just do the planting near their house to avoid people stealing, since not acres of land is needed to put food on the table.
•How to make composter (material, workings etc) so that even in tropical weather and poor environment composter still can work in optimal condition.

EDIT: For concept #2, existing composter would be used meaning the product would be the pots where the plants are going to be planted.

Proposed PSS #2 (Concept #2):

1. With aid from government, each family or each area will be given 1 community composter. As an exchange, people have to participate in collecting rubbish around the area or off the street/ kali (Indonesia's term for shallow rivers which are usually are flooded with rubbish).

2. Each family have to sign up for the program, in exchange they will be given 2-4 empty pots (product still being researched) along with some tools for growing foods/ veggies.

3. A government worker will then come to explain them how to work the composter - Participating restaurants / warungs (small street food kiosks in Indonesia) will spare their organic / food waste to be put in the compost. Each family will take turn to work the composter each time it runs out of compost.

4. Several seeds will be given (not alot, since only so they can get enough food to eat themselves) to each family, they will also be taught how to grow plants.

5. Once a month, a government worker will be sent to each area to investigate. If system runs smoothly, then they will give more pots along with better quality seeds and tools to help the community. For long term plan, if community grows more than enough vegetable, they will be able to sell the excess produce to markets or restaurants, which in turn will get rid of the food shortage and improve their quality of life.


POSSIBLE PRODUCTS / THREATS:
- To get rid of thefts, pot has to have some sort of an identification feature so government worker can know that it's not stolen from their neighbours etc.

- Also, to avoid theft, maybe design some kind of product so that the pot can easily be put / stored at home before they sleep and then easily take it out (sunlight) when they wake up.

- The people, living in small housing area, will  not be able to store the pot easily since they don't have space. So design a product system that enable them to store them without wasting space and easy to move etc. 

*After a bit more research, it seems that theft is not as major as the lack of space available for them to do the planting since usually the one who works are usually the man, leaving the wife, son, elders doing nothing but chat to other people in the same area (having free time). Therefore the product will be more likely for them to be able to maximize the little space available to them to put the pots in.
The pots could also be put on the roof (design so it sits in there?). The idea of putting it on the roof will also help them in terms of when raining, as there usually are leaks/holes on their roof.
THEREFORE,  one of my  solutions would be something that allows them to put the pot and plant seeds on the roof with easy and efficient take in & out of the roof to water or just something that allow them to maximize the available space to them to put the pot in.

BACKGROUND RESEARCH FOR THIS CONCEPT:
- Waste in Indonesia are largely organic / have larger (70% more) organic composition compared to other more developed countries, e.g Singapore.

Peer Comments (Cormack)

• Seb Gregory
• Siting Lin
• Andrew Bae
• James Cheng
• Anurag Shivach

S+ICKIFIX Bandage Dispenser (Cormack)

*Open each image (poster) in new tab for easier text viewing

Focus Group

Summary of what my peers in my focus group said regarding my product:

- How does the lid stay up? (Living hinge, consider locking)
- Bandage - has another layer of plastic wrapper or just the band aid inside the packaging?
- Think of maybe do a roll of bandaid
- Make wheels move, and when they move get bandage out one at a time
- Show more about who target market is (Poster)
- Consider of making a full band aid kit instead of just bandages
- *Show in poster how big it is
- Edges -> make them round / less sharp so it's safe for users
- Slide or Flick to open lid? Show clearer!
- Grip can be slippery, so consider textured grip!
- Too much writing on poster. Minimalize it.


My Strategies of addressing the issues found:

- Lid will lock once it is in a position of where it's held more than 90 degrees
- Wheel rolling idea is good - but too expensive for manufacturing
- Make poster show target market more (parents/kids)
- Show in poster how big the product is
- Show how to open lid clearer in poster
- Minimalize writing by just keeping the things that are important to be noted

Video Reflection: Giving Packaging a New Life

Click here to see the videos!

Watching these videos about recycling, the one thing I’m most surprised about is the effort put into these innovations used for recycling. I didn’t even know that some of the technology used exists! The thing that intrigues me most is the use Optical Sorting System that’s able to identify which kind of plastics the packaging is manufactured from and sort it appropriately which uses infra-red technology. I always thought recycling would be a really long manual process, that machines involvement is required only after the trash is sorted manually by government-paid workers. 

It is certainly refreshing to know society and industries are becoming to adapt a more-environmentally approach nowadays than they did years ago. We, as industrial designers have also the responsibility to incorporate more of this approach in designing products. This includes having to think of ways that products can be recycled after they reach the end of their lifecycle. Like what’s said during last lecture, consumerism is a big problem – which people are buying more and more products, triggering companies to make more products to sell. With the fast-advancement of technology these days, old or outdated products are left, creating wastage. We, as designers are to blame if the materials in some of this wastage take more time or energy to recycle.

Although designers are partly to blame, society should also be more educated by the governments, maybe with the help of media and technology of the need of them to be more “green”.  Like in Germany, other countries – with government and media aids, should raise awareness of ecological impacts to encourage more recycling. Campaigns encouraging the acts of recycling and the buildings of more recycling factories should be implemented. I believe if this can happen, carbon emissions will be reduced and fewer trees will need to be cut down – making us closer to reaching our goals.

Video Reflection: How It's Made - Packaging

These videos of how packagings are made really opened my eyes to a whole new world. I knew that packagings are produced in factories at an ultraspeed, but what I didn't know was how complex the process really is.

For the first video, about Corrogated Cardboard; I always thought they were the easiest to make- when in reality they require no less than 4 stages, which include pressing with rollers, applying glue with water and starch and the printing process which requires several different rollers applying different colorings to each part of the cardboard. The one that surprised me most being the printing, since I always thought the printing would be done all at once per paper instead of being divided into several different stages.

The process of how packaging tubes are made, although interesting, doesn't really excite me as much as the others since I've watched a similar video before.

 On how to make Tetra Pak Containers, from the video I found out that there are 3 layers on each container, with them being plastic layer, paperboard and a foil- with the plastic layer making it leak-proof. One thing that concerns me was the manual quality control after printing, which shows the worker being exposed to a constant on/off light without him wearing any eye protection.

The makings of Glass and Plastic Bottles & Jars excite me as well, as who knew that for both, the inital form would just be a blob, for both but then as for plastic it's stretched and made into a bigger form, and with glass with it being molded.

As for all of them (including making of Aluminium Cans), it amazes me that there is actually a Cleaning process done near the finish- as I never thought there was 1 in the first place.

Overall, these videos really helped me learned as an industrial designer, the technical process of how packagings are formed. It also gave me an insight of just how much machine and manual labor plays a part in making these packagings.

Click here to see the videos!

Video Reflection (Task 2D) - "Objectified"

Out of all the videos I've seen regarding Design, I think this one is the most inspiring and the most useful one out of the bunch.

It's interesting that designers have slightly different ideas of what a good design is. Whereas Dieter Rams regards a good design as something that looks the least designed, Hella Jongerius contradicts this by usually adding some extra details (e.g the button on the Vietra sofa) to her design to give it a more unique feel to it. Although slightly the opposite, I think both concepts apply well in real life because some people have different preference - some will find the extra detail to be unneccessary but some will "get" its uniqueness and buy the product because of that.

Also what I've learned from this video is that there are so many elements of design that have to be considered in order for it to be a good design. It has to make the user get some kind of emotional connection like when they're looking at art, be environmentally friendly, long-lasting and also subconsciously make users want to use it all the time, without knowing about the extra features during the initial usage of the products. On top of that we have to keep asking ourselves when designing something whether we wanna use it or not, and imagine ourselves as the users.

I just think this is so significant for every designers / design students that outside knowledge and research, along with some on-field experience can go a long way for all of us. One thing I also find useful in the video is when the design firm is trying to make a product, that instead of focusing on designing for the 90% of the population (like what I always do) we should try to design for the other 10%, because if we're able to do that, there shouldn't be a problem for that 90% to be able to use the design as well.

Still, I think the hardest element of creating a good design would be to create some sort of an emotional attachement to the users. Like the last designer says, at the end of the day when you're looking around the room and if there's a hurricane and there's hardly enough time -- the objects you'd take with you are the ones you feel some sort of attachement to.

There are just so many interesting and inspiring elements in this video, especially for me, who's trying to be an industrial designer. The processes that they go through, along with the smart and effective linkage between the past and the future used -- it's just so overwhelmingly exciting to know and see, although difficult when we actually try doing it ourselves.