PRESENT

DEVELOPMENT THROUGHOUT THE YEARS

I have developed myself as a designer both during my study and my extracurricular activities. Over the years, I have developed my designer’s personal identity and vision.

At first, I did not yet have a specific defined goal with my role as a designer. Unconsciously, my main goal to become or be a designer has always been there. However, I managed to put this into words and discovered my vision during my study. I developed from an insecure person, not being completely in place, and looking for my own identity, to a confident, powerful person who has a clear purpose in life and can be truly herself. I do not get discouraged easily and I currently dare to take on projects that I stand for. Even though I know this will not be the easiest road to walk - like my final bachelor project - this contributes to the courage to implement innovative ideas. I believe that you cannot become an excellent designer and distinguish yourself without taking risks. This all is partly caused by building a new life fully on my own after moving from the north to the south of the Netherlands, without acquaintances at first. But also because of my board year at E.S.V.V. Hajraa as commissioner of competition, where I improved my professional skills. And networking with experts and companies during committees of my volleyball association and especially during my final bachelor project.

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CREATIVITY AND AESTHETICS

Different iteration techniques stimulate creativity such that you can come up with better ideas. Co-creation, brainstorming with independent people, sketches, and 3D software are used as different iteration techniques to get to the end result of the project. I have learned from this that it is important for me to have opinions and ideas of others to be inspired to come up with a final concept. I developed my knowledge about the 3D software as well to make designs look aesthetically pleasing and show materials in the visuals that are aesthetically hard to use make beautiful in a physical prototype. Moreover, I have created a final video fully by myself for the first time. I learned to master the basic skills of Adobe Premiere Pro, where I made the video. This allows me to work faster and more efficiently. I want to explore more with materials in the future to discover its characters and to make physically aesthetic products, because I have mostly used wood or cardboard when it comes to large objects during extracurricular activities and the courses Designing for the Everyday and Aesthetics for Interaction.

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TECHNOLOGY AND REALIZATION

To enable people to experience my concept and design, I created several realizations of prototypes. These prototypes were made with different explorations, low-fi clay, sketches, 3D-printing and 3D modelling. Since I have never worked with the 3D software Fusion 360 before, I have strongly developed myself in this by mastering the basic skills of this program where I taught myself by using knowledge of others and tutorials. Although the 3D printing did not go completely according to plan, I did gain a lot of new knowledge from this. The desired size and shapes are easy to create as a low-fi prototype by claying first, and then process the outcome in a 3D model. This will filter out errors in advance. Moreover, I have realized that using 3D software makes it easier and clearer to communicate the final realization of a concept. Because of this I managed to create my concept exactly like preferred without being limited by material. During the project no use was made of electronics because this part of the vibrator is already fully thought out and working in current models. The focus has therefore been on developing a different experience for senior women who suffer from osteoarthritis. However, I would like to use more complex electronic circuits in my next project to learn more about applying electronics that need each other to function optimally.

USER AND SOCIETY

Together with my final bachelor project, I worked on the societal problem of the taboo on elderly’s sexuality. The elderly in society are soon forgotten, but everyone deserves a respected place to fully express themselves. Unfortunately, this is not the case when it comes to elderly’s sexuality. Addressing this problem has taught me to conduct specific research on the community through literature research and interviews. The original goal in field of the user and society was to focus on interviewing the target group dementia because this was going to be an extra challenge due to online contact in connection with COVID-19. However, the ultimate target group has become the general female over 60 because the subject of elderly’s sexuality is complex enough without the complexity of dementia itself. Unfortunately, no user was interviewed to map the needs in advance or to validate the design because there was no response to the question for participants. This is probably due to the complex and taboo subject of sexuality where one has to be vulnerable. As a result, it was decided to base the knowledge and validation on different experts. However, Silver Delight is designed with the user always in mind. I learned from this that it is important to always think in backups. If one idea does not work, then the second idea has to be executed to eventually achieve the similar. Sometimes the ultimate goal has to be reached by different roads.

BUSINESS AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP

During my final bachelor project, I made use of a business strategy for Silver Delight to break the taboo on sexuality. This is based on the get-keep-grow strategy where the product is still in the get phase. Although I learned different business strategies in my previous courses (see past), the business model of Silver Delight is based on the model of EasyToys together with the fundamental aspects of business design. I used a successful current model from practice contrary to the theory, to use theory in a next step to analyse and improve the currently created model. In conclusion, reflecting on my personal development plan, I have made a business plan for putting the device on the market to learn the business perspective in the design process and to make the design valuable for both the user and the market. In addition, I also came up with a strategy to create brand awareness, which is the most important part to achieve the main goal of breaking the taboo. I learned that business is a complex subject, where one goals needs another to reach the higher intention. I hope to fully develop this business plan and learn how to actually launch the product and get acquainted with the details of the associated actions in the short-term.

MATH, DATA AND COMPUTING

Even though math, data and computing is an important aspect in de development of innovative products, was this expertise area not used during my final bachelor project. This was because data representations of large numbers and models were not used during the project together with statistical methods.

PROFESSIONAL SKILLS

Networking was an activity that took place throughout the entire process. From the start of the project, no specific client was involved. Because of this, I have provided myself with the information through contacting experts that I turned out to need from practice from both medical experts and the business world. I am proud to say that I initially managed to arrange a tour of the company EasyToys. However, this turned out to be an online conversation due to COVID-19. Besides, I have been provided with information by an employee of this company who deals with concept developments within the team, and I received free prototype material for the electronical part of the device. All this has made me realize that a good project with the right communication opens many doors. However, this takes time and of course not everyone will help you further in the process. This enabled me to distinguish between people who can and want to help me and experts who cannot.

Furthermore, I am currently doing a project called Stichting Move, where we supervise a project for primary school children who are going to improve something in their neighbourhood. This to show the children that they can contribute to society. I am learning to guide others, coordinate, delegate, plan and organize by devising and performing the lessons.

DESIGN RESEARCH PROCESSES

I have developed in the field design research proces as well, this is how I found out what my ideal way of approaching a project is. By approaching projects in an investigative way through literature or field research, problems about the specific topic can be mapped out or indicated problems can be better understood. This provides the basic knowledge to continue building the project. From here iterating can start, experts in the field can be approached and stakeholders are involved in the process. I approach all this with an open mindset, to remain open to the unexpected. This unexpected contributes to the quality and uniqueness of a project. The design must be validated by means of user testing in order to always strive for perfect interaction, user-friendliness and user-centered design. Design and research go together and one doesn't level up without the other.