Project 2: Suppress Addiction Design

 Suppress Addiction Design, is a dispense that attracts the smokers to take notice in the possibilities in quitting smoking. The dispenser will provide an incentive, such as to play a game to be rewarded. However this game also is a learning tool, which is an educating technique for the consumers interacting with this design. This dispensing is initialising their behaviour to consider stopping smoking as they have started to get rid of their cigarettes in exchange for a patch. The throwing away of the cigarettes is an indicator that they are declaring themselves to quit smoking. The rewards are symbolism of a pledge to stop smoking.

In addition they will be supplied with a unique code that is scanned into their phones. This will enable them to claim their rewards. These rewards involve discount tokens for food or fitness memberships. These rewards will encourage healthier living, with the first step of declaring that they are aware and persuaded to stop smoking. Initially the dispensers will have this illuminating light on the dispenser that will intensify as more smoke in the area increases. This brings attention to smoker’s behaviour, but it is the incentive that will bring attraction and action to the dispenser that will educate them and influence their behaviour to change.

Thus the perceived barriers of stopping smoking that were addressed within the design were the:

i.                     lack of incentive to continue/start to quit smoking.

ii.                   High risk temptation situation, that is around alcohol and people to resist smoking.

iii.                  difficult to declare and pledge to quit smoking.

iv.                 difficult to maintain and monitor quitting program.

v.                   emotions of fear, uncertainty, nervousness and doubt trigger smoking.

vi.                 Not convenient or persuaded to stop smoking.

Furthermore, the dispenser is implemented in the pub to address the healthiness of the living and eliminating the barriers that consumers hold against the action to quitting smoking. Suppress Addiction is designed in a way that it is easily maintained, whereby the design includes a pivoting hinge, at the base of the design and is opened vertically, allowing for the service man to access both the cigarette dispenser and the roll of patches as well as the electronics for easy access and repair. The design is implemented with a lock where consumers aren’t able to access the dispenser. The colour orange was used as a link back to the cigarettes theme. The form is bold and curvaous, different to other dispensing machines, moving away from the boxy form as a way to attract consumers to the suppress addiction dispenser.

As a result pubs will provide a dispenser to influence consumers that are more likely to smoking in these facilities to consider smoking a game that has to be conquered with the initial nicotine patch for relief.

 

The main social issue found was that smokers have the lack of incentive in stopping to top smoking as they are addicted to their smoking habits. Smokers especially in pubs, smoking are a symbol of self-image and control of their emotional/psychological thoughts. Emotions of fear, uncertainty, nervousness and stress are emotions that cause smoking habits. But the most influential situations that smoking occurs is in pubs as consumers to go there to socialise, drink and then smoke, such that as if your friend is smoking it is more likely to smoke with them.

Hence smoking has effects on the environment as cigarettes are created with chemical substances, thus when burnt pollute the earth’s atmosphere. The smoke that come out from the cigarettes including secondary hand smoke affect their health and others whilst affecting the air quality of the environment. Large amounts of butts are littered, affecting the cleanliness of the environment.

REVIEW 3: Who killed the electric car?

Did you know that electric cars existing over 100 years ago and where used over petrol running cars? Who knew? Well, when I viewed this film it was interesting to hear how the electric car was popular once then faded in and out, whilst the petrol car came to be more popular and frequently purchased. This video explores the reasons why the electric car wasn’t and still isn’t a great success to consumers and addresses the continuous debate.

Initially, electric cars where quiet and smooth to run and could be charged from home compared to the gasoline run cars. Thus it was the fast changing world whereby gasoline cars were preferred due to their momentum, cheaper gas, and automatic starters. It had the edge. However, there was one fault to the car, it created smog. This issue was the beginning of poor air quality especially in America, influencing diseases and respiratory illnesses effecting adults and children.

In retrospect the film focused on the idea of why the electric car which was a great alternative and solution to the health issues being faced with a gasoline car was being dismissed by the public. It questioned who was to blame and what where the reasons to do away with it.

It mentioned that electric cars were gaining their momentum in their use by Americans but it was the sceptics that stopped the change. This was insightful, as some consumers felt that they couldn’t trust the cars enough to switch, in terms of strength, size, function and ability to understand this new technology. It had inconsistent utility providence.

An interesting point raised was that depending on how much information the consumers were being provided with, influenced the purchasing behaviour of the consumer. This said was rebutted with the fact that oil companies have a great influence in the automotive industry, which discouraged the alternative electric car, due to it affecting their finance standing (profits).

The line of reasoning continues throughout the video, battling the reasons of who did and didn’t want it? and why it was eliminated?. There seems to be an ongoing blame game between consumers, technology, companies, politics and governments that have influenced the discontinuing of the electric car. Furthermore this said, the argument has influenced other developments, such as the Hybrid, trying to address a greener automotive industry, but there is still a challenge in acceptance and adaptation of greener cars.

 Overall, with the arguments unfolded on electric cars and a greener environment displayed by various parties Industrial Designers can take these views and try to encourage greener products. It creates an opportunity for greener design and encourages eco friendly designs as trustworthy and similar to existing products.

So key messages of this video where:

(a)    Consumers base their decisions on the knowledge and experience of the product. So some consumers felt that they couldn’t trust the electric cars enough to switch. Whilst others where willing to help the environment thus society in the future with their health.

(b)   Electric Cars were environmentally friendly. Although it was the reason of poor utility providence in comparison to gasoline cars that it didn’t succeed.

(c)    This decision was heavily influenced by the opinions of the consumers, politics, government, automotive industries, technology as well hidden agendas of oil companies and their financial standing.

(d)   Through decades of argument, it has led many to think of creating products for a greener environment but the challenge today is for consumers to move away from that mindset that eco products aren’t an equalised function to existing products. Acceptance is the key to the future of greener products.

 

Project 1: Pure Care & Rationale

Problem

The redesign of the petroleum jelly container was a necessary problem to address, where the current design of the petroleum jelly container have an easy clip on & off cap which makes it easy for children at the ages of 5 and below to access  thus using the product inappropriately. 

This was evident through research of children using the petroleum jelly as a toy, for their hair or face. It seemed that the oily, smooth texture of the jelly is liked by young children, besides the fact that they don’t fully understand the usage of the product. Further research was conducted into the safety and healthiness of the product to see if this product is appropriate for new packaging, it resulted that ‘petroleum is [also] not considered safe for ingestion or internal use in large amounts.’  From this it was concluded thus identified that parents should have the control in using and applying
 the substance onto their child.

Besides looking at the problems faced with the easy accessibility of the packaging causing higher risks of children being unsafe, it was mentioned by many parents that they try to carry a minimal amount of items in their bag when outdoors with their children. Thus, the large structure of the container is not practical for parents that travel outdoors where they will require the need to carry the container for the comfort of their child. Likewise the content of the container is relatively not used in one go when the parent is outdoors.

[Solution]: My Design

The ‘Pure Care’ container manages the dispensing of petroleum jelly to a minimal amount and stopping children at that young age to access the inner content of the container. The main operation of the packaging is the parent presses the lid to open and squeeze the pouch to release the petroleum jelly into their hands. Having the petroleum jelly being squeezed into the parent’s hands reduces further contamination or gems being placed in the petroleum jelly container.   

The Pure Care packaging comes in two parts, the outer shell and pouch. The outer shell is shaped in an egg like form, for reason of comfort in one’s hand, but to reflect safety and gentleness, thus no rough edges with smooth contour lines. This is enhanced by the use of blue shades of colour to reinforce the clean and safety of the product being contained in the packaging. The outer shell has two living hinges within the design to allow for the lid to be attached to the form and avoid parents losing the lid as well as a living hinge to support the two main casings that is holding the pouch in place.

Pure Care has allowed for parents to be able to carry a minimal amount of petroleum jelly, when travelling from place to place. The outer shell has a wedge detail around the rim of the main body, which allows for the two parts to clip in and be squeezed together with the assistance of force and friction to wedge the parts together encasing the pouch. However the way it is put together, isn’t permanent, but able to be released, by pulling the two halves apart, whereby there are scallop details on the side of the form to indicate to the parents where they can place their hand to pull from.

Furthermore, with the ability for the shell of the packaging to come apart from the pouch that sits within the packaging it has allowed for the Pure Care product to be refillable, which is an approach in minimising the amount of  jelly being carried outdoors by parents. Hence the outer shell has five bosses that the pouch is slotted into for perfect alignment and instalment of a new pouch. These pouches can be bought within the supermarket by parents when needed. These refillable pouches are seal with an aluminium foil before used to avoid any tampering with.

Pure Care also addresses the transportation problem by the size of the packaging. It NET’s 65g, whereby it is small enough for transport purposes, thus able to be placed in either a baby bag or the mothers hand bag. The reasons of why the content of the petroleum jelly was reduced was to allow for the parent to not have to care around a large amount of petroleum jelly at the one time, knowing that they wouldn’t need to use it all on their day out. I also considered that the parent wouldn’t run out of the petroleum jelly in one go, but last a week so it could be refilled for the next two weeks or so.

Pure Care minimises the chances of children below the age of 5 to access the packaging as the lid must be pressed and rotated to prevent children in opening the lid but it also stops the mess created by children. However parents are able to still access the packaging, whereby there is a scallop detail on the lid to identify where to place the hand to press. This action is reinforced by embossed instructions near the lid.

The lid also has a cylindrical detail whereby when the packaging is closed it wedges into the pouch to stop any petroleum jelly being squeezed out of the packaging accidently if squashed in bag, thus it reduces over spillage of jelly to fill the recess of the outer shell.  This has been allowed as the pouch has a very thin wall section so it can be squeezed, but with the assistance of the cross section detail at the nozzle, allows for the plug to wedge down the detail and fasten in their tightly.

Likewise, Pure Care packaging is addressing the issue of sustainability, whereby the packaging is both recyclable and reusable. Pure Care Packaging is fully recyclable, whereby the entire packing is made out of Polypropylene so when the product goes to the recycling plant, the product won’t need to be separated thus reducing costs with the recycling of the product, but also there with be some saving with the manufacturing stage, as the packaging is made out of two parts only. The outer shell is injection moulded and the pouch is blow moulded. Having the pouch at a very flexible wall thickness with a large opening and cross section detail at the top of pouch allows for an injection pin to be inserted into the pouch and filled with the petroleum jelly.

Pure Care is reusable, as mentioned earlier as it can be refilled. However sustainability was also considered in the shelving of the product, whereby adding an additional feature, that is a hole at the top end of the organic form, allows the product to hang on hooks in the aisled of the store, eliminating the extra supporting material that would have been needed if shelved on the shelf. This goes the same with the refillable pouches.

In conclusion, Pure Care prevents children of 5 years and below from accessing the petroleum jelly product and creating a mess when not supervised by the parents. It keeps them from harm’s way if ingesting the product, also it allows for the parent to carry a minimal amount of the product around with them for the comfort of their child. Plus the packaging is designed with sustainability in mind, by reusing and recycling and increasing the life span of the products usage.

Pre-final Posters

This week,  I presenetd  my pre - final posters to a focus group where they gave me some very valuable comments that I could fix and address to my product and poster design.

What are the issues, diffculties, or problems that my peer group found in understanding or interacting with my design, as expressed by my mockup and posters?

• They were confused with the lid design. How does it open and close? Which way does it rotate? Does it block the spout of the pouch?
• How is the pouch packaged in the store as a refill?
• When placed in bag, it will squish and release petroleum jelly into the cap. This will be unpleasent to clean out the petroleum jelly that is trapped in the contours of the lid detail.
• Maybe make it thinner.
• Make it clear to the people viewing the posters that the top detail of the pouch is a feature that is harder to dispense the petroleum jelly from for children but not for adults.

What are my strategies for addressing the issues found? What steps should I take to ensure that my posters communicate the merits of my design in the best possible way for the Cormack industry critique next week?

• Change or adjust the lid detail.
• Provide arrows to make the function of the lid clear and more understandable in how it works and is released from many body.
• Put the same bottom detail of the outer shell on teh pouch to assit in aligning the pouch in the shell when refilling as well as the pouch also being able to be hooked in the supermarket when the parent is purchasing refillables.
• Having the shell parts be attached by a living hinge, to assist in opening the shell for refilling, rather than the parent trying to spilt the shells in two.
• Add a detail on the cap so that when the parent opens and closes the cap their is plug that seals the pouch to avoid any petroleum jelly from being released in the cap detail when accidently squeezed.

My Development of Cormack Packaging Design

Design Product Lifetime Exercise

Today’s class exercise was a great one to experience whereby we got to disassemble a kitchen electronic product. Our team got the Breville Mix Master. The aim was to demonstrate that the way we design a product has a great impact on its lifetime. The reasons for disassembling were to see how the product was assemble, the various materials used, the number of components and how long we would take to disassemble.  

All these aspects impact the lifetime of a product whereby the longer time it takes to disassemble the product the more likely the company won’t  repair, upgrade or recycle components of the product as there is more money spent in disassembling it rather than creating a new product. This essentially impacted the environment.  It took us 55 minutes to disassemble the product which indicates that this product is most likely to go to landfill.

This exercise also demonstrated the problems and opportunities that come as a result in considering the assembly, part design and fasteners designs with a product.  As designers we should consider designing for durability, disassembly, repair, upgrade and recycling. The images below show the difficulties when disassembling the Mix Master as well as design improvements of making the mix master more durable, easier to disassemble and repair/upgrade which will dramatically reduce the effect on the environment, extend usage and encourage the reuse of resources.

REVIEW 2: The 11th Hour

This video really captures the essence of human life and how it impacted environmental changes. It shows the issues and consequences of global warming and its dramatic effects. There needs to be a balance between human life and the environment.  With no balance the bio – sphere is suffering in that the environment might live but the human/animal life will suffer.

From the credited interviewees they comment on what life is, how we came about and the importance of life on earth. We as human have a great understanding in the creation of tools and communication. It is our developing minds that created the advancements and our attitudes and our economy driving the view on the environment destructions.

From this said, the film clearly identified the obverse issues in relation to the destruction of the planet. It was with the introduction of steam trains and fossil fuel plants thus the industrial and infrastructure revolution that caused nature to be a human resource rather than think of it as an equal. The main contributor to environmental impact is the oiling industry, thus effecting not only the environment, CO2 emissions but human health.

The most concerning point mentioned was global warming, it bring an element of uncertainty, causing rain fall, weather patterns to change. These destructions are concerning but it is a reality and should be aware of it by all. This is a crisis which is brilliantly demonstrating through this film. The level of destruction that is not only happening on land but in the ocean is having a dramatic effect on the eco – system. In fact it was sad to hear that most of this is affecting people in the less fortunate areas.

What was enticing from this film was the referencing to forces that are stopping change. They are the companies, industries especially the oiling companies that make choices and have authority that lead the change, which isn’t happening. For change to happen our culture and wellbeing needs to transform. Consumers need to have the knowledge and awareness to act, but we dismiss the problem and the beauty of the world. It is a global crisis.

This film was inspiring as it concludes with the idea of using our way of thinking, knowledge to help in restoring the earth thus our life. Looking at our culture and science and we must re- design design that is changing processes, high power and create a waste free industrial system. It is amazing how trees, insects, organic membranes do so much with no effect to the environment in comparison to our high energy machinery.

Nature and science is fascinating and is the key that is driving the solutions to help the improvements of the industrial era. It is rebuilding our infrastructure. It is about coming together in order to change, learn and the willingness to act. We have the economy, but it is using that economy affectively to change quickly. Thus, the introduction of the carbon tax was an incentive. We need to be smarter to save ourselves and the world we love.

Overall industrial designers when watching this film are inspired to design technology and products for the greater good and health of species, rather than just for the consumer and economy. Industrial designers are inspired to re-design design in favour of the environment, to influence the change of production and infrastructure to better sustain our life, in harmony and balance. It is up to the logic and intellects of not just designers to create products of sustainable qualities. We must look at ways in changing industrial process in comparison to how nature creates.

Messages:

(a)   Economy is one major factor that is effecting the action being taken in reducing the effects on the environment. It is the economists that don’t consider that the environment can do much more for our way of living. Economists are the higher authorities that must drive the decisions to reduce pollution. It is all about economic gain which is diminishing the environment.

(b)   We humans are the cause of change. We must use the intelligence and knowledge of the world that we are destroying and find solutions, with technology in our favour. It is using our understanding and love of the world and life to fix the damage we have caused.

(c)    The industrial and infrastructure industries are not only causing effects on the environment but human’s health and wellbeing. It isn’t just affecting the land but the ocean and the eco – systems.

If you are interested in watching this film go to:
 http://vimeo.com/42487584