We formed a team last week named hand gang.

Obviously, the form we are gonna choose would be hand and our domain space would be sassy tech. The hand form comes from "secret handshake" which can open the door though giving correct handshake to the robot hand.

We all think this a really interesting form, in most cases, robot hands are considered as an extension of human hand that do the same thing but more precise and delicate. In our concept, we will assign new meaning to the hand to have a different interaction.

We decide our form first then give it context and function , which is different from normal ideas generating. So we use "why" ideation method to develop our concept.

Form( when we talking about , what we can use and interact with the hand)

Arm

Hand

Fingers

Why sassy tech

Behaviour management

Mental satisfaction

Why hand

hold something

Sign language

Punch, rub, tickle, twist

Features

Stop casual talking

Facilitator

Rules keeper

Timer

What Context

Group discussion

Formal meeting

Contact class

Interaction mode

voice instructing

Concept

This hand will have different modes(school, social, group meeting). In school mode, the hand will point at students who speak at an inappropriate time ,like the lecturer is speaking. Also it could detect who is playing their phone.

A revised version of the Breakfast Bubby, introducing the Bubbly Buddy. This bubbly coated smart device is able to help you make better choices and have fun whilst doing so. Instead of sticking just to the breakfast box shape, this new BB is able to be formed to many different scenarios such as doing homework, or drinking water.

It uses a futuristic 'bubble touch' technology, whereby the 'flexible touch screen' is actually a type of reusable bubble wrap that can be popped. Behind each individual bubble is a RGB LED.

Users set up the mode and then use it for the specific scenario.

In a studying scenario, users might have trouble sticking to good study habits. Using the BB, they wrap the BB around the outside of their notebook. The BB then starts up a game to get their brains warmed up. The game involves users trying to pop the bubble when it lights up. However the speed at which the bubble stays lit gradually gets faster and more difficult. When the user misses the lights, it's game over. The BB will then enter study mode, not disturbing the user until after 25 minutes for a 5 minute break. This would follow the 'Pomodoro timer' technique which recommends users study for 25 minute bursts with a short break in between to maximise brain retention and focus. During the break, the user could choose to play a little game, perhaps just let off some stress by popping bubbles, etc.

Another scenario, drinking water, the BB would wrap around your water bottle, like a cooler, keeping your drink cold/hot. If you struggle to remember to stay hydrated, it would flash up and annoy you until it detects you pick it up and using inbuilt accelerometers, you drinking. This could be a once per hour distraction (more or less) depending on user preference.

Playing card activity

As part of the studio activities, we were able to conduct an ideation exercise that would hopefully help us think more creatively. we started off this activity by conducting it in a team then moving on to ideating individually. after that, we came back together as a team to further discuss and refine our ideas.

How it works

Each student was handed a random card from four different suits, we would then have to match each card to an index that would generate 4 different action words and we would have to generate ideas based on those words that we were assigned to.

My idea

The idea I came up with was a street lamp indicator where a street lamp is programmed to be lit up in a different color when a QR code is scanned (the QR code will be stuck on the side of the lamp). this could be used in multiple ways but my main idea was for it to be used by tourists. the idea came about the fact that most people walking in the city often look down at their phones which might be a social indicator that they do not want to be disturbed, making it hard for visitors to ask for directions if needed. by having a lamp light up, passersbys might see the light flashing and be encouraged to stop and help them.

Thoughts

Personally I thought the activity was very helpful in forcing you to ideate by encouraging creative thinking. Forcing yourself to be creative with an added deadline of presenting it to your table is surprisingly a great way to ideate new concepts. Despite it being a fun activity to conduct, I don't think we followed through with any of the ideas we had.

World Cafe

I was looking forward to attempt a World Cafe session which is an interesting way to generate new ideas by using the existing concepts. After have a quick look at peers’ design concept posters have already be categorised into different themes on the table, we start to do the brainstorming and idea generation based on those ideas under 3 rounds: context, audience/domain and refine. The whole process for me is like “standing on the shoulders of giants” to discover the unexplored area of those themes.

I do like the structure of the event; it has been divided into three big sections. So that I have the chance to go through six different categories of ideas in an hour. At this point, this an efficient ideation for a medium/large group in a short time. The first sections of Context and Audience are not difficult for me, I could quickly drill the key points from the pitch poster. Then based on what we have got from those ideas and combining with my own thoughts, some really great new ideas have been come up with. That was exciting and a cheerful process. But when it comes to the last section of Refine, I found it is difficult to generate new ideas especially for myself. However, being a host is quite challenging for me, because I need to quickly get understating and summarise the previous discussion, then explain and pass the key message to the next coming new group of people, and again choose some certain angle to have another turn of brainstorming.

I summarise some inspired takeaways I got from each round, and will try to combine them into our team's concept ideation process.

To sum up, during this one hour World Cafe session, I was inspired by some interesting interaction ways and other data display possibility for my previous pitch idea. In addition, I also get some ideas for other datasets I have not been looking for but have a similar concept on mine. I will try to organise those exciting new ideas and see how the group project can use those ideas the generate new ideas.

Ideation Process

Team forming

I'm really excited to be on the team with Eddie, Jay and Kuan. We come from different backgrounds, degrees and skill sets, I believe we'll work together to create something cool and novel. During the contact session, we shared about each person's expectation, working preference and concerns regarding group work. We also discussed about the team basic working strategy and some rules to make the make work efficiently and joyfully. I'm quite honoured to become the leader of our team, I will try my best to make sure everyone could use the best of their expertises and have a wonderful memory of this course. But I'm still bit worried about my team leading skills since this is my first time to play a role of team leader. I'm confident in my task management and organising skills, but I'm not sure I could divide the workload and different types or work in the way that everyone will be happy about. To sort out this problem, I will keep frequent communication with everyone in the team and listen to there advices for me as well. Other details regarding our team rules will be discussed together during the following team meetings. And I will complete the team charter then send to the teaching team. (P.s Although we haven’t came up with a rock team name yet, we will figure it out soon.) We had two meetings on Thursday and Sunday for 2 hours respectively. We had a short ideation regarding possible interaction ways and locations of the problem space.

Group formation and idea generation

After discussion and ideation process of different topics in world cafe, we selected three topics that we were interested in and groups are allocated randomly according to our preferences. I am very happy that I have chosen the first voluntary theme--music metrics, and also very happy to see three members, Rhea, Iris and Haley, who have the same preferences as me. Since I have worked with some of the team members before, so we just conduct a brief self-introduction then we start preparing for the presentation related work for next week.

We started a preliminary discussion based on our own insights on the topic -- music metrics and try to try to get some inspirations from the ideas generated by our classmates in the world cafe process. Merging and integrating existing ideas, for this topic we can conduct in-depth research in the following four aspects.

Everyday sound collection(This is the theme we decided to work on)

All of us were attracted by the idea about the everyday music collection glasses. Because we realised there are a lot of voice exisiting in the nature that is always neglected by us because of the fast pace of city life. How to make use of these pieces of everyday music and interact with it become a major concern for us. During the discussion, we found out that the way to present it in the VR environment seems not that novel and playful. Inspired by the chemical experiment happens, I come up with an idea called music lab. It consists of 4 major part, voice collection device, voice storage device, voice operating device and voice emptying device.

Eyedropper: Press the tip of the eyedropper to draw the everyday sound you find interesting

Test tube: can be seen as a sound reservoir. Store various collected sounds.

Erlenmeyer flask: Sound generator. Dump your interested test tube to this bottle store and shake the bottle to mix the poured sound into a unique melody. The speed of the melody will be determined by the speed of the rotation.

Rubbish bin: Responsible for processing undesired sounds. Once the test tube / conical flask touches the trash can, the existing sound will be emptied. These empty devices will be able to store new sound clips.

Music + exercise

This theme is inspired by the ideas of utilising different fitness equipment to generate music. When thinking of the interaction mode which will make it more playful and unique to others, we have some different options like punching, riding, body movement... However, these ideas seem to be similar to the ideas of some existing interactive installations. Regarding how to better combine sports elements and music, although our group thinks it is an area worth exploring, it is difficult to determine a clear direction on the current form of interaction and presentation.

Color + music

Shadow + music

UQ Innovate

I went to the workspace this week and the staff showed us how to cut wood. First of all, we need to bring goggles, and when using the tool for cutting wood, open the air vent. Every machine needs a key to turn it on. In the process of cutting wood, if we need to move the woodblock, we can not directly touch the wood being cut with our hands, we can use another woodblock to push the woodblock being cut. In addition, he showed us how to polish blackened iron. After that, the staff led us to the paint-only room, but he just reminded us to turn on the fan when painting and did not teach us how to use the paint tools. I feel a bit sorry. At the end of the class, he showed us how to use a laser cutting machine, etc. This seemed very troublesome. I didn't learn or even know what the drawing tool he used. Fortunately, he told us that he would help us when we use it.

My name is...., I am..., I am unique because...

I find the hardest part to write is explaining why I am unique. I thought about this part for a long time, but eventually, I didn't find the answer, I just wrote that there is only one me in the world. In the beginning, we were going to write 50 words. To be honest, I think 50 words is not enough to introduce myself. Finally, we need to delete to only 3 words. Many of my classmates only left their names. But the three words I have left are "I AM UNIQUE". In this small writing exercise, I think the focus is not on who I am or what I am, but on believing in myself, believing in yourself, and believing in the value of your existence significance.

World Cafe

After discussing a number of topics that I randomly participated in, I divided these topics into two categories, one related to the creation and the other related to emotions. The content of the creation may be music, pictures, etc., and their expressions are usually lights, images, and sounds. Emotions can also be said to focus on mental health, including expressing one's emotions, regulating one's emotions, and better communication between people.

Because my idea is about music, I want to continue to participate in projects about music. After watching other students' ideas on music, I think the interactive methods to further improve these ideas are: 1. Combine music with sports; 2. Combine music with lights; 3. Combine shadow with music. These ideas can also be divided into two directions, one is to help people learn music, and the other is to provide more possibilities for creating new music.

World Cafe

In this week's session, we are mainly doing activities called world cafe. To run this activity, we need to switch tables with new people talking about the main topics grouped based on previous pitch concepts. Each round has two question slides and we need to discuss and put the insights down on the draft. Also, for each round, one of the people sitting on the table needs to stand out and stay as a host for the new coming group members. I was honored to be host twice, it was a bit awkward but fun in general haha!

Round 1: Context

1. What could the project be?
2. What problem does it solve?
3. What space is it exploring?
4. Draw from theme inspirations?
5. Think "Blue Sky"

Round 2:Domain

1. Who are we designing for?
2. Where could the project be applied?
3. Which situations?
4. What experiences are we designing?

Round 3: Refined

1. How could the concept be realised?
2. What approaches could we take?
3. How could we do it?

Bonus: Guest Time!

We had a very special guest sharing his life in London as a product designer, which is fun and I did learn a lot! (Like culture differences, office rules and what the employees are expecting)

Lastly, we picked our favorite topic(idea) and formed a group afterward.

Target audience

The young adults who are interested on making new friends.

WHAT

It can used at any occasions of party. When there is a family union for Christmas, birthday or other festivals, party cup can be used. Places like bars or clubs will use this kind of glasses a lot. Party cup is designed for fun and funky looks while drinking. It presents beautiful lights when cups collide. every cup has a sensor built inside.The sensor on will detect two colors from different cup to get the mixed color. It is a communication drive activity which is a simple game to help people to make more friends.

The bridge of communication (why):

This concept is mainly focused on help young adults making new friends. Normally, many young adults are projected to be nervous, they only interact with familiar people. this concept is to drive audience to collide with new people.

Secial interactions:

The hoster of this party will display a color mix on the main screen. guests are encouraged to walk around to looking for some one to cheer with them to reach the goal. For example, hoster show a purple one screen. green cup and blue cup should look for each other. And then, people can drive and talking with each other and enjoying a wonderful time.

This game has a reward system that that if audience can mix more color they can get free drinks, which means they most frequently collide with otrhers.

The excepted tools for this concept:

Cups, LED lights, sensor, and database. The sensors are used to detect two different lights when people collide cups, and then change it to mixed color. the database is used to store colors and recoding the progress of each audience.

challenges:

he cost of this concept is projected to be high.

How to build the database to store and connect with sensor needs to do more research.

How to use algorithm to avoide people to get same col or or cannot pair with others.

World Cafe

In this exercises, we have exposed to different topics, which gave me a deeper understanding of topics and ideas. I have been in the table of change through rewards, change though discomfort, emotional totems, guided movement, etc. I personally like one of the concepts in change though discomfort, where the shoes will become heavy when a user walks close to the ice cream shop, so that the person could not move forward. The concept can be used within jail, when the criminals try to break the jail, their clothes will become heavy as they move close to the fences.

I was the host for the beautify self, where the idea was combining 3 concepts in a room for users to gain a healthier lifestyle in both physical and mental aspects. Through the exercise of expanding ideas and inspirations based on the original concepts, I exposed myself to different context of use, aiming different target users and combining different ideas to create a new one.

After the exercise, we chose the top 3 topics that was interest for us. I have chosen the Creative learning, change through rewards and Emotion totems. I think creative learning is more flexible in terms of developing novel ideas as well as investigating a novel way of effective learning. Change through rewards and emotion totems are the two concepts I am also interested in, since those have a wide range of topics that can be developed based on the ideas and the concepts also match with my original pitch idea.

Bash

This week, we had a meeting with Bash, who is a UQ alumni living in UK. He shared with us about some tips to get a job such as photo the projects we have done and practice telling stories for interview. We also have a small exercise about developing our unique values.

We were asked to write 50 words in the format:

My name is …,

I am a …,

I am unique because …

Then reduced the paragraph to 25 words, then 12 words, 6 words, 3 words and 1 word left. My last word is Sheryl, then we were asked to think of what does the word and value means to us. I have my own working style and personality and I developed it as maintaining a brand. The exercise really helped me finding my uniqueness and what makes me outstanding.

Team Formation

We were grouped into a team of 4. Creative learning will be the topic of the project for the rest of the semester. Our team first introduced about each other, and started to write and agree on the team charter, which we will be referred if needed. The team have similar goals and working styles, and decided that the punishments are buying bubble tea for the rest of the team members. We have discussed about the idea, and agreed to developed a language learning system like mort, which is a concept about learning morse code by a machine with physical interaction with it. During the weekend, each of the team members will research within the area and propose a solution by sketching out the product.

Class Activities

In the Tuesday workshop, I attended the discussions of different topics. I have been hosting for two rounds, beautify yourself and everyday sustainability. In terms of beautify self, we focused on different interactions of emotion detective jacket. For example, a compliment changes the look of the jacket, changing design based on mood and environment and to match colour to tell people near who has the same interest. In the case of everyday sustainability, we discussed targeting people that unaware sustainability and individual effect to collaborative sustainability effect.

Group Discussion

We categorised the ideas written on the emotional totems and tried to get some inspirations from it. We got four category, interaction method, target audience, target audience and purpose.

Pitch feedbacks & reflections

Considering colour with emotions:

I received this suggestion from people sitting in the same group. To make interactions more playful, different colours can be used to represents user's status. For example, blue means looking for someone who has same hobbits. Pink represents the user is matched with someone. Different colours give user more informations about others and encourage them to make conversations when they are not knowing each others.

Comments on other's pitch

![Imgur] (https://imgur.com/ubRywkZ)

Soldering

78-207

Pitch feedbacks & reflections

Considering colour with emotions:

I received this suggestion from people sitting in the same group. To make interactions more playful, different colours can be used to represents user's status. For example, blue means looking for someone who has same hobbits. Pink represents the user is matched with someone. Different colours give user more informations about others and encourage them to make conversations when they are not knowing each others.

Comments on other's pitch

![Imgur] (https://imgur.com/ubRywkZ)

Soldering

78-207

We have a group meeting in Friday and decided what we are going to do for the next several days. Because we are going to give a presentation and bodystorm next Wednesday, we planned to make a video to present our design concept.

The first 30min we discuessed the concept we are going to use. Basically its the design idea I presented in week 2, but we thought its a little bit simple and we want to add some interactions to make it more interesting. Although the idea is about "Music" and "Fitness", but its core is "Data visualization", so we are thinking to make more use of the data collected from the sensor, We want to make the data not only presented as sounds, but also showed as visuals, like the visual effects in the early Windows XP music players.

We spent the next 30min talked about some more details of the video we are going to make. We decide to meet at Sunday, bring some instruments(both musical instruments and instruments for exercise), and try to use bodystorm to show how the user expected to interact with the product.

Team formation

Brain storm

Concept

This week is the group formation week for the project to be worked on until the end of this semester. The group is determined by Lorna and other tutors based on several selections. The first selection is to fill in the form provided. The exciting thing I found there was a question about 'Spiritual Animal'. I don't think I will find someone who chose the same animal as I want. But I saw him for sure in my group.

The next activity for group formation is to do a World Café on Tuesday. I did this activity in the Computing Studio 1 last semester. The problem that often arises first is the loss of hosts from several tables. In this course, in the rounds before the break, everything was safe. But after returning from break time, some hosts disappeared. Several tables I visited, one table did not have a host, so everyone on the table had to read the notes on the paper on the table. In general, this activity helped me to get new inspiration. Each person must have a different idea that will not be heard if not in the same table with them.

After World Café is finished, we gave three votes to the theme we like. The day before this activity, I was interested in Creative Learning. But I don't know what I want for the second and third choices. After World Café, I decided to choose Altered Landscape and Change Through Reward as other options. In my opinion, all these choices can be used as one project in common.

The next day is the announcement of the specified list group. Before that, we made a video call with Bash Isai, UQ alumni. The exciting thing that I got at the talk was to keep thinking positive—and not easily entangled in one place. If the workplace that we go to does not provide what we need, you should leave the area. Each person has their unique characteristics.

After Bash is finished, the group list is announced. I got a group with Bowen Jiang, Wentai Ouyang, and Sulaiman Ma. It was a great relief because we had all been on the same team. Hopefully, this team can work together very well!

The theme we get is Creative Learning. To determine the project idea that we will work on, we ask the question "what do you want to teach" to each group member. Programming, Music, Electronic, and even cooking appear as our consideration.

On Friday, we had our first meeting. Before this activity, we looked for some inspiration. I looked at ideas on Kickstarter. There I found chess in physical form. The opponent's chess piece can move on its own. I think this is good to be combined with learning programming with the concept of fighting. And some other ideas that I found based on mobile games that I have ever played.

The results of the first meeting, we decided to teach programming with the concept of the racing game using characters shaped like chess pieces. The inspirations are "Square Off Neo & SWAP" and "7 Billion Humans". To make it enjoyable, we added challenges like a maze, but simpler ones like trees, houses, or other objects placed on the same board. And even at this meeting, we found the name of our group, namely BEE BEAR LIONS, based on the spiritual animals we chose.

Concerns Thus Far

In recent weeks the coronavirus has been a major concern for me. Given the epidemic levels at the moment, it is a timely reminder to ensure good hygiene practices.

Due to this rising issue, I have my concerns regarding this semester academically and the disruption that this virus will have a detrimental impact on the semester both academically and health-wise.

Given the nature of this course and the high levels of interactions needed with other parties (e.g. user testing, exhibition, etc.) I'm uncertain that we are still able to ensure these activities are carried out to achieve the best possible outcome.

The coronavirus has impacted and will continue to impact families around the world. Inevitably academic studies will also be impacted due to disruptions and unexpected closures or isolation.

None the less, on a positive note, we are continuing to power through and communicate with the team via skype. This is quite an inconvenience due to connection/network instability with people cutting in and out during calls.

Stay safe!

New Group

The group has been formed today. Happily, I can still work with the people I am familiar with. With our new team member, we did some warm-up conversation.

Then we made our team agreement. We reached the agreement that when we have different opinions, we would vote for the idea. But there three team members(including me) have worked together for a whole year. I am afraid that the new team member might not used to the way we work. It's always good to welcome new thinking, but still, I think we would have many disagreements in the future.

Our idea

boring space

We have thought about many boring spaces in our life including the workplace, home, and public space. Not only the physical spaces, but we also think about the activities that could be boring.

Some ideas have been generated in the class.

Mailbox

A cute mailbox that can swallow your mail. And threw the mail up when you receive one. It can also identify people, so it would make some noise when you pass by and there is a mail waiting for you.

For this project, I was concerned about the rubbish mail. I live in an apartment with two roommates last year. Each month, we would receive a lot of rubbish mail but we never checked our mailbox until someone buy something on the internet. So, people might not want to be disturbed every time they have got mail. What's more, most of the important mail has been sent through the internet. Thus, is it necessary to have something for the mailbox?

Interactive Floor

The cleaning floor would be boring, so we are thinking about making the floor interesting. Such as giving some interaction when finish clean up a part of the floor. The idea is good but I was thinking about whether the idea of modifying the floor would be too common. And we still need to expand on the idea to make it more interactive. Considering the action always happens at home, maybe we can think about all the family members.

Reminder bag

This idea is about a screen on the bag to remind people of things. But I was thinking that the time people would look at the bag. It's only when you put on it. So what about the other time when people put on their bags. They cannot see the bag, but can it do something with the strangers on the street. This would also contribute to the interaction as only a screen would lack interaction.

Washing hands

To encourage washing hands, we are thinking to make the water interesting. Give the water some special Effects both when washing and after washing. But this idea would be super hard to complete.

Chopping Game

The last one is a chopping game that people can play when chopping vegetables. This could be unsafe but still can be interesting. The movement of chopping can be related to hitting the monsters.

Because of the time limitation, we decided to discuss more after the class by Facebook group channel

Innovation Lab

In the innovation lab I learned the skills of sawing wood, drilling, painting, and laser cutting. The inspiration for me is about that i know a lot manufacturing knowledge which i could use the skill in future design projects.

World cafe

The world cafe has three rounds, and the poster is separated with a different theme. Each round, we need to discuss with the various content.I will record some interesting table discuss as following:

• Process: 8 different ideas with different table and discussion in this time.
• Goal:Projects identified

Round 1: Context(30min)

Round2:(45min)

We design for the music lover. Some of these projects will be applied to public space, and the other will be applied to personal creation. What was interesting in the discussion was that we proposed how to transform one of these ideas. The final exam results will be applied to individual syllables, through which we can record the results of this semester and even the entire school year.

Round: (45min)

Guests Sharing Meeting

We have a remote meeting with UQ previous students who live in UK now.

I got some work experience from the sharing guests.The interesting meeting session is that we need to write the detail information about:

• My name is ...
• I am a ...
• I am unique because ...

The process will help us to know our advantage and it will give us clear career positioning.

Day 2 of week 3 started off with a meeting with Bash Isai in London (felt sorry for him cause it was 11 pm there). He went through the process of what to expect after we all graduate, how we will be competing for jobs. He explained that we need to understand what we are worth so that we can find our self a job where we are treated right. He definitely suggested looking at a requirement agency. In terms of money, he said that each job would only increase salary by a small percentage each year so he recommended that after 2 years you should find yourself a new place to work where they will pay you more. A fun exercise that we completed was were we wrote 50 words about ourselves then cut them down to which we only had three left. This showed us what really defines us as a person and asked us to look deeper in ourselves for this. The following is what I had written and the three words that I had selected.

My name is Dimitri Filippakis and i Am a cloud architect, I am unique because I’m an understanding and realistic person who can be optimistic in times of hope and understand that not everything can be solved right away. I can work hard to achieve goals and tasks, and sometimes allow myself to lose track of time cause of this attribute.

1. Realistic
2. Work-hard
3. Goals

Following the guest speaker, we met with our team and got to know each other with some warm-up questions. After we warmed up, we worked on making a team contract for the semester, this covered topics such as meetings, financial management and emergencies. Following the team contract, we were looked into what we needed for the assignment and how we could develop ideas and the proper process to do so.

Work Done

During the World Cafe, we moved from table to table, exploring different themes with different ideas. I got to get a glimpse at many different themes and then understand what others viewed it as. The whole day was full of continuous brainstorming, fast thinking and building upon others ideas. This was a great mindset to get into to start brainstorming for the theme we were most interested in. Even though I never actually sat at the "change through discomfort" table, I went to other tables with similar concepts and could still build an understanding and insight into the ideas that can stem from them. On Wednesday we met our group members and got to know them. We discussed how we work and what we want from this course and this group. We also started brainstorming ideas.

How It Relates

Participating in the World Cafe allowed us to widen our thoughts and delve deeper into the ideation process, producing more results. This helped when trying to go through the ideation process with my team. We were able to generate a mass amount of ideas, then focus on a few we liked and break them down more and then flesh it out.

Work to Do

Our team needs to continue through the process and solidify an idea for our project. We agreed to continue to flesh out potential ideas before agreeing on a particular one. This will then lead into the beginning of the proposal due in Week 6.

Inspirations

When brainstorming, the inspirations mainly came from bad habits that I do but know I shouldn't such as loving to spend time in bed or biting my nails!