Category Archives: 4th Year Product Design

New Zealand Radio Interview

Just over a week ago I had a skype interview with the team over at Radio New Zealand’s weekly tech/consumer show ‘This Way Up‘. Yesterday it was broadcast and now it’s all up online to listen to. My interview can … Continue reading

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Reflection on New Designers

Recently I exhibited DON-8r at New Designers – a 4 day showcase of design graduate work at the Business Design Centre in Islington, London. This was an opportunity for fledgling designers to promote themselves and network with industry types in … Continue reading

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Submission Video and Final Hand-in

As one of our deliverables we were asked to submit a 90 second video detailing our designed and refined products. This video begins with an in studio shot inspired by what I tried on my coin collecting early prototype video. … Continue reading

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Finishing Up Making-of

I think I have been suffering bloggers block. Since I put out my first few press releases I have been pretty narssisistically infatuated with watching and waiting for updates from twitter feeds and google analytics. Well here goes the last … Continue reading

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Post Press FAQ Response

Blog neglect strikes again but I have a legitimate reason this time. DON-8r has been receiving a lot of online media attention since my last blog post so I have found myself flitting between various other blogs, websites and comments … Continue reading

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Testing User Interaction

While also being a fund raising and publicity opportunity for Dundee Science Centre, my couple of days out at The Overgate Shopping Centre was also a great opportunity for some in depth user testing. This has allowed me to highlight … Continue reading

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Fundraising at the Overgate

On Friday and Saturday, Dundee Science Centre were at The Overgate shopping centre in Dundee performing some fun experiments such as dusting for fingerprints and creating lemonade fountains. DON-8r and I were also there, outside in the sunshine, gathering money … Continue reading

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Tweaks and Changes

A typical backlog of blog here so in a non-chronological order here are some updates from the last week. After the successful PR day at Dundee Science Centre, I took DON-8r back to the studio for a repaint and a … Continue reading

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Final Model #12 – The Final Model!

Though still needing a few tweaks and tidy here and there, this is pretty much the finished model! Really chuffed with how it has all come out! Had this all working and ready (just) in time for a PR afternoon … Continue reading

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Final Model #11 – Assembly and Decals

Nearly finished! with all the electronics inside I attached the bumpers using hacked up Tesco Value sponges which were absolutely perfect! Not too much pressure to hit the switch and enough sponge to bounce them back out easily. The RGB … Continue reading

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Final Model #10 – Embedding

Although working fine, it is important that I have access to the circuitry within DON-8r as problems are inevitable (as I know now all too well!). I have designed DON-8r so that the front motors and electronics unit can slide in and … Continue reading

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Final Model #9 – Glue, Sand and Spray

With the electronics soldered and working, I returned to getting the body looking less like a mouldy egg. To start with, I glued the two halves of the body together and clamped it over night (above). The next day I … Continue reading

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Final Model #8 – Electronics

I am really chuffed with how the electronics have come out having taken it off the PCB and soldered it onto 3 tiers of strip board with it still working! Looks a bit manic but it does all make sense, … Continue reading

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Final Model #7 – Coin Chamber

  This is the beginning of making the back half of DON-8r – the coin chamber and trolley wheels. The wheels are attached through a couple of snug holes securing them in place. The chamber is made up of lots … Continue reading

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Final Model #6 – Head Forming

  The head of the robot was made the same way as the body, I created a mould of the shape I needed and then vacuum formed plastic over it. The difference being though that I could not keep the … Continue reading

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Final Model #5 – Body Building

For the sake of not writing too massive a post here I will summarise a stressful week of testing, testing and retesting vacuum forms in order to produce the formed body parts you see in the above image – 2 … Continue reading

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Final Model #4 – Real Robot Motors

The motors I have been using so far have been taken from Cybot – a robot I built through collecting components  as part of a subscription to Real Robots magazine. Unfortunately though, my extensive testing has left them a little … Continue reading

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Exploded Views

  Hit a bit of a blog backlog again so Ill go through some stuff today in chronological order. First up, here’s some exploded isometric sketches I produced to help get my head round how I am actually going to … Continue reading

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Final Design Sketches

*** CLICK IMAGES FOR BIGGER*** So if you have missed it in any previous posts, here is what the final design will look like along with some highlighted alterations. I put these sketches together for Sensation to make as clear … Continue reading

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Sensation(al) News!

For the past couple of weeks I have been in contact with Sensation Science Centre in Dundee as a venue which I thought would be ideal for me to do some user testing for DON-8r. What has stemmed from this correspondence is … Continue reading

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