Mapping and Scoping Techniques for identifying Design Opportunities

External Presentations on: 

 

Samiksha Gajbhiye

5th Semester, Industrial Design

Mapping and Scoping techniques for identifying 

Design opportunities

Faculty- Kuntal De

National Institute of Design, Andhra Pradesh

Opportunity mapping is an analytical tool that deepens our understanding of 'opportunity' dynamics within regions.

Understanding systems help up know the different variables involved and also the high and low concentrations of them. In a system, these difference in concentration can lead to 'Opportunity'. A system has elements in it which are interdependent and perform specific function or purpose which gives them an identity. There are various parameters or/and constrains, eg. culture, weather, technology, environment ( these can be the indicators of opportunity) etc. By understanding them we can identify the gaps, highs and lows of the system and also the problems.

    The variation in concentration leads to the opportunity for different products or services. 

Words help us understand the system( the data) in a linear manner. But the complex system is coherently organised and has elements connected in many directions. Using just words we can't always understand the behavior of the system by just knowing the elements because the system is more than the sum of its part.

Information can be more dimensional. That's when mapping(visualization) comes into picture. It gives an airplane view so that we can survey the data quickly, and be able to have particularly salient elements(high and lows) pop out. We can later go down and view details if we need.

 

So going forward with the course,

OBJECTIVE

• Map all the conflict points in the house and their frequency and time of occurrence.

   Before starting the mapping, I drew the rough sketches of the house and area of interest. 

I made a list of parameters:

1. Frequency

2.Time

3.Family members involved

    While doing so I got really confused as to how to show the them all in just a single map. What can be done to make it less confusing and more informative? 

rough work before beginning the assignment

I started with a 2-D representation of the house and marked the points/areas of interest.

Was I successful in showing the information?

No.

There are many problems with this map representation,

When looked at map the information should catch the eye, unnecessary detailing should be avoided. 

It did show the areas but they didn't give any information about the time of occurrence.

The second attempt, this time I used axonometric view to give little context.

Axonometric vs Isometric

Axonometric is a type of orthographic projection in which the object is rotated around one or more axes to reveal more sides.

Isometric is one type of axonometric projection where the axes have a common angle of 120 degrees between them.

In this the information representation is a little better than previous one.

Yet again I failed to represent the time of occurrence.

After this assignment I was left with few questions..

Is it possible to make the map self-explanatory?

How to represent more than 2 parameters?

11 AUGUST 2020

OBJECTIVE

• Mapping a resource being used over a course of year.
• Observing the frequency changes in different times of the year.
• Is there any correlation between different variables?

2D Representation

Using a single color I began the assignment, in this below representation I showed frequency of  human resource used. 

Next, different colors are used to show different time of the year. But what about the frequency?

I reduced the time period from a year to a day and used different colors to show night and day and different color intensities to show different frequencies.

After doing so I had a question,

What about the overlapping? 

Aren't there times when the human resource and places used common to both of them ?

How can I show that?

So, for the next one I used different color to show the overlapping, in the below map, the greys show the overlapping.

Aren't there any better ways to show the above the representation?

Till now I concentrated to show the different parameters and variables in a single map. 

LAYERING

I made two different maps and overlapped them, this helped me see the different times separately and together. 

Below map shows Human resource frequency in winter season.

Below map shows Human resource frequency in summer season.

Below map shows Human resource frequency in summer and winter.

12 AUGUST 2020

Three blind men come across an elephant, an animal none of them had ever encountered before.They each touch different parts of the animal, and describe it based on their limited experience. All have valid subjective information, but without hearing what the other two men know, they have incomplete view. 

I can sit all day and think about all the conflicts and areas involved and still I won't be able to cover everything. Reason being there are many things I don't know. Seeing just from my perspective is like have a piece of puzzle but when seen from different perspectives we can look at the whole picture.(This can better enable us to find the root cause and help us discover a solution that takes the needs and feelings of everyone involved in consideration).

I had a conversation with my family members to know about what problems they face in the house and to get their views on the map,

Sister's view,

   "With the start of the online classes I spend most of my time in living room attending the school's and tuition's online classes. There is a lot disturbance, papa wants to watch TV after coming back from the office. Many a times during class Kiwi(our dog), comes for petting. I use the tea table for keeping my laptop. I like eating in the living room as it has more open space. If I want to work in the bedroom where there is no disturbance I have to turn on the lights even in the daylight.  "

 Aai's view,

   "Cleaning is a problem now a days. My daughters occupy different rooms and I can't clean Kiwi sleeps in the passage, brings the outside dirt in. There isn't much space in front of the washing machine, front load machine requires you bending to put in and take out clothes… On the first floor there is a lot of storage space but the top shelf I can access only by the ladder, it is difficult to do when I’m in hurry. If it rains heavily there is stagnant water in the front yard, I have to use a broom to remove that water."

 Papa's view,

   " Not able to watch the current news regularly now.... need space proper space between the tea table and the sofa. Little space in front the cupboards. Before sleeping I have to close all the doors, in rainy season 2 of the doors swell and I’m unable to close them properly. Bore-well motor doesn’t give proper feedback when its full, the water starts flowing down if its full, I have to run to switch it off.

 Kiwi's view,

     He likes sleeping at cold places, usually in cooler seasons he sleeps outside or inside, the floors are cool but in summer he prefers sleeping in the laundry room which is cold.

15 AUGUST 2020 

After the discussion the following were the major problems,

Door swellage

Mainly in the rainy season two my doors swell , we have to apply force to close it and once closed its difficult to open them.

No Proper Natural Light

The bedroom is on the west-most side of the house so there is no proper natural light coming, we have to turn on lights even in daylight.

Difficulty in accessing the storage

To access the top most shelves we need a ladder. It's quite time and energy consuming to get something out of them.

Dirt coming in the house

After bringing back Kiwi from his evening walk he brings a lot of dirt in the house, he is taken directly to the washroom for cleaning mud paw-prints can be seen in the hall and passage. 

Standing Water

If there is heavy rain there is water getting collected in the floored part of the front yard, using broom aai cleans it.

24-26 August 2020

So next what I did was to choose one problem and see if it really was a problem in different geographic locations.

Here're the links for the further study,

 

The mapping,  

 

The prezi presentation,

After this I compared and contrasted two very different geographically located areas, Florida, USA and Uttarakhand, India.

Layering of data was done  to see the overlapping.