Design Assignment

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Design Assignment

• Section 2
• Design Development

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Section 2 Design Development

• Useful Skills
• Reconciliation of design factors, Analysis,
  evaluation, awareness, appreciation and
  synthesis.
• Useful knowledge
• Relationship of design factors, enhanced
  knowledge of design factors, deeper understanding
  of the design process, detailed knowledge of
  materials, construction and manufacture.
• As with idea generation, the key to doing well
  is planning, preparation and research. Dont
  leave anything to chance.

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Section 2 Design Development

• In developing your design proposal follow these
  points
• Design proposal will be clearly derived from
  initial idea(s) and/or concept.
• Most promising idea(s) and/or concept explored
  and evaluated into detailed design proposal.
• Clear evidence of diversity in exploration of
  potential solution
• Meaningful reference to specification at
  appropriate points.
• Materials and manufacturing processes for
  proposal are clear and justified.
• Clear understanding or design issues evident.
• Design proposal clearly evaluated by extensive
  reference to specification.

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Selecting a Promising Idea

• Begin by identifying which idea has most
  potential for development towards your solution.
• Remember it may not be your favourite or best! It
  is the knowledge and ability to change, improve,
  and progress your idea that is assessed. Chose
  one that will make it easy.
• Simple evaluation at this stage using
  specification as a bench mark is not always
  informative or useful. It is likely that all
  ideas meet the specification. It may be better to
  ask the questions that follow, this activity will
  highlight the idea with most potential and will
  focus on development factors

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Initial Evaluation

• Try evaluating your ideas using the following
  questions. You may need to change, add or ignore
  some points depending on the design task
• Could the function be improved upon to make it
  more suited to the purpose?
• Could the aesthetics be improved?
• Could it be easier to use?
• Could the design present any safety issues
• Could the design be manufactured?
• Could the design be improved to better suite the
  environment?

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A Methodical Approach

• Using these questions with the specification
  should enable you to make an informed choice for
  your design. If your still not sure. Have you
  really been thorough and rigorous?
• Clearly defined areas to work on will make design
  development far easier and productive. It creates
  opportunities for preparation and research that
  can be carried out in advance, areas such as
  function, aesthetics, ergonomics, safety,
  manufacture, construction and materials.
• As the development progresses the function will
  move away from the general function, aesthetics
  and environment considerations, becoming more
  concerned on details relating to issues such as
  ergonomics, anthropometrics, manufacturing
  limitations, construction, safety issues
  materials, size and scale

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A Methodical Approach

• Development section causes most concern and often
  attempted in a haphazard way. Remember to limit
  the need for inspiration alone, replace it with
  more reliable methodical approach.
• Focus the development around a range of factors
  relevant to the design task. Use initial
  evaluation questions again to highlight areas to
  be developed.
• Dont base all development around one factor,
  this will lead to simplistic development lacking
  depth and maturity. Considering more factors will
  give more opportunity to experiment, explore,
  improve, justify and reason, all of which will
  gain more marks for the section

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Constant Evaluation

• Good development relies on constant evaluation
  and re-evaluation of all changes and
  decisions made. You dont have to make constant
  improvements as may of the changes made may have
  little or no effect, or could prove you where
  right in the first place.

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Useful forms of Development

• Constituent Development
• Avoid making whole scale changes to your design
  idea, as this could lead to another concept
  rather than a improvement. Development should be
  about exploring possibilities not redesign.
  Complete change makes evaluation vague and
  generic and fails to generate focus. The examiner
  should be able to chart changes and decisions
  from your initial ideas to your final proposal.
  Think of working on a story board showing each
  step you have taken to reach your final solution.

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Useful forms of Development

• Focused Development
• Remember the examiner needs to know and have a
  clear understanding of design issues. To do this
  you will first have to select relevant issues.
• Use the research, analysis and specification,
  together with your own evaluation to ID design
  issues that you feel are important. Annotate to
  explain why you feel your design could be
  enhanced as this will gain you marks as the
  examiner will see you are communicating reasons
  and justifications.
• Work on one factor at a time as this allows
  better judgment about their effects. Analysing
  the effect has on the others can offer
  interesting development opportunities. This is
  sometimes referred to as getting a balanced
  design.

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Useful forms of Development

• Ergonomic Development
• A more detailed exploration that will benefit
  from additional research. Human interaction is
  always an important aspect of the design, is easy
  to understand and incorporate into a development.
  It will have a influence on issues such as
• Function
• Anthropometrics
• Size and scale
• Safety
• Materials
• Usually the primary reason for ergonomics is to
  make the product easier or better to use. Make
  this your goal if you decide to include this form
  of development.

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Useful forms of Development

• Reconciliation development
• This form of development will show that you have
  greater depth of understanding and lead to
  enhanced reasoning and justification, also
  generating evidence of diversity and exploration.
  Making a simple change to one element will have
  an impact on all other factors. For example just
  changing the function could effect the
  aesthetics, materials, method of manufacture,
  construction methods, leading to safety issues
  etc.

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Useful forms of Development

• Reconciliation development (cont)
• Typical influence chains may be
• Function will impact on aesthetics, ergonomics,
  choice of materials, construction and manufacture
• Aesthetics will be determined by environment,
  intended target market.
• Choice of materials will be influenced by product
  function, e.g. strength, rigidity, ductility,
  weight, durability, hygiene, construction,
  manufacture.
• Manufacture will be influenced by materials,
  quantity required, accuracy.
• Construction depends on materials, basic
  functions method of manufacture.

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Useful forms of Development

• Trial Development
• Dont be afraid to experiment. Good design is
  created from asking what if rather than thats
  it. Change for changes sake is not always a
  waste of time, it can stimulate creative ideas,
  especially if you run into a mental block. Simply
  turning an idea on its head (literally) can
  stimulate an idea. Radical changes usually work
  best for this activity.

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Useful forms of Development

• Manufacturing Development
• Essential in development but should not be the
  only form of development. Only considering
  manufacture as development the project will lack
  depth and be difficult to explore potential
  solutions.
• Manufacturing development is very technical in
  nature and will become more important as your
  design nears completion, but dont leave the
  considerations to last. Good understanding of
  manufacture and materials should be evident
  throughout your development. Make sure you
  highlight any limiting factors min the research
  or specification that could influence the designs
  manufacture, i.e. cost or number of items
  required.
• Remember some manufacturing techniques will not
  be suitable.

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Working to Scale

• Beginning to work to scale can cause problems for
  the designer. Dont consider it at the end of the
  design, what looks good in a small sketch can
  become featureless when drawn to scale and faults
  can often be exposed.
• Using models can help, giving greater potential
  to analyse and evaluate due to the 3D form. They
  are essential to assess human interaction as they
  offer the potential for actual interaction. They
  can be used to test ideas that may only be good
  in theory, also making a model will generate a
  better understanding and encourage development.
  Be sure to record any changes made to your model,
  take lots of pictures and write down what made
  you change the design, remember the examiner is
  interested in your thoughts and opinions.

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Appropriate Means of Communication for Development

• More detail in 2D sketches, use of scale to zoom
  in on detail, sectional views to explore and
  display construction and interior workings.
• Increased use of 3D sketching with more detail
  and refinements to explore form and function with
  more realism.
• Exploded views to display information about
  construction.
• Block and scale models to explore aesthetics and
  complex 3D forms.
• More detailed full size models or prototypes for
  testing.
• Increased use of colour and rendering.
• Scale models as a means to evaluate and develop
  design and an excellent way of communicating
  design ideas if recorded properly.
• Experiments with anthropometrics require scale
  drawings if to have any real meaning. They dont
  have to be formal, sketches will do.
• Computer generated graphics are also useful as
  they can generate more insight to the design and
  highlight possible problems or areas of further
  development.