In class we had to share our passions and our interests. I am very passionate about hands on work. I love the process of creating something from brainstorm to finished product. I love how an Idea can become something so much greater, a raw material like aluminum can become the chases of a super car. While I love design and creation in general, my true passion is with structures. I love to analyse the architecture of buildings and I love to design buildings of all shapes and sizes.
We were given an assignment which made us look at an everyday object (in my case a computer mouse) and look at it with the limited knowledge about human life of an extra terrestrial. I assumed the alien knew who humans were and had a basic semblance of our history, but no in depth knowledge about things like computer mice or staplers. It was difficult to try and relearn what something is, to try to explain something I am already familiar with as if It is the first time I had ever seen it. It was a weird experience and it really challenged my skills as a thinker and as someone who loves design, to describe in such detail, an everyday object that I take for granted. Looking at the object now, I appreciate it more, as if I have a different perspective on it. A different perspective is super important int he design cycle because; for example, one could draw a picture looking at the paper from one angle, but once they look at it from the other side the proportions are all incorrect. It is essential to rotate through perspectives in order to create a quality finish product.
I landed on an alien planet and found a remnant of an ancient human society. Sitting on the ground the small object looks sleek and ergonomic, made up of a type of plastic or some other material with a circular wheel of sorts in the center. It seems that if one presses down on either side of the tip of the object it will make a click sound. This possibly served a function for humans. On the underside there is a bulb emitting an infrared ray, which could possibly be used as a sensor of sorts. There are pieces on the side that one could press that possibly have some ulterior function. The ergonomic design leads me to believe that it may be used in the grasp of an organism with different hand structures than my own. It seems that one would need fingers (which the ancient humans were said to have possessed) in order to control this object. Given that there is a IR sensor at the bottom, one would infer that this would sit on a surface and be used to control something else. Perhaps the wheel in the middle was used to select or scroll through something. I had heard of ancient human computers, one could wonder if this was somehow connected, as some sort of control device, but there are pieces to the puzzle I am missing. The overall design of the object is sleek and cunning, as if it was meant to move in rapid motions, but it also seems to have a use sitting still. It emits a presence of ferocity, as if it is ready to attack in an aggressive yet controlled manner. I may never know what this was used for, but based on its design I know that it was handheld and used to control something.
Looking back on this assignment, it is easy to understand why we had to do it. I realize now that sometimes the only way to solve a problem is to take a step back and analyze it down to every minute detail. Sometimes one has to look at the bigger picture and break down how every single aspect of the problem works in order to formulate an effective solution. I said effective solution because many solutions are not effective, solving a problem is easy, but finding the right way to solve it is extremely difficult. Overall, this was a great brain exercise, and it really helped me realize that sometimes I have to use an entirely different frame of thought to solve a problem. In this situation the problem was that we use a very particular frame of thought and it is difficult to change that and think outside of the box.