A3: Laser Cut iPhone/iPad Stand

Design

This project had to have been one of my favorites so far! I didn’t want to limit myself to one of the assignment prompts, so I began the design process by sketching out as many ideas as possible after being inspired by some Google searches of cardboard structures. At one point, I even considered creating a stand that could be used for all three prompts given. Here are some of the ideas I came up with:

In the end, I ended up roughly prototyping two of these stands (the ones circled above in black) to find out if they would work. The first design I prototyped was intended to hold a laptop and tablet for viewing/testing purposes, but I found that it was quite unstable. It could barely hold the tablet up for more than a couple minutes before collapsing. However, I did like the shape of the design and how you could adjust the tilt of the tablet while it was on the stand. It looked like this:

Prototype of one design, which allowed the iPad to be propped at different angles based on how it was positioned on the stand.

The second design I pursued was simple in form as it only consisted of simple shapes and two pieces. This stand was intended to hold an iPhone to film whatever was going on below. The design was actually more complicated than I originally thought because the angle of the cardboard needed to be just right so that the stand base wouldn’t be captured in the filming frame below. I thought the first prototype for an iPhone was successful and stable, so I made a second larger one to fit both iPhones and iPads and eventually ended up using this design for the final stand. Notches are present in the stand to allow for the transformation from an iPhone stand to an iPad stand. This is the progression of all three stands from early prototype (left), second prototype (middle), to the final laser cut design (right):

The initial prototypes allowed me to explore dimensions so that when I created the final stand in Rhino, I knew what numbers to use. Here are some additional photos of the final stand:

The final laser cut pieces for the stand.

The Rhino file for the stand, which has cut lines in red and score lines in blue.

The stand can hold an iPad to film below.

Or hold an iPhone horizontally (left and middle) or vertically (right) to film below.

The stand also functions sideways for viewing iPhone content.

Analysis

I got feedback from a peer on the stand to learn about my design. Here’s what she had to say:

• She liked how the stand was adjustable to iPhones and iPads both horizontally and vertically because of the notches.
• She would’ve liked being able to adjust the angle of filming. This was also pointed out in class during critique, but filming is upside down (with the top of the video appearing larger than the bottom) unless the person in the video wraps their arms around the stand.
• She thought that since my notches on the folded piece were so large (especially compared to the other two prototypes that I did), it took away from the stability of the stand.

Overall, the stand’s purpose was to be able to film below with an iPhone/iPad and it is effective in that way, but adding more flexibility for the user to be able to film at different angles was a suggestion I would’ve liked to explore further. Also, I would’ve liked to explore additional ways to give stability to the form so that users don’t have to struggle with placing devices on it.

In regards to this project, it was my first time using a laser cutter and I’m amazed by how intricate and precise the cuts are. Now that I know how to use it, I’ll definitely be thinking of more reasons to do so in the future!