Leo

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Pouch (Product Design)

For product design, we were challenged to think of a problem and solve it with a piece of faux leather around the size of an A4 piece of paper. The bag can help keep the earphones in a way so it doesn’t get tangled up. I learned how to use contact cement and other techniques to put the bag together such as sewing the bag together and putting on the snaps so the bag can be closed up.

If I made this again, I would cut out the leather with the laser cutter to the patterns can be more accurate. I would also measure out the places where I put on the snaps so that it looks better. I may also change the shape of the bag so that it is smaller and more portable.

I struggled most on the sewing part so the line isn’t very neat. If it is possible, I would also hand sew it since I can control it more easily compared to the machine.

The hardest decision I had to make was cutting out the size of the leather since I had to make it bigger just in case it didn’t fit in.

My problem to fix

May 31, 2021 / Leo / 0 Comments

My problem is that I don’t have a bag/box for my earphones. My earphones get tangled easily and when I don’t use them, I just stuff them into my pocket which makes it even more tangled when I take them out. The ear tips can also come off so it gets lost easily. My inspiration came from the leather pouches for earphones like the ones shown below.

Smell Detector Prototype

May 25, 2021 / Leo / 0 Comments

The way my smell detector works is you press the button on the right at the top of the detector. After you turn it on, just hold the smell detector/identifier where the smell is and press the process button on the screen. The smell will go in the other small rectangle on the left at the top of the identifier/detector. The object the smell is coming from will show on the screen with its name. If you want to see what smells have been detected before when using the identifier, you can press the History button the screen. To scroll through history, just swipe on the screen like a mobile phone. There is also settings where you can change the brightness of the screen, turn on low power mode, turn on or off the voice feature where it can say the name out, and the volume of the voice if it is on. The black tiles on the side are grips where you can put your fingers in between to get a better hold on the detector. There are speakers on the bottom and a charging port in the middle. The hole is for you to hold it another way or make it easier to get it out of your pocket.

My inspiration came from my phone. I made the shape similar and the screen. The charging ports and speakers also came from a phone. The handle or hole came from a staple gun. The grips on the side were from the handle of a temperature gun.

If I made this again, I would make the measurements more accurate to there are so messy edges.

Louie’s Journal

April 19, 2021 / Leo / 0 Comments

This journal showed the life of Louie, a young adult that lived during the French Revolution. He was part of the Third Estate, meaning his life under monarchy was difficult. Not only did he get through life during the reign of King Louis XVI, he also survived through the reign of terror, a period of time where many executions were happening.

Many things have changed during and after the revolution, some have also stayed the same. Many people in the first two Estates have become the “new poor”. After the revolution, they have almost lost everything. The social structure of France has also changed. Most of the ideas of the way France should be has stayed the same. The Third Estate has not become the new rich but stayed poor.

Lightbox

April 12, 2021 / Leo / 0 Comments

For product design, our task/challenge was to create a lightbox of a place that we missed and couldn’t visit during the pandemic. For my lightbox, I chose a lake view in Canada. The lake view my lightbox is based on has abnormally blue water and high mountains surrounding it.

I learned new techniques and skills while making this lightbox like using Adobe Illustrator to make the layers and box. Most of the project was done on Adobe Illustrator. There were skills like joining shapes, importing images from TheNounProject and changing the line color so that the laser cutter receives different messages. Some Illustrator tools were needed like expanding/tracing, group/ungroup, and rounding corners. There were also skills like acrylic painting where we used a card with a dad joke written on it then hid the answer with paint so it can be scratched off and revealed as an example. There were also pieces like the LED where we needed to customize it ourselves for length, where it went in the box, or how compact it needed to be so it can hide behind a layer.

There are also some things I would change about my lightbox. First of all, I would change the mountains in the back layer so it would be more obvious and not nearly completely blocked by the other layer. Another thing I would change is the hill layer. Instead of using semi-circles, I would find a good hill shape to replace it so overall the lightbox would be more realistic. The last thing I would change is the color of the sky layer and lake. They are the same color but if one of the layers had a lighter shade, there would be more contrast and show that the color of the lake is abnormally blue.

One piece of advice I would give is to check your layers before you laser cut them since some pieces could be too thin and snap off or some details could be too difficult to

Overall, I think my project was successful with a few minor details here and there. My biggest success was that the layers came out the way I wanted and the details were there. An obstacle I faced was painting the mountain details since I needed to tape them, paint it, then take off the tape for some small details.

Money Can’t Buy Everything: Headless King and Queen

March 29, 2021 / Leo / 1 Comment

By: Dan, Leo and Andrew

The French Revolution was the rise of leaders like Maximilien Robespierre and Napoleon Bonaparte, it was also a bloody process that ended where it started. The video explains what life was like under King Louis XIV’s control, what sparked the revolution, the rise of the Jacobins and Robespierre, and a lot of executions. It also includes details about the bloody executions during the reign of terror and how it lead to the death of Robespierre and the end of the revolution.

Unbroken

January 22, 2021 / Leo / 1 Comment

The video contains some details on the story, central ideas, the theme and other elements of the book “Unbroken”. Under the video is some of my thoughts and information I got after reading the book.

“Unbroken” by Lauren Hillenbrand is about Louis Zamperini’s life and how becoming an athlete and World War 2 has affected him. It talks about Louis Zamperini throughout his life, from being an Italian immigrant as a child to becoming a soldier, and the many different problems he has faced along the way. One of the themes in this book is always have hope as it can help you in difficult situations.

You should read this book because 1) it can teach you about living in a racist society as an Italian and how foreigners were treated in that era. 2) The way Louis Zamperini changed over the years can inspire you and shows that if you have hope and be resilient, you can achieve many things. I was inspired by the fact that Louis Zamperini always had hope and survived many difficult situations. 3) The book shows what captured American soldiers had to experience as Prisoners of War and what they risked to protect their country.

After reading this book, I learnt that re-reading a book or parts of a book can help you understand the plot more clearly, find out more themes, or take in more information you missed the first time.

Boxer Rebellion: Good or Bad?

December 1, 2020 / Leo / 0 Comments

The Boxer Rebellion, also known as the Society of the Righteous and Harmonious Fists, did not deserve a bad reputation. The influence and pressure of foreign countries was destroying China and its culture. China was already weakened country since many foreign powers took parts of China like Germany in Shandong and Russia in Manchuria. The more China resisted, the more foreign countries would attack and that would lead to the creation of more peace treaties giving foreign countries even more of an advantage. Most of the peace treaties were in favor of foreign countries so the influence of foreign powers would be increased. The Boxer Rebellion would eventually rise and fight back. In conclusion, the Boxer Rebellion did not deserve a bad reputation because foreigners were affecting China’s culture for the benefit of themselves.