Homelessness is a major issue in the world. We decided we wanted to think outside the box on how to tackle the issue. One of the main areas of concern that we tried to tackle is apathy towards homeless people. Most people don’t know why people end up homeless. We wanted to create an art block in Hayes Valley to educate people on the homeless issue.
Video to Urban Intervention: Hayes ValleyPersonas: Daniel Lau
Persona
Scenario
Chloe Kim is a data scientist for Stitch Fix. She lives in Hayes Valley because she feels most at home in that neighborhood. She is an avid foodie, typically spending most of her expendable income on good food with friends. Sometimes she works really late at Stitch Fix and is starving by the time she gets home. Instead of cooking something, she heads over to a local fast casual restaurant, Souvla. She doesn’t need a car because it’s walking distance from her apartment. Her typical order is the chicken salad to go. The warm rotisserie chicken pairs wonderfully with the briny feta cheese and crisp lettuce. She devours it when she gets home.
Storyboard
RESOURCES
Storyboard Creator | Comic Strip Maker | Online Storyboarding Prototypes
https://www.storyboardthat.com/storyboard-creator
Narratives: Daniel Lau
Thanksgiving is such a joyous time of year. There’s a lot to be thankful for. I’m grateful for a wonderful relationship, good health, friends, family, employment, and a great cohort to do my Masters degree with. Every year, I celebrate in at least one Friendsgiving, which is basically a second Thanksgiving but mostly with friends instead of family. This year, I was in charge of the main dish but with one caveat. I had one friend who was strictly vegetarian and another, vegan.
First of all, I’m not a big fan of Thanksgiving foods. Turkey is dry. Mashed potatoes and gravy are only good with butter in them. Overall, the food is bland. Was I going to subject myself to creating tofurky for the sake of this holiday? I wrote a poem about this dilemma and what became of it. Please enjoy.
In today’s day and age,
People live far from their families,
When Thanksgiving comes around,
Some don’t make it home, tragically.
Friendsgiving is a pseudo-holiday,
That brings together friends,
They celebrate holiday cheer,
They consider it a godsend.
This year I was asked to cook the main meal,
Two vegetarian friends made me consider something meat-free,
What could I possible cook that’s festive and veggie,
Is taste taken into account when considering tofurky?
So I sat and I thought aimlessly,
Could I roast vegetables or throw something in a Crockp – Oh!
My mind was filled with a delicious, but non=traditional idea,
Would my friends mind if I made the humble taco?
So I ran to Safeway and gathered ingredients,
I bought onions and tortillas and potatoes galore,
The purpose of Friendsgiving isn’t about turkey,
It’s about celebrating friendship and holidays and good tidings and more.
Exercise 2.3.2 Geographies Part 2: Daniel Lau
Reflection
This experience was really fun for me. I’ve worked at my company for over 2 years and I’ve already begun to ignore big portions of my commute and my surroundings. When I went into drawing my psychogeographic map, my attention to detail was heightened. I noticed buildings and bridges I had never given a second thought to. There was fascinating architecture all around me. New buildings with circular shapes, similar to the new Apple campus, were being built near my office that I had never noticed before. I was taken on an adventurous journey because these paths were not ones I would normally take.
Exercise 2.2 Architectures: Daniel Lau
My movement within my place of work
Right outside my office building
My commute from the Caltrain station to my office
Project 2: Daniel Lau
Intuitive Campus
Intuitive is a medical device company that creates surgical robots and robotic diagnostic tools. The company has around five thousand employees, two thousand of which work in Sunnyvale, CA. Since so many people work in Sunnyvale, the campus has sprawled out across Kifer Road. All employees are spread out across 8 buildings, with more buildings and parking lots currently being built. The campus spans 1.2 miles from end to end and this image helps in illustrating that.
MAIN HEADQUARTERS
As noted earlier, Intuitive has 5,000 full time employees worldwide. Main hiring flows through the headquarters. Important C-level employees, Finance, and HR reside in this building. They are a major force in creating employment opportunities in this region.
CONGESTION
The speed limit at Intuitive’s parking lots are 15MPH. This roundabout that shows which way is the correct orientation of it has always confounded drivers at the company. Although the speed limit is 15MPH, people drive even slower at this roundabout as it is also an intersection where people walk between buildings. Congestion is a force within this lot.
PARKING
The amount of parking spaces almost mimic the amount of land Intuitive owns. For now, all parking is flat on one level. This has caused parking shortages at several buildings. Intuitive is currently building a new parking structure to accomodate additional buildings and employees.
OUTDOOR PATIO
This space is utilized for outdoor seating. It’s also an area where seems to busiest during lunch hours. This illustrates the human habitation force as only employees utilize it during certain hours of the day. These areas are also decorated with manicured trees, bushes, and grass. It is a force that makes people appreciate the “outdoors” while working in grey concrete buildings.
Forces
Click maps for enlarged & detailed view.
Force: Employment Space
These eight buildings represent the Sunnyvale campus of Intuitive. Since we are a medical device company, research and development requires a large workforce. Intuitive employs over 5,000 people and a bulk of the workforce works in Sunnyvale. Each building houses a workforce with diverse sections of the company including engineering, manufacturing, shipping, information technology, finance, accounting, human resources, etc.
Force: Manicured Space
The area is filled with manicured bushes, trees, and grass. It takes up some space, but creates some natural beauty in an area filled with concrete. Trees provide cover for some cars in the parking lot, which is especially nice for hot summer days. The spots closer to these trees are normally the most coveted spots in the parking lot due to this fact. Intuitive has a company park where events are held. This is the largest density of trees in the area.
Force: Human Habitation (Recreation)
Any opportunity for employees to be outside is a good thing. In this four building layout in the middle of the map, there are two main areas where people can eat outdoors. Patio seats, picnic tables, and grassy areas allow employees to eat outdoors. During lunch, these areas are incredibly busy and utilized in a meaningful way. You can sometimes hear people talk about work as the outdoors gives people a different context. At Intuitive’s park, a baseball field, running trails, and event space are utilized for special company events and engagements. Note: only a few buildings have outdoor habitation space for eating outdoors.
Force: Congestion
Most of the land use in this area is utilized on buildings and parking. Congestion becomes an issue as people start trickling into work. There are several roundabouts in the campus that cause cars to drive more carefully. The speed limit is 15mph in the parking lot. Cars drive in single file and the central area with the roundabouts cause the most amount of morning parking lot congestion.
Force: Parking
Parking is a complex force in this company. The amount of employees that commute to Sunnyvale outnumber the number of parking spots. Since the parking spots are on a single layer and there is only a limited amount of land, this parking lot fills up quickly. Recently, there has been valet parking added to employee benefits in order to alleviate the parking congestion. It’s also forced a few employees to find other ways to commute to work, such as public transit and ride sharing. There’s also parking for electric vehicles that is highly sought after. As more of the workforce is environmentally conscious, the purchase of plug-in electric vehicles has increased. The parking near the plug-in stations has gotten increasingly congested.
All Forces
Layering the maps show the campus and all of the forces that hold this campus together. Forces work in harmony to create a campus with a large footprint. Intuitive’s campus easily spans over a mile from end to end. It’s diverse workforce commutes from all across the Bay Area.
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Informations, Part 2: Daniel Lau
I found this fascinating Soviet-era map of San Francisco online (Larger Version Here). The incredible detail the Soviets included in this map is astounding. They also used design principles to create well designed maps of the region. These maps were likely intended for a Communist takeover as the Soviets believed communism would win out over democracy (Robertson 2017).
Layering
Layering is utilized on this map to show landmarks such as secret military buildings, ports, parks, and neighborhoods. The map is detailed enough to even see underwater currents and elevation differences in the terrain. The Soviets included a lot of information on this two-dimensional map by adding icons and certain line patterns.
Consistency
The Soviets utilized consistency for this detailed map. There’s an aesthetic consistency in this map. It helps the user easily find things like military bases and major roadways. There’s also a functional consistency with way the Soviets used icons, landmarks, identifiers, and numbers. Users were probably well versed in reading this map.
Color
This map takes advantage of a lot of color. You could see that the Soviets had ideas of what they wanted to use the land for as well. The orange blocks were used to indicate neighborhoods. Blue was used to indicate the ocean and green was used for undeveloped wild terrain.
Resources:
Robertson, M. (2017, November 27). These ‘chilling’ Soviet maps of San Francisco, Bay Area likely intended for the Communist takeover. Retrieved from https://www.sfchronicle.com/living/article/russia-soviet-ussr-maps-communism-sf-bay-area-12384563.php
The Russians Are(n’t) Coming to С-Ф. (2012, October 27). Retrieved from https://burritojustice.com/2012/06/27/the-russians-arent-coming-to-с-ф/
Graphics: Daniel Lau
See the progression here: Daniel_Omar_Graham.jpg
Collaboration by: Daniel Lau, Omar Filippelli, Graham Bachelder (Team 5)
Team 6 Principle #6: Hierarchy
Hierarchy is a principle that organizes complex relationships into simple and visual structures. When information is grouped together and related, several ways to visualize these relationships is through tree, nest, and stair structures. This allows the user to understand the structure of a system by seeing the relationship between the parent element and children elements. Tree structures represent high-level views of relationships. Nest structures show information grouped by function and hierarchy. Stair structures reveal hierarchies in systems that are growing and unpredictable (Lidwell, Holden, & Butler, n.d., p. 122).
Example 1: Tree, Nest, and Stair Structures
The Universal Principles of Design illustrates the 3 structures of hierarchy. Source: Universal Principles of Design by William Lidwell, Kritina Holden, and Jill Butler
Example 2: Mac OS Nested File Structure
Mac OSX does nested file a different way. You can see the hierarchy between parent and child in a horizontal fashion. Source: Mac OS
Example 3: Hand drawn hierarchy
I drew another representation of how I organized different files for Project 1. I had little blurbs written as documents and I put them in a folder with the images I wanted to attach.
Resources:
Lidwell, W., Holden, K., & Butler, J. (n.d.). Universal Principles of Design. Rockport.
Team 6 Principle #5: Gutenberg Diagram
The Gutenberg Diagram is a principle that describes the Western reading orientation of homogenous and evenly distributed content. Content is separated into 4 different quadrants: primary optical area (top left), terminal area (bottom right), strong fallow area (top right), and weak fallow area (bottom left). The reading gravity begins at the top left and gravitates towards the bottom right (Lidwell, Holden, & Butler, n.d., p. 118). Research by Pernice (2017) shows that Western readers still read this way, even on mobile devices. Using eye tracking software, Pernice found that the pattern is shaped like an “F.”
Example 1: Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal divides it’s content by sections. The sections allow for reading in from left to right, top to bottom. Source: Wall Street Journal
Example 2: Eye Tracking Heatmap
Pernice (2017) found that users read websites in an F-shaped pattern using eye tracking software. Source: F-Shaped Pattern Reading Web Content
Example 3: Textbook
This is a real world example of Gutenberg Diagram in a textbook given to us for our MHCID program at UC Irvine. Source: Contextual Design by Karen Holtzblatt and Hugh Beyer
Resources:
Lidwell, W., Holden, K., & Butler, J. (n.d.). Universal Principles of Design. Rockport.
Pernice, K. (2017, November 12). F-Shaped Pattern of Reading on the Web: Misunderstood, But Still Relevant (Even on Mobile). Retrieved from https://www.nngroup.com/articles/f-shaped-pattern-reading-web-content/
Objects, Part 2: Daniel Lau
This is my favorite chair even though I don’t get to sit in it often. This is the office chair that I have in my apartment and it’s been with me for years. The mesh allows great airflow and the backrest hits my lower back just right, providing great support for long hours of sitting. Although it’s not the infamous Herman Miller Aeron chair, this chair mimics Aeron’s ergonomics and came at only a fraction of the price. I can make several adjustments including the height, tilt angle, and arm height, which means I can make the chair as comfortable to my body as possible.
Everyday for work, I hop onto a Caltrain and plop myself into one of these seats. This chair, despite it’s look, is the least comfortable chair I sit on everyday. The seat has very little padding, doesn’t adjust, and there’s very little leg room. I sit in this seat for nearly 2 hours every work day and it’s the most unpleasant sitting I do all week. I’m sure these seats are mass produced and try to help you to sit upright. However, getting comfortable in this seat is an impossible task.
We were given these work chairs in our office. Although it has meshing on the back, I’ve found that this chair is not as enjoyable to sit in compared to my apartment’s office chair. The cushion stores up heat and becomes uncomfortable to sit in after a while. As my company grows, cubicle space seems to be getting smaller. This chair, which twists 360 degrees, allows for easily getting in and out of my cubicle.
These are my Toyota Corolla’s seats. They are rather comfortable because of how they mold to my body. The seat’s edges act like a brace for sharp turns and also lock me in place pretty well. I can adjust the back’s pitch, how close or far I’m from my steering wheel, and how high my headrest is. This allows me to create an optimal seating arrangement for driving.
Objects, Part 1: Daniel Lau
An object I love is my Bowers & Wilkins PX Wireless Noise Cancelling Headphones. This love is due to the pure exhilaration and joy I get from listening to music with these headphones. The sound is incredibly crisp and well rounded, creating an immersive experience similar to a concert venue. My absolute favorite feature of these headphones are the ear pads.
Affordances for these headphones are subtle, to the point where signifiers would be helpful. The ear pads cup my ears perfectly, creating a comfortable gap between my ears and the headphone’s drivers. The drivers are angled so that they create a 3d sound effect within the ear pads. Another benefit from these drivers are that if you put these headphones on the wrong ears, the angled drivers dig into your ears. This physical constraint helps you put the headphones on correctly.
On the right ear pad, the controls are located on the back of the headphones. Volume up, pause, and volume down are grouped together and have unique ridges to differentiate from one another. The physical mapping allows me to control the headphones without having to take them off. The only confusion caused by the physical mapping is that there are hidden controls based on how many times you hit pause consecutively (double click is skip forward and triple click is to go backwards).
An object I hate and loathe is the Spigen® Car Mount Holder. At first, it seemed like an incredibly simple solution to attach my phone to my dashboard. After attaching the enclosed metal plate to my phone, the car mount magnetically attaches to the phone. Based on the way the car mount is designed, the affordance shows that it fits through the grates of your air conditioning vents.
The problem with this car mount holder is that as smart phones have grown larger, the more difficult it is to see where the car mount attaches to the metal plate. The phone becomes a barrier (physical constraint) to actually attach to the car mount holder.
The one thing I hated most about this car mount holder is also the breakdowns to this product. As I said before, smart phones keep getting larger and heavier. The prongs that I believed were a great affordance actually broke down from the weight of the phone. The prongs would no longer grip onto my air conditioning vent and broke shortly after a week of use. It was definitely the biggest waste of money in recent memory.
Histories: Daniel Lau
The Joule Immersion Circulator, by ChefSteps. This gadget inspired me because it is beautifully designed, conveniently sized, yet difficult to connect via WiFi. An immersion circulator is a tool that makes precise, temperature-controlled water baths to cook vacuum sealed food. The benefit of this style of cooking is that you never end up overcooking foods, such as steaks and roasts, because the temperature is consistently kept at a maximum temperature. The Joule does this task with relative ease as it’s controlled by a mobile application to set temperatures and timers.
One of the reasons I purchased the Joule was to cook at friend’s houses due to it’s portability (standing at 11 inches tall and weighing roughly 1.25 pounds). The issue I have with the Joule is that it first requires a WiFi connection to work. Since I originally connected my Joule to my home’s WiFi network, it has trouble connecting anywhere else. Since there’s no physical interface on the Joule to reset a WiFi connection, I’m helplessly unplugging the device, replugging it back in, and hitting the physical button on top in the hopes that my phone will recognize the device. This process usually takes 10-20 minutes to figure out, whereas it connects instantly at home. As much as I love using this tool, I’ve recently grown to despise the connection process. I admire the beautiful aesthetic of the device, but would love a physical button with appropriate signifiers and/or feedback to expedite the connection process.