Sage with Design

A blank page has edges so it has limits. Limits give us something to work with. Some restrictions make problem solving easier because it narrows your scope. Leverage a blank page by giving it rules. Rules don’t prohibit creativity, they play a role in it. Rules are what make games fun. Making your own rules for a blank page is part of what it means to be creative.

Planned obsolescence is the practice of designing products to have a limited lifespan and must be replaced within a determined timeframe. Functional obsolescence is old school technology. Most people over 30 have a box in their home filled with cables that won’t fit their devices. RCAs and VGAs have little value in the digital world. Physical obsolescence is when something breaks or wears out. This is what most people think of when they think of planned obsolescence. Economic obsolescence is when a product loses value due to a recession, legislative changes, reduced market demand, or other economic factors. This can be difficult to design for because the designer often has little influence over these factors. Emotional obsolescence is when you want a new phone even though your old one still works. Your old phone is probably slower and the battery isn’t as good, but one reason you originally bought it was because it was the best one at the time. We want the best one and adver...

Studying change means that you can identify the difference between what is now and what was before. It’s a simple concept that can be easy to over look and difficult to describe. There are many types of change to be aware of. Technology changes are one of the most important and they are constantly evolving. ChatGPT and similar tools are a lot to keep up with. Just like with design problem solving, it’s important to prioritize what is worth learning and what is not. On top of this is social change, environmental change and economic change. With so much change, we need constants to ground our thinking. Designers can use unchanging human needs as inspiration for their designs. Humans will always have a need for meaning, beauty, creativity, and connections with others. These constants are the basis for creating a timeless design. Change is inevitable. Designers who are able to identify change and use it to help the unchanging needs of people are the most successful.

Something small and made from plastic or metal could be put it in a 3D scanner or find a reference image could be found for Ai to scan. An identical part or a missing piece could be created without needing many technical skills. If people could have access to smart 3D printing, product models could be crowdsourced. When we made tools more accessible, we give more power to people. The technology will only get more inclusive. Many enthusiasts have desktop 3D printers. With the rise of artificial intelligence the need for technical knowledge of CAD may become old school.

That’s why Heath is the best candy bar. The toffee has a satisfying feel like pushing a firm button that has a deep clunk. Most buttons are similar to other buttons, but sometimes one in particular steals the show. Differentiation can be expressed through details because people form strong opinions around them. Maybe it’s worth investing a little extra to give it that crunch.

In the late 1980s, soft drinks took grip on America. Pepsi had Michael Jackson and Coke replaced “New Coke” with their original formula under the name “Coca-Cola Classic”. Snapple was growing rapidly and Quaker just built the Gatorade empire using textbook business strategy. In the early 90s, Quaker acquired Snapple in what marketers refer to as the worst acquisition of all time. Snapple introduced new flavors that people didn’t buy. Their core following bought Peach Tea, Grapefruit Tea, and Half & Half Tea and Lemonade. But you couldn’t buy them because the store had to make room for Snapple’s Fruit Punch and Strawberry Tea flavors. Snapple stretched their popular flavors thin on the shelves. Then there were shortages on shelves and in distribution, which forced long-time Snapple drinkers to switch to Arizona Tea. Snapple designed larger bottle options but people didn’t buy them. It makes sense for larger Gatorade bottles because you ...

It’s easier for me to work in a clean workspace and an organized environment. Everything’s in it’s place. It feels great to have a clean desk, makerspace, floors, organized computer files, and a clean home. When I work from home and need to think, I take a break to clean the kitchen. It’s how I gather my thoughts. It’s lots of little things that I have to catch myself to stop doing and focus. These things will need to get done, but the problem is they are not urgent. Maybe there’s something else that you should be doing right now.

Data will always generate more accurate direction than estimations. Many resources are scattered around the internet and this list could be much longer. But for most of the Anthropometric work that product designers take on, the first two links will be more than what they’ll ever need. If you want to design for people, it’s important to understand people. Handbook of Anthropometry 3000 pages that explain everything Anthropometry. Chapter 2 teaches you how to calculate and use Z-scores, which indicates how much a given value differs from the standard deviation. 2012 Anthropometric Survey of U.S. Army Personnel (ANSUR II) The largest, most accurate, public dataset of human measurements. 93 total measurements over 6,000 people, 4,000 men and 2,000 women. While insightful, this data will not accommodate most user populations. 1995 NASA Man-Systems Integration Standards 2011-2014 Anthropometric Reference Data for Children and Adults, United States 2013-2015 US EMT Dimensions 2015...

Human brains are hardwired by evolution to be drawn to certain shapes, colors and patterns because they were important for our ancestor’s survival. To subconsciously determine that a person is a person, we look at their body and their face. Your form and face are your primary, universal components used to express body language. It’s what we sent to space on the Pioneer Plaque for alien civilizations to know who made the spacecraft. The form and face are patterns that we take as a sign of social interaction or a potential mate. When done right, putting a face on a product can be inviting. But many times it can creep people out, like the Furby. The large eyes and animatronic movements aren’t what we see in nature, so it feels unnatural and off-putting. We don’t trust it. But the problem is not that artificial faces are not realistic enough. When creators walk the line of human-inspired faces and hyper-realistic ones is when the uncanny valley phenomenon kicks in. ...

Books are left aligned because it is easier to read text that is aligned in this way. When text is centered, it can be difficult to find the beginning of each line. It would feel chaotic reading a book formatted this way. It’s difficult to follow the text and can lead to eye strain. Left aligned text creates an anchor for the eye. It creates a sense of structure. When in doubt, align left and not centered.

One of the most important principles of design is to generate many thoughtful ideas as a means to find a great idea. This is how we develop language skills. We try different words and phrases when we’re young and develop speaking patterns that express ourselves as we age. It’s how we live our lives. When we decorate our homes, organize our work, and choose what to wear, we are making design decisions. We are all capable of creativity, not because we can be taught to design, but because it’s a fundamental part of being human.

Deepfakes create convincing visuals of people doing and saying things that never took place in real life. Facial filters are the most popular and they are dramatically better than they were 5 years ago. The future of this technology will continue improving and integrating with other technology. As generative Ai improves, it’s reasonable to assume that we will have conversations with a digital face in real time. https://youtu.be/SHSmo72oVao?t=191 You can have a conversation with anyone, and if you upload your own data you could communicate with a relative. You just need images of their face which you likely have in your phone, and voice recordings which you could obtain through a conversation, in-person or not. Let Ai listen to all your calls and run through your texts to allow it to gather information about how your relative communicates. Now you can practice asking a parent for a favor or speak with a relative after they pass away. And your great great great grandchildren will be...

A product teardown shows us what’s inside. Seeing what’s put together and what works and what doesn’t helps us unravel the product’s backstory. You learn how all the parts and pieces come together, it’s like reading a book. There’s a story and if the story is good then we learn something. And if you read a book to become a better writer, you ruminate over the decisions made by the book’s author. Teardowns are powerful tools to: -Identify potential areas for improvement. -Compliance with regulatory requirements. -Gather inspiration for new product designs. -Improved understanding of the competition.

When I was in a Drawing I course, I looked at my paper too long. My professor taught me to look back and forth between the page and the subject every few seconds. They had me sketch different areas of the page and not focus on one spot. I would have to set down my graphite and step away from my work every few minutes. Then I would draw large areas standing up and sit back down for details. This forced me to see my drawing from a fresh perspective and to make adjustments as needed. The lesson: a good way to create something interesting is to pack a bunch of perspectives into one piece. In order to make a product ergonomic, appropriately sized, idiot-proof, trendy and manufacturable, it’s imperative to get fresh perspectives.

You can tell that a door’s purpose is to move through it, so a door is an affordance. The signifiers that make a door a door are the doorknob and the clearance around the door because they suggest that the door can be opened or closed. Most signifiers for a door are also affordances. The door handle is an affordance for how to get through the door. The handle is also a signifier because of its long shape, size to fit a hand, and material to stand out from the background. Signifiers are the physical attributes of a component. An affordance suggests how it’s used but doesn’t suggest what it does, like a signifier.

Computer keyboards use QWERTY because typewriters used QWERTY. I won’t get into the backstory, but debate to change the layout blew up in the 80s. People argued for more efficient layouts but consumers were too familiar with typewriters. Americans use the English system of measurement along with two other countries, Myanmar and Liberia. Adopting the Metric System would increase efficiency in trading and communication, but it’s unfamiliar and not intuitive. It takes real urgency for that sort of change to happen. We like things to be familiar. When a design is intuitive, you know how to use it without ever having experienced something quite like it before. They rely on form and other signifiers to be easy to understand. No one is taught what to do with a chair before we sit on it for the first time. And we just know how to use a doorknob. The form of an ergonomic handle is clearly meant for your hand to grab. Intuition is not better than familiarity, neither is the other way ...

Bamboo It grows fast and strong and used in place of wood and some packaging. It’s trending most in furniture design, flooring and construction. It’s expensive to process but high quality. Cork It grows in popularity now and then, both functional and stylish as kitchen pan coasters or bulletin boards. It’s a good insulator making it useful as flooring if you can afford it. Cork is a great accent to light, small appliances. Recycled Plastics It’s still a plastic, but hands get tied. Plastics are a miracle despite the environmental part. Search for companies like Eastman Chemical Company (previously Kodak) for new and upcoming recycled plastics. Hemp It’s becoming less taboo and more available. As difficult as hemp can be to process, it requires less water than traditional crops that can grow quickly. It’s found in place of wood, cotton, plastic packaging, or construction materials. It’s a versatile material with more study needed. Mushrooms Mushr...

Recognizing a phone as a Google Pixel or a Samsung Ultra depends on the design details. Phone designs are subtly different, all phones are filleted rectangles. To know if a phone is a Pixel, you look at the rear camera for a Camera Bar and the oblong, pill-shaped cameras. A Samsung Ultra is instantly recognizable by their vertical line of at least three rear cameras. Phones with a square rear camera cluster seem generic because so many phones take on that look. Shapes and the placement of shapes are powerful tools for designers to generate memorable and unique products.

Universal Design, compared to Inclusive Design, is a more specific approach to design for the needs of people with disabilities. The aim of Universal Design is to create products that can be used by everyone regardless of their abilities. Inclusive design strives to create products that are accessible to a wide range of people, including people with disabilities. Inclusive Design goes beyond Universal Design by considering the needs of people with different backgrounds, cultures, and experiences. Inclusive design takes a holistic approach than the specific focus of people with disabilities in Universal Design. Inclusive Design does not focus specifically on people with disabilities, but there are examples of when Inclusive Design was the better approach to design for people with disabilities. This includes accessibility features, like closed captions or your phone’s high contrast settings. The wheelchair most commonly comes up in Universal Design conversations. Wheelchair design v...

Biomimicry is a design approach where nature’s solutions to problems are mimicked for the purpose of solving complex human problems. Velcro was one solution, inspired by the burrs that attach themselves to animals’ fur. Another is the concept of grouping, such as birds flying in flocks for better chances of survival. There are ancient drivers behind this approach and most are environmentally friendly. As designs inch towards sustainability, price tends to increase. By studying nature, designers can find inspiration for new and innovative solutions to their own problems.

Ai What-about-isms follow Ai more than any other news topic and it’s hard to know exactly what the future will hold. Newer tools and models will become available and it will be important to stay on top of it. We know Ai can help us research and generate sometimes useful images and our dependence on this will increase over time. Ai generated 3D printed prototypes may be the most useful ability among product designers when that bridge is crossed. In the further future it’s reasonable to say that products will be more personalized to each user since Ai is able to iterate designs instantly. 3D printing 3D printing was exclusive for a long time due to high prices and advanced technical skills required to use it. Desktop 3D printers are affordable and reliable. More and more people have access to creating prototypes and custom-made products. Sustainability Not just sustainable designs, but designs that looks sustainable are also successful, albeit less ethical. Consumers want to feel like th...

Vanilla was a luxury spice from Mexico and Guatemala and took off in Europe in the 17th century. Vanilla ice cream was recently invented in France when Thomas Jefferson discovered it and brought his recipe to the United States. Vanilla later skyrocketed in demand when soft drinks were invented in the 19th Century, an integral ingredient in Pepsi and Coca-Cola. Now it’s in all of our sodas, ice creams and baked foods. Vanilla is historically an exclusive flavor in high demand, but when we describe a style as being vanilla, it’s ordinary. It gets a bad rep sometimes. As expensive as vanilla still is, it’s a mainstream product. It’s the default ice cream for parties because most people agree it tastes good. Searching the web is a luxury that was incredible when it was new. Everyone takes it for granted now. It’s ordinary, but it plays a large part in our lives. Search engines are everywhere and Ai integrated search will follow. The difference will be how we ad...

A leader and a team member have the capacity to be synonymous. People learn leadership traits without ever learning how to be a good member. They learn to give people orders but struggle to listen to feedback or to be wrong. Too many people only offer brutal honesty, but they enjoy being brutal more when being honest does the job. The best leaders in my life taught me to be respectful, be assertive and be honest. When leaders know how to listen, admit mistakes and share credit, team communication will thrive as a whole. Learn to be a good team member to learn to be a good team lead.

Having a purpose means having a driving factor in the pursuit for accomplishing a goal. There is a reason behind what you do and once you finish doing something, the goal is complete and lost. A goal is such an all encompassing word. It can sometimes mean that doing something every day to builds to or sustains something. Purpose does not only drive checklists, but a system or a way of being. This is what it means to design for the user experience. It’s why it’s important to design for the experience and not just for the feature which a competitor has and you don’t.

Text prompts to images by Generative Ai are not useful for ideating entire concepts yet. The useful part is finding inspiration through shapes, materials, finishes, and other design details. Using good design concept attributes is the most effective way to generate useful ideas from Ai. Use words like comfortable, ergonomic and stylish. Keep the prompts conversational and use the 5 Whys Method , by asking Ai “Why?” 5 times, about a topic you want to dig into. Iterate based on your Ai image board. Use your research to prioritize your ideas and Ai’s to determine your design direction.

Premium products have the highest quality material and craftsmanship. They are worth the price because they are more reliable, sturdy and beautiful. Since Ai will integrate with the design and manufacturing process of goods, the idea of premium will change. Human-made products will not be premium. Handcrafted work will exist much like it exists now through markets and local shops. Demands in local niche groups will always favor the handmade coffee mug or candles, but there’s too much benefit that comes from the accuracy of machines. Premium products will be developed by humans with Ai. Nearly all products today are created by both people and machines. Rolex Pearlmasters are among the most expensive, premium watches a person could buy. Most parts are handmade, many are machine made. Ai won’t replace all people in the design process for premium products. People prefer the warmth of a human touch for products to invest in because people come with stories. Creativity and uniquen...

It’s a good habit to use it everyday. When you ask Ai to give you an in-depth rundown of Ai news today, the bulleted list is easier to digest than scrolling through articles. Create an archive of copy/paste prompts to stay up to date.

Tik Tok videos were limited to 15 seconds to achieve high content turnaround to keep your attention. When you scroll through a video and forget to save or like it, it’s impossible to find later. There are billions and billions of Tik Tok videos. When there is an abundance of consumable material, people can become jaded and their expectations adjust. Tik Tok videos are cheap. Ai alone will not make the most interesting content. Human influence and how we use this tool is what matters.

Ghost kitchens are popping up more and more due to high overhead at restaurants. Ghost kitchens can be a shared kitchen that’s rented out, but some kitchens operate through two menus. It could be a Mexican restaurant which also sells breakfast burritos, but the breakfast burritos can only be bought online, never in-store. When cook and delivery jobs begin to be replaced with Ai and automation, there could be opportunities for people to order any food from a single location which houses different ghost kitchens. When Ai is able to create webpages instantly after you click a link, it could make a restaurant with food catered specifically to you. People from across the world could order homestyle food from their country in a town that would otherwise never sell their cuisine. More and more, combined technologies are used in new products to delight people.

Human-to-dog communication will continue to improve, so dogs may pick up on more human traits. Dogs could understand more complex thoughts and emotions. It would help to be able to communicate clearly to your dog that the uncomfortable ear medicine will make them feel better. Better communication would be useful for service dogs to communicate with their owner or with strangers when they need help. Dogs are already good at reading and responding to humans, but improved communication between humans and dogs could lead to even greater levels of understanding and cooperation. Before we know it, Canine Centered Design will be commonplace.

The chitter chatter about what we don’t know about Ai gets old when industry leaders are constantly being quoted for fearing Ai. But it’s easy to play semantics and generate fearful hype, for example, any news source right now. There’s plenty of fear to acknowledge, but we know we have no control over that. Instead, we have control over what we can explore today and how we can use our tools in creative ways. There is also information on likely tools that will soon be available. We know that Ai tools can help decision makers reach conclusions faster and this will improve with better Ai and humans getting better at generating prompts. An Ai companion in all of our devices could save seconds off small things like saving files with anticipated file names. It will be able to carrying the load of outlining our entire project and save us hours of work. Generative Ai can make a webpage in real time as you click the link, so it could make beautiful mock ups for designers in a s...