Recap: Lab 5 — Bachelor Insights
The previous lab was all about the current bachelor projects in HTW’s communication design department where five students gave a little insight on their current work.
In the beginning, Felix held a presentation on his and Max’ project that deals with future storytelling opportunities inside chat windows. They’re thinking of chat bots that enable users to go through a complete new and individual story experience and are working on a concept to expand digital storytelling as we currently know it.
What‘s the designer’s role in the chatbot bubble?
Within their research, they encountered several problems. One example: how and in which dimensions will stories within chat windows need designers to create them, independently of their content? Considering that messenger services will very likely grow in the future, companies will profit by them to spread their message. On the same hand they will have to figure out alternatives to position their brand in social media as in messenger windows for instance — whereas visual branding becomes very likely redundant at some point. For those who want to learn more on that I recommend reading their article.
Design for the deaf
Subsequently, Maike spoke about her bachelor concept that is about cultural mediation between deaf and hearing people. In her research, she figured out how there is already a wide supply of digital services for blind people available but very few for the deaf. So she tried to find opportunities to enrich the media offer that is addressed to deaf people, since many existing charitable projects are not well designed. She picked an already existing project that will take place in September to redesign their on-/offline appearance. She evaluated that her main focus is not only the process of redesigning but also raising awareness for problems deaf people are dealing with today.
Changing how we donate today
Next was Thomas to share his thoughts about donation and why the idea of donation apparently doesn’t seem to be appealing for people under 40 since the majority of donors is older than 70, at least in Germany. So why is that? Very likely it’s because charity organizations have issues raising awareness of their donation campaigns online, and if they do so, they’ll lose their users on the long way of registering, terms of payment and so on. Thomas’ answer to this issue is an app concept that he is going to create with a user centered design approachinterface that helps to shorten and simplify the process of donating. The groundwork for his concept was laid by applying user centered design research.
Allergolink helps people with food intolerances
Ferdinand introduced us to Allergolink: A database that helps people with food intolerances by filtering the menus of franchise restaurants for suitable dishes. In his research, he found out about the difficulties allergic people have to face when it comes to eating out due to little transparency on dish ingredients. He claimed that his project won’t just end after the Bachelor graduation. The app will be further developed in the masters program “Design Entrepreneurship” at the Bern University of Arts in Switzerland starting in September. If you’re interested in this topic and want to stay updated or become a beta tester, sign up for Ferdinands newsletter on www.allergolink.de or check Twitter: twitter.com/allergolink and Facebook: facebook.com/allergolink
Redesigning creative techniques
Last but not least: The experiences Max gained during his internship at Edenspiekermann Berlin led him to think of a digital canvas for creative discussions in brainstorming workshops.
After doing expert interviews in order to get to know potential users, he developed the idea of extending the capabilities in workshops to better discuss digitally relevant design elements like animation, interaction, video and sound. Another benefit of this would be less work in preparation and documentation, since the whole process would be digital and ideally needn’t be transformed into paper in between. During writing the thesis Max figured the top criteria to make the product functional: mobility, flexibility and intuitiveness. Also he found out that a modular approach instead of whole revamp could be more realistic and manageable in a bachelor project.
Finally, I would like to thank the bachelor graduates-to-be for sharing their work with us in this lab, taking the time and giving us insights into their working process though the final exam is not even over yet. We all really don’t worry about your results. For those who want to know more, go check #BAklava16 on Twitter.
