Tag: REAP

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Talking about about design artifacts

On Friday I visited the REAP Felt Lab to talk with a group of people about design artifacts.

It was a bit of an overview of some of the things used to communicate a design to the various stakeholders in a product development project. As time was limited, the focus was on representations of the user interface. That is, while they’re important, we didn’t get into such useful research artifacts as personas or scenarios or journey maps.

We did cover such obvious candidates as wireframes and prototypes in various levels of fidelity, exploring the different forms that they can take, and their strengths and weaknesses in different contexts. We also looked at sketches, which might have a more limited audience — maybe even just the designer in some cases — but which are something that I use on every design project. (As an aside, I’ve written before about pencils and how regularly I use them for sketching and more.)

The discussion was lively and the group was an engaging one. I always find it much more interesting to hear what other folks have to say, and welcomed the thoughts that everyone shared. My thanks to REAP for inviting me!

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Text + Tech = productive fun

A group of people around a table at the Text + Tech event

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m involved with REAP at the University of Waterloo. It’s a terrific program for the students and community partners who work together on various projects.

This past weekend I was fortunate to be a part of the Text + Tech event, a joint initiative between REAP and Pat the Dog Playwright Centre that saw technologists and theatre folks come together to help the latter better understand how emerging interactive display technologies might be incorporated into theatre pieces. It was hosted at Felt Lab, and at Quarry Integrated Communications.

It was a fascinating experience, with some unexpected insights.

Both groups were surprised by how often the question of whether something was possible was answered with yes, but with different perspectives. Theatre folks were surprised that something was possible, while technologists were surprised that the questions were so easy.

My favourite activity was when the whole group sat around a table and listened while each playwright outlined a piece they are working on, and asked how a display technology might be used to address a specific challenge. The discussions were fantastic. The process of collaborative problem solving was pretty much the same as what I experience in software product development. While details were different, we were all able to work together to discover potential solutions.

Everyone was happy to work together — there was no big gap between the arts and tech groups. Of course, as someone with a foot in both groups, that felt like business as usual for me.

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Busy!

I’ve let my blog slide more than usual lately, in part due to being busy on a number of fronts. Here’s a bit of an update that also serves as an explanation!

There’s always plenty to do in my regular work at Karos Health, including a February trip to Las Vegas for the annual HIMSS conference. It was the company’s first trip as an exhibitor to that particular conference, and with our successful visit we’re already committed to going again next year.

February also saw the eighth Ignite Waterloo event at the terrific Waterloo Region Museum. I’ve been an Ignite Waterloo organizer since the very beginning, and it was great to see that people continue to enjoy our events. The next one will be even more special, as we have some very cool plans in the making for our ninth event.

uxWaterloo remains on ongoing pursuit for me, and our monthly meetings are a wonderful way to spend my time. Organizing them with Bob Barlow-Busch is a real treat, and the support that we get from our community of attendees is gratifying. Our February event was essentially a socializing one, where the discussion centred on conference experiences. Our March event was a trip to Felt lab to see the projects that REAP student teams have been working on. It sounds like everyone found the meeting productive and fun.

Speaking of REAP, I’ve been involved there from the beginning as well, acting as a sort of design mentor to the student teams. It’s an easy thing to do, as the student teams really do all the work. I just ask them questions about what they are up to and answer their occasional questions. Connecting REAP with uxWaterloo was a happy opportunity that just seemed inevitable.

A newer initiative is Fluxible, a design event that Bob Barlow-Busch and I are planning for September 2012. We’ve got some interesting speakers and great venues lined up, and we hope to announce more news soon.

Finally, I’ve been busy since January teaching an undergraduate course in presentation design at the University of Waterloo. It’s a joint offering under both Digital Arts Communication and Speech Communication, and the course is another rewarding experience for me. We’re nearing the end of the term, and I’m looking forward to the Ignite-style presentations that my students will be delivering in class. Maybe one of them will apply to Ignite Waterloo and deliver a presentation there.

Sometime way back in January I also managed to make it out to DemoCampGuelph and StartupCampWaterloo, both of which are always enlightening and entertaining.

As I said, I’ve been busy!

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Serious play at Felt lab with uxWaterloo

A group of people looking at a screen at a uxWaterloo event at Felt Lab

We had a great uxWaterloo event at Felt lab yesterday, and Paul Goodwin and his student team from REAP were wonderful hosts. There were plenty of interactive display toys to play with, and lots of opportunity for “thinkering” with like-minded people who attended.

Darin White has a nice summary in the form of a photo essay over at his always interesting makebright place. We’ll have more at uxWaterloo soon, too.

Thanks to everyone for coming out and making the event a success.

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The prototype is done, let’s ramp up!

I wrote a little while back about the Research Entrepreneurship Accelerator Project at the University of Waterloo. The program got up and running for this past winter’s academic term, and saw a team of six students working on a prototype of an online marketplace in which artists and other content creators provide creative services for owners of Christie Digital MicroTiles. I was lucky to be able to work with the student team, as well as with the extended REAP leadership team.

Last Wednesday was the end-of-term presentation for the inaugural student REAP team, and I was happy to be able to see them present the results of their project to representatives for Christie. While I had seen the team’s work at various points during the project, the students still managed to surprise me. Their presentation was in the form of a play in which the team acted out the the scenarios that they had created in support of their design work. This was delightfully unexpected, but perhaps shouldn’t have been given that REAP is an initiative of the Arts faculty that happens to build cross-disciplinary teams.

Fittingly, the first REAP term was something of a prototype itself, and the lessons learned by everyone involved are already being applied as preparations move forward for the spring REAP term that starts in May. There are multiple projects lined up this time, with some interesting ideas to explore. The recruiting process is in its final stages — last night I had a chance to meet the student candidates for the next REAP teams —and I’m looking forward to supporting the new teams on their projects over the coming months.