CIID Week 3: Intro to Interaction Design
By: Siddharth Ahuja
Tags: Design Thinking, Design Process, Design Education, Design, Interaction Design

Do. Feel. Know.

This article covers the design brief for this particular project and how our group approached it

“A designer’s job isn’t knowing the solution to a problem, their job is to know how to look for a solution.” — Jose Torre.

Week 3 started with a brief introduction to Interaction Design. The class was taught by Matt Nish-Lapidus and Erik Dahl. We were given a history of interaction design, and various frameworks and ways of thinking that would help guide us to design better interactions.

Groups of three were formed on the first day of the week itself, after we were given the brief.

The brief

The design brief was as follows: Design an interactive device or object related to your experience of moving to Copenhagen and adjusting to life at CIID. We were supposed to focus one interaction and build a physical product around it in four days.

The outcome

We created a product called Easy Squeezy, a handy device that soaks up information for you while sitting in a lecture. You can turn it on by hitting the button on top, and it lights up to indicate it is recording. It initially looks squeezed.

While it is recording, it soaks up information and grows in size, just like a sponge. The user can then squeeze the device to send the recordings in the form of a voice note and text to their cloud. It is similar in working to a sponge, which absorbs water, and can be squeezed to discharge the water.

Easy Squeezy in its initial state(left) and filled-up state(right), after it has soaked up information

The process

Ideation

Our group came up with problems we had faced, related to the brief. We did this individually at first, and then presented our ideas to the rest of the group. These activities were timeboxed to keep the process streamlined.

Affinity Mapping

The problems were open sorted into themes. This was repeated many times until we were satisfied with the clustering and the group theme. From these themes, we then picked the idea we liked the most using confidence voting. Read more about affinity mapping here.

Clustering problems into relatable themes

Defining the problem:

From the chosen problem theme, we tried to get to the root of the problem. We had to keep going deeper into the problem and ask ourselves “Why?” at each step. We then formulated a “How Might We?” statement. Finding the right balance for a How Might We statement proved to be tricky. It can be too specific sometimes, and too broad other times. Our statement finally was “How might we help CIID students deal with information overload so that they stay in control of their studies.”

Creating the interaction

Once we had defined what our problem was, we ideated on an interaction that could solve this problem.

In order to create different interactions, we used this framework by Bill Verplank:

Interaction Design Framework by Bill Verplank

You can read more about this framework here.

We each individually brainstormed on different interactions, and then came together as a group to brainstorm on the interactions with the most potential.

We finally settled upon a metaphor of a sponge. The affordances of soaking up and squeezing to release seemed to fit in well with information. We were excited by the idea of a device that soaks up information, and you could squeeze to dispel it.

Feedback loop of the interaction

We refined the interaction and got down to the details by testing it with the Do — Feel — Know loop. We could test the feedback loop this way, and test what the user would do, what feedback the user would receive, and what the user would learn from the feedback, and what action they would perform next, and so on.

The Do — Feel — Know loop for interactions

You can read up more on this framework here.

Creating a product around the interaction

Once we had discussed the interaction in more detail, we started thinking of the form of the product that would support the interaction. We started ideating on different physical forms the product could take.

Ideating on the form factor

We finally settled on a cylindrical form, which the user could squeeze with ease, since it’s ergonomic.

Prototyping the product

We started building the prototype on Thursday, based on the form and interaction we had decided upon. We laser cut the cylindrical form which you could squeeze with some resistance. For this, we used a tiny air pump inside the prototype, and filled the rest with cotton. There was a large circular button on top, which you could press with some nice feedback. We tested the prototype with other classmates. Based on the feedback, we kept on iterating on it. We built, tested, and repeated quickly. We then quickly finished and presented to the rest of the class on Friday.

Prototypin’

Learnings