Assignment DA612 Materials in Design

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What I did:

I started this assignment by analyzing the material (D3O) on a functional, sensorial, emotional and application point of view. I never had any interest in materials. However due the material research I realized that it is quite interesting to analyze the properties and specific application of the material. Now I enjoy analyzing materials more because it is for an industrial designer important to look at different materials.

What I learned:

Analyzing the material characteristics enables me to understand the (dis)advantages of a material, where I could use it for and what makes it better to use than other materials. Also the sense of a material is very important to take in mind when designing; e.g. what materials make an iPod more solid compared with a cheap Chinese mp3-player? Besides I realized that awareness of materials makes me stronger as a designer and brings new possibilities in designing. If I am aware of the newest materials, I can think about futuristic products or designs. Finally I had to find a new application or product of the D3O material. This made me aware that designing based on the properties of a material is not easy. Because there was no clear problem or design direction there were too many options. It was actually more inventing instead of designing. Eventually I enjoyed analyzing the material properties and senses by implementing it in a new way. By combining the senses of the material I finally came up with a new application as shown in the report on page 26-30. Overall this assignment learned me a lot about what to think of when analyzing a material and why it is so important to think of materials when being a designer.