Wearable payment for young women - Utilizing rapid prototyping in iterative conceptual design

摘要

This is a production-based thesis work made aside my work as a 3d-printing specialist in Microsoft Mobile`s Design Department`s 3d-lab. The topic is designing a jewelry-like payment device for young women. A production-based thesis work was made to discover the process of designing for wearable technology and the practical issues related to it. The main process-guiding assumption in this thesis is that familiar, jewelry-like form would be more acceptable for young women in context of everyday wearable device. Important goal for 3d-lab is to knit rapid prototyping as an integral part of design process, so I utilized rapid prototyping as my main methodology for studying the subject. The goals for thesis work were to learn more about wearable devices field and practical design issues relevant to it. For author the goal was to improve my skills both in iterative design concept -creation and prototyping. The goal for the concept-creation was to prototype an idea for acceptable, wearable, contactless alternative for traditional debit card in small everyday purchases, targeting to young women. The methods used in this thesis work are literature research, benchmarking, rapid prototyping, expert interview and user-centered design methods. The process consisted of background research, making re-brief, technical concept creation, making several product design ideas, testing and reviewing the ideas, selecting one design for further development and finally testing and reviewing the appearance model and interaction prototype with potential end users. The project`s end result is a design concept depicted by prototypes and pictures, and a written thesis report about the design process and philosophy behind the design work. The main focus of this written report is in product design, the minor focus areas are designing interaction and concept creation. Concentrating deeply to all product development areas was not purposeful in thesis framework, so I decided to put most effort on describing the product design development.