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Finishing the last assignment for this class allowed me to reflect on my growth this semester.  Doing my ransom note made me realize how I have expanded my mind creatively in the last few months, by being challenged to make the craziest ideas. I believe having to think outside of my comfort zone has given me a better understanding of what being creative truly means. After this class, I know what goes into coming up with an idea and the steps involved in getting there.

The ransom note was one of my favorite projects. This was the perfect time to do this project I feel, because of the buildup of learning about all the factors that go into design. I saw how far the mind can go and how different everyone’s was, this took a level of brainstorming to come up with the idea. When I was coming up with mine I, of course, had a few bad ideas and was missing the mark in my opinion. But, when I came up with the idea that I ended up using, I knew it was what I wanted to do, I was pleased with how it turned out.

Overall this class has given me so much knowledge that I will be applying to my future classes and career. Learning about the steps of the design thinking process taught me what is truly put into creating something.  Knowing all these stages gives me the ability to make my creations better by using the tools I have been taught in class. Being pushed out of my comfort zone in class has shown me what makes you a better creator, and I am happy I have had this practice in my first semester in college, so I got to learn this lesson early on. I have always wanted a career that I loved and wanted to work harder in because it interests me, after taking this class and knowing what my future can look like, I have more motivation to keep working hard to reach my goals.

Storyboards are a display of pictures that can tell a story in a creative way. The purpose is to give an understanding of what the storyteller is trying to say. They are supposed to be simple to follow, and understand what is going on, because if it becomes unclear what story that the photos are telling, it can cause confusion for the viewers, which is not ideal.

The idea of storyboards has progressed into different uses, it is used in many advertisement avenues and in business presentations to represent the idea in a way that becomes clear through pictures. This tool can provide the viewer with a better idea of the concept of a design, this is useful when app making or many things involving software. The UXstoryboard stated “The UX storyboard can help visually predict and explore the user experience with a product. It visualizes how people would interact with a service or app. A UX storyboard can also help understand users current motivations and experiences connected to a certain problem.” This relates back to our design thinking process, where we use the tools we have learned about this semester, these are applied to storyboards in the real world. They express the emotion and create an understanding of whatever the purpose of it is. A storyboard can have many purposes that’s what makes it so useful in design, pre-visualizing a motion picture, animation, motion graphic or interactive media sequence. Ad agencies typically will hire storyboard artists, this is because they want a professional in charge of conveying the advertisement idea in a way that is creative. When people are presenting ideas even in a business setting, will use this tool because it allows them to show their ideas again in a creative way, these are typically also advanced to being called presentation boards, but come from the storyboards.

Storyboards are to think outside the box, to allow the audience to fully understand the concept with illustration’s or pictures is the goal. It can be the simplest thing like drawings on post-it notes, or it could be so complex to being put on slides and making a huge thing out of what started as nothing. Inspiration could be from anything as Ivan Brunetti said when he stated “I like to encourage students to explore their own past and explore the things that shape them and then I think from there you can use that kind of as raw material for whatever you want to explore.” Storyboards like most things in design have to come from a creative place that we tend to seek for, ideas come from all different things and that’s why this tool is used in ideation so often. Ideation involves with seeing a product of something, capturing more ideas and feedback. Storyboards are a way in the design word to show a sequence of illustration’s or drawings to get the viewer to see a certain concept. I have seen from my personal practice with this, how important it is to make the sequences in a way that anyone can understand by just looking at it quickly. It should not take long to understand the idea. Overall storyboards are useful for many different purposes, and that’s what makes them so popular and used throughout the design world.

The last stage in our design thinking process is to test; this requires all of the previous modes we’ve learned about so that they can be involved, to get the most out of the process. We’re testing the prototype we’ve made from the previous step, so that we can have people use it for observation, to build on the prototype, making it as strong as possible.

The purpose of testing is for instances when the user runs into a problem, the designers can go back and find a different way to solve the same issue. Problems come up that the people working on the project never noticed, and designers learn from the mistakes and can fix them while reflecting for the future. It should be clear after testing what needs to be refined, to make the product as strong and easy for the user as possible. Rikke Dam and Tao Siang spoke in the Interaction Design Foundation stating: “Therefore, you must see feedback wherever possible, conduct tests using real people, and analyze the results to determine what is working well and what is causing problems.” The goal is to create something that is relevant to the target group and brings a great user experience. To be able to reach these goals, it’s necessary to receive negative feedback. With discussion, the issues with the product will come through and it will be obvious as to what needs to be changed. The only way to create something original and different is for the designers to make mistakes, and change aspects that make it something unexpected.

Conducting a user test is key because it makes it clear how the product works with a real person, somebody who has not been exposed to it before this process. When the designer creates something, they’re the primary expert of the uses and functions; this makes them blind to aspects that don’t work. Testing allows the designers to observe the user face with the product, so, when it’s over they could go back and pick out the parts that need to be redefined. Rikke Dam and Tao Siang again, spoke in the Interaction Design Foundation stating: “When conducting a user test on your prototype, it is ideal to utilize a natural setting (i.e., the normal environment in which your users would use the prototype). If testing in a natural setting proves difficult, try to get users to perform a task, or play a role, when testing the prototype.” The user needs to use the product in the most accurate way to give a real test of what the problems are, it’s all about learning from the previous mistakes.

Testing being the last stage of the design thinking process, designers have to go into this with an open mind because even with all the time and effort put into it, there are going to be things that require change to give the users a simpler experience. Providing this mode gives the process that insight to the details that need to be changed, without this the product could miss the mark, so that’s why this step is truly essential to design.

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The stage of prototyping is to create ideas receiving quick feedback, without needing to be perfect. Rapid productions of ideas to get a better understanding of the end goal, after hearing the opinions of those around us we can get a better concept on what exactly is desired. There should be aspects that are being improved because then that means the end product will be the best it could be.

            The stage of prototyping is to bring insight to the problems of the product so, failing can be done quickly to lead to the best solutions. Users often in this phase uncover the parts of the product that need to be fixed because it doesn’t work. Tim Brown spoke to The Interaction Design stating about prototyping “They slow us down to speed us up. By taking the time to prototype our ideas, we avoid costly mistakes such as becoming too complex too early and sticking with a weak idea for too long.” Time is important especially in prototyping because if too much time is spent on a weak idea, an attachment can occur making it difficult to judge and critique products. So, creating fast prototypes and getting feedback as soon as possible allows for time to not be wasted avoiding the process being dragged out. Instead, the bad ideas can be thrown out and the good ones can be examined deeper to imagine and produce a greater product as the result.

            When producing something it needs to make sense without frustrating the user, they need to be able to understand how to use what is in front of them quickly. If not, they’ll become confused or unsatisfied leading to the idea missing the mark. If the public can’t use and understand it then it’ll never become successful. The user face is what is important to practice with the prototype to see what works and what to reject. This gives a better understanding of where to go from there. Without prototyping, people tend to work on something, put everything into it, and miss the mark completely. This is all because while they were going through the process of creating, they didn’t stop to use the tool of prototyping to receive feedback that would impact the way they went about the project. The Ideation Design presented a saying at IDEO which states “If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a prototype is worth a thousand meetings.” Hearing other’s voices and critiques is necessary to bounce around figuring out what is mutually liked and functions well, then what needs to be changed and turned into something that can generate the product into an amazing creation.

            To explore different ideas and possibilities people need to think by doing, that’s what this step provides. Engaging with the product and picking apart every aspect is how a group can experiment with propositions. Emily Stevens from career foundry spoke about prototyping stating “Prototypes allow you to iterate, refine, rework and make improvements until you have a market-ready product.” Looking into what needs to be fixed and replaced is the way to reach the goals of a product. The best way to see if an assumption is a good idea and should be further looked at and improved is by using this stage.

            Ideation is the process to spark off ideas, it allows the mind to brainstorm at a different level. Generation without judgment, it’s about quantity over quality in this stage. It is crucial when it comes to the design process. Developing concepts that could lead to a solution is what this stage needs to solve a problem.

            People have misconceptions about creativity, assuming that they cannot come up with imaginative ideas, creativity is problem-solving. Relevance is the degree by which we solve a problem, which adults become an expert at. But novelty is the uniqueness at which a problem possesses and that’s what great designers have, something most adults struggle with because they don’t practice it. As children, we have great novelty but as we grow up, we are taught how to think in terms of relevance. So, many choose to learn how to bring the skill of novelty into their everyday lives again. People interpret creativity as a talent but in reality, it’s a skill. So, when a person or group is in the ideation stage, everyone involved has to immerse themselves into brainstorming without judging the ideas that are being produced at this time. People often have the misconception about being wrong in design, but in ideation, there are no “bad ideas” they need to be produced so whoever is working on the topic can go from there. Later on, these ideas will be looked at and a lot of them will be rejected, but this will bring a better concept on what the solution should look like. David Kelly spoke about this in his Ted talk ideas worth spreading and stated: “We see them come up with more interesting—and just more – ideas, so they can choose from better ideas. And they just make better decisions.” He spoke about how people learn to open their minds up to the stage of ideation, and how to do it properly to lead to success. Once people see that they can be creative and generate great ideas, their confidence rises to lead to better work possibly in their actual career or just in life.

            To create a good idea ideation needs to be involved, it is said that most startups fail because they don’t brainstorm correctly for the problem that needs to be solved, many ideas just miss the mark. Many times, in design people, will have to “go back to the drawing board” and that is fine, just means that great creative thought has not occurred at this point. Lorca Lokassa Sa spoke about The Zone of Infinite Possibilities stating: “During ideation you release your mind from the mentality of “finding a right solution”, get the obvious solution out of the way, and embrace the broadest possibilities available to you through this process.” What is so crucial to ideation is the concept of thinking of things beyond the usual, that’s how ideas become a reality, being something different and interesting. That’s why brainstorming is key because at first anyone is going to think simply but it’s what comes after that which is amazing. So, when people lack dedication in this stage it shows, with the idea missing the mark as the result.

            Pushing the mind to think outside the box, is what a person or group needs to produce when practicing ideation. If the ideas are not different and unique then it’s not where it should be, wild ideas should be encouraged in this stage. Brainstorming should result in uniqueness because that’s how great solutions are made. Interaction Design Foundation spoke about the ideation process stating “By being bold and curious, participants can challenge commonly held beliefs and explore possibilities past these obstacles. Team members should take each other’s ideas and build on them, find ways to link concepts, recognize patterns and flip seemly impossibly notions over to reveal new insights.” Creating a solution involves going beyond the normal, and in design people often bounce off of each other which brings different points of view, and that helps create ideas that work. Being in a group where people can think, and brainstorm together gives the mind a chance to spark up something great.

            The purpose of ideation is to steer from the quick solution because reality is if a person or group skips over this stage then there’s a good chance, they missed the mark. Which this means they’re going to have to start over and think about what they’re going to create. The Interaction Design Foundation spoke again about how important the ideation process is stating “By expanding the solution place, the design team will be able to look beyond the usual methods of solving problems in order to find better, more elegant, and satisfying solutions to problems that affect a user’s experience of a product.” People in this stage need to always keep an open mind and listen to others to result in many ideas to look at, and eventually getting down to the true solution of the problem.