Wearable

 

Introduction

The world is filled with nature, and fire is one of them. Almost everyone has been burned by something that is hot before and it is a really despicable experience. Being burned creates extra obstacles that you have to overcome such as not being able to actively work on whatever you are working on and most importantly, wastes a significant amount of time to heal. However, through research and continuous testing, Utility Gloves is formed with the intention of solving small problems that affect your daily life. This new type of glove gives a unique experience as it can be used for both shooting longbows, and preventing heat burns which is extremely convenient for fieldwork or even hunting. Including lasting durability, Comfy insides, and affordable as it only costs around 24 dollars!

What Does Success Look Look

At the end of this unit, I am hoping to create a prototype that is useable (a semi-fire prove glove). Furthermore, I would try to achieve to make a detailed reflection on this unit all the way from brainstorming to actually making the prototype.

How Will you Know That You Have Succeeded

I will know that I have achieved my own goals by creating a semi heat prove glove that is aesthetically pleasing and usable for all. Moreover, create a full reflection on the prototype.

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Design Problem and Targeted Audience

As I confirmed my design idea through sketching and from the class brainstorming we did at the beginning of this unit, I have decided to start with something that can resolve multiple everyday life problems from only 1 product, essentially, a product that has multiple uses for different things, for instance, backyard organization, fire/water resistance, preventing cuts..etc. From these uses, it automatically identifies the targeted audience already, which is parents, gardeners, and everyone who does any outside work. However, as I progressed through this unit, I found several more quirky uses for the utility glove, such as digital drawing and longbow shooter, as the glove is brown leather.

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Generating Design Ideas

For this unit’s first design thinking process, I started by using a Padlet to generate the essential direction that I am going to go with, in which I decided to continue with the design idea mentioned above (Multipurpose). Then after I had finalized the general idea, I started to model possible products on pen and paper (sketching):

For this unit’s design process, I did not provide an extensive idea board compared to the other projects; however, this time, I attempted to focus more on the modeling and physically showing the product that I was making.

 

Developing Selected Ideas into Concepts

We, as a class, came up with a significant amount of general ideas, and I myself have selected a number of them and turned it into sketches of items. However, the selective part of this process was pretty easy for me as I have already somewhat chosen because I already thought of doing something possible to physically make from the beginning of the wearables unit. From the utility idea, I turned it into a design concept with more detailed sketchings and real-life examples:

 

Applying Feedback

From one of the class feedback sessions, when we were paired up with someone, I received much feedback for my first prototype design:

including that my design is too simple and common to the point that it does not affect the grand scheme of glove design. So, after that feedback session, I redesigned the glove to be more portable in that I just simply cut out the unnecessary parts of the glove, which also improved air regulation. This modification also improves the aesthetic of the glove, in my opinion, to be more “outline/skeleton of the glove”:

 

Technical Design Techniques 

For this project, I designed the 2D model, mainly Affinity Design, and some of the small parts; I used Photoshop. In this unit, I have familiarized myself more with Affinity Design because I had to create the Utility Gloves’ poster background from scratch instead of just searching for a template on canvas, which helped me practice layer and tracking (clip mask too). I was also somewhat forced to sketch a lot of sketches on paper which was also refreshing and helped me improve my anatomy skills (sense I HAVE TO DRAW FREAKING HANDS)

 

Reflection: strength/Weaknesses

Originally I had no pier knowledge or interest in fashion/wearables; however, throughout this unit, I feel I have gained some information about what it is like designing and making quirky clothing. I first started with several brainstorming classes where we needed to finalize and confirm our design idea. In this phase, I feel that I did not do brainstorming but more like, “Ok, I will choose between these two.” Nevertheless, at the end of this, I came up with a design concept that was interesting to me, and we started to make the first prototype which I did. However, I was confused about the direction that I was going at. At the end of that, as I said in the feedback section above, I received explicit feedback from my classmates and began with what I consider the illustration phase, which is basically me drawing on a trackpad (pain). This unit, compared to other projects before, including graphic design, was the most challenging for me as I had to constantly switch between brainstorming (modifying the design), modeling (creating a physical copy), and illustrating (PAIN why can’t my laptop handle AI) which from this, I realized that coming up with an obvious design idea that you fully understand (like a game design document) is better than just jumping straight into drawing sketches which is mostly what I did. The final obstacle that prevented me from having a clean outcome was the final physical model, which I made out of leather:

This model wasn’t what I expected to make; however, I did not keep track of how much time was left (2 classes), and I couldn’t start from scratch again, which is why this prototype looks like a medieval execution glove. But in the end, I was still able to connect everything and make an adapt presentation/pitch. If I had another chance to redo this project, I would take the brainstorming classes more seriously and come up with a successful design using digital tools and not sketches because I can’t scan them for my final presentation at the end. As this glove is relatively cheap to make and beneficial in many ways, I feel the audience would be at least interested in trying them out because of the quirky aesthetic. However, unfortunately, I failed to think about the environmental impacts of this glove on cows/water, which is why this product is not environmentally friendly, and that’s another thing that I would consider if I had a second chance.

 

Padlet - Inspirations - CLICK THIS