Week 1 Reflection + Questions

It is interesting how good design is all about communication between machine and man. never thought about it this way. I always thought that good design means being instinctive, that people can use products instinctively, like when you see a knobs, you turn it, and when you see a button, you push it. there is no other. but communication is getting more important now that technology is rapidly improving in different aspects, like VR. After playing with VR machines, it does seem like communication is important; how does the machine communicate with the player that you are stepping out of the safe boundaries within the room? or how you are not within the sensor range of a Kinect machine.

I feel like it will have to be important to pick up the habit of being aware of how I feel when I interact with products and objects. Why would I feel happy using my phone when it does not vibrate at everything I do on it, or why do I feel frustrated when paper gets jammed in the printer? What made it a good design base on the discoverability of a product’s affordance to users, the usage of signifiers to guide the users with utilising the product (intentional or unintentional, positive or negative feedback from the machines), the mapping of controls so that users know which switch is for which feature, the feedbacks given to users by machines as a form of communication.

horrible norman doors

Norman doors example. Retrieved from: https://www.mmdesignhouse.com/c/norman-doors/