Georgi V. Georgiev

METHOD OF DESIGN THROUGH STRUCTURING OF MEANINGS

This research shows a new approach and development of a design methodology, based on the perspective of meanings. In this study the design process is explored as a development of the structure of meanings. The processes of search and evaluation of meanings form the foundations of developing this structure. In order to facilitate the use and operation of the meanings, the WordNet lexical database and an existing visualization of WordNet — Visuwords — is used for the process of meaning search. The basic tool used for evaluation process is the WordNet::Similarity software, measuring the relatedness of meanings in the database. In this way it is measuring the degree of interconnections between different meanings. This kind of search and evaluation techniques are later on incorporated into our methodology of the structure of meanings to support the design process. The measures of relatedness of meanings are developed as convergence criteria for application in the processes of evaluation. Further on, the methodology for the structure of meanings developed here is used to construct meanings in a verification of product design. The steps of the design methodology, including the search and evaluation processes involved in developing the structure of the meanings, are elucidated. The choices, made by the designer in terms of meanings are supported by consequent searches and evaluations of meanings to be implemented in the designed product. In conclusion, the paper presents directions for developing and further extensions of the proposed design methodology.

Methodology for creating new scenes through the use of thematic relations for innovative designs

Abstract In order to support the design of products with innovative desired functions (creating the desired functions), this study aims to develop a methodology to create new scenes in which a new product may be used by synthesizing the existing scenes. The development of this methodology focused on thematic relations, which are the relationships between two objects through a thematic scene, such as “an apple is cut by knife.” Thematic relations enable us to represent and manipulate the scenes in a computational manner. In particular, we highlighted the synthesis of the scenes which belong to the different contexts (periods in time, culture, and technology). We propose a specific methodology in which thematic relations are used to construct a database of existing scenes and then create a new scene using this database. This methodology was implemented in a computer system. Case studies were provided to demonstrate the use of this system.

Polysemy in Design Review Conversations

This paper examines the role of polysemy, defined as the quality of having multiple meanings, in design review conversations. It examines the polysemy, particularly of nouns, involved in a dataset of design review conversations with reference to design ideas. The purpose is to determine whether polysemy is related to successful development of design ideas and more creative design outcomes. The results show that the polysemy of nouns involved in the conversations of the finally developed, successful, design ideas exceeds in the most cases the average polysemy involved in the conversations pertaining to the unsuccessful design ideas. Furthermore, the polysemy of these nouns is linked to high overall creativity of the design idea. The paper concludes by discussing issues and directions for further investigation of polysemy.

Users’ Tactile Interactions With New Product Materials: An Analysis of Depth Impressions Based on Associative Concept Networks

Depth impressions are an inward associative layer of the expressed impressions of humans. To analyze tactile interaction, it is essential to examine what users feel and imagine and how they create depth impressions by touching and looking at different materials. On the basis of tactile interactions, this study captures and analyzes users’ depth impressions on materials. We propose impressionable new tactile material for design from the viewpoint of depth impressions and emotional engineering. We employed a concept networks-based method to analyze the experimentally obtained verbalized protocols and to identify the depth impressions. We found that the feel of materials’ tactile naturalness is related to the depth impressions and concept networks’ complexity. The depth impressions and concept network of the proposed micro-print material are distinct and beyond that of existing natural or artificial materials. These findings will help in employing new analysis tools and developing better tactile materials for designing products.Copyright

Augmenting creative design thinking using networks of concepts

Here we propose an interactive system to augment creative design thinking using networks of concepts in a virtual reality environment. We discuss how to augment the human capacity to be creative through dynamic suggestions providing new and original ideas, based on specific semantic network characteristics. We outline directions to explore the structures of the concept network and their connection to creative concept generation. It is expected that augmented creative thinking will allow the user to have more original ideas and thus be more innovative.

Evaluating Tactual Experience with Products

This chapter focuses on design research that analyzes users’ tactual experience with product interfaces, especially, the analysis of users’ impressions of such experiences. In practice, a systematic approach is required to evaluate users’ interactions with product interfaces. Therefore, the research objective is to propose a systematic method and tools for evaluating users’ tactual interaction with products on the basis of users’ inexplicit impressions, so that the method should benefit the practice. The method was developed and applied in a case to evaluate users’ tactual interactions with product interfaces in the context of the car industry, particularly in the research and development of interfaces of vehicles. The method was applied in a trial evaluation for vehicle interfaces of navigation systems, audio systems, and air conditioning systems. The role of this design research is to propose a systematic approach to evaluate product interfaces based on users’ inexplicit impressions and deeper feelings; this approach can be applied in practice of product design. Based on the inconclusive results of this first application in practice, further developments of the method are needed.

The taste of criticism: enhancing feedback for creativity

Criticism is important for cultivating creativity. In this paper, we propose a method to enhance feedback to creators of creative works. We separate the explicit evaluation from the implicit evaluation. We pay particular attention to cases in which the viewer expresses a positive evaluation of a work but the actual implicit evaluation is rather negative. In such cases, the feedback of the implicit criticism is important for creativity. We describe a prototype system designed to deliver such feedback to the creator. The feedback interface is represented by the taste of green tea, directly delivered to the creator, thus motivating the creator.

Extension of the Framework of Knowledge Process Analysis: A Case Study of Design Research Process

This study undergoes the approach of Knowledge process analysis in an academic research project. It investigates the knowledge creation primitives of KPA used in previous studies and tests other possible primitives from the domain of design studies. This is a step improving KPA with design research experience.