physical model

This is the physical model that I have made out of  wood and paint. I have also put it round the house to show how it would look in every day life.

First presentation

After the first presentation I got some feed back from the class. I of which was maybe I should change the shape of the design and also change the colour. Because even though I was trying to have the colours like the colour of a heart it was a to literal translation to the model. The reason why I needed to change the shape was because it could be to sharp to carry around. This is the new design I have come up with.

New model shape

This is the new model for my interface. This is instead of the love heart shape. However it has maintained the colours of a love heart so it will relate to the idea that it is the "heart rate" monitor for your house. It still dose the same thing as the love haert concept its just in a different shape.

Talk with Tutor and experiment

After talking with Paul. I realised that having the design look like a love heart might not be the right thing to do because it wont be targeting a big target audience (Males might not want to be carrying round a love heart). We discussed different shapes and sizes that would be a better than a love heart. I decided to choose the shape of the house for the design. This would be a great shape because more people wouldn't mind carrying round something shaped as a house so it is gender friendly which increases the target audience by a significant amount. Also we talked about the weight of the object and how I should consider how much it should weigh because the weight of the design could make it feel quite nice to carry around. I wasn't quite sure exactly how much I wanted it to weigh so I conducted an experiment. I printed out different sizes of a house and made little pockets out of then an started to add little magnets in then to test how it would feel if it was a certain weight. Im still not quite sure how heavy I want it but I do know that I don't want it to be light beucase it would just feel cheap and worthless.

Storyboard concept

Written description

For my project I am going to design a key ring that is like a heart rate monitor for you're house. This key ring will be shaped like a heart and have a few buttons on it which will let you navigate the interface so that you can find out how much energy you're house you are using. The technology I am going to use for it will be the same as the heart rate monitors that people use for exercising. But instead of it showing a heart rate it will show an energy reading. It will all so have a button on it which will turn on the "pulse" this will pulse faster or slower depending on how much energy you are using.

The target audience I am designing for would be for everybody who owns their own house who is looking to save energy (mostly family house holds).It would be best for persons from ages 16 on wards ( Younger kids might not care about energy saving) the reason why I chose this group was because a lot of families use a lot of energy with out any realisation on how much energy is being wasted and all it takes is one family member to want to save energy and then it usually starts to work for a while. But if they had something on them all the time like a keyring then it will be a continuous observation on energy usage in the house. I am going to use easy accessibility to attract the target audience. Because my device will be so easy to use and carry around with you and the only thing you need to do is clip it on to you're keys will attract the busy household of a modern family. Because most families don't have much time or they cant be bothered continuing with the energy observation this key change will solve this because it will always be there

3rd Idea

This idea has a meter on the light switch in every room so that when people leave the room they can see how much power they are using. There will also be a master meter which shows all of the meters in each room.