Spencer Chamberlin focused his thesis on this problem and after spending six weeks in India researching farmers’ needs first hand, he designed a revolutionary vehicle system.

Spencer observed how farmers spend hours each day hauling heavy loads of crops, tools, and water on underdeveloped roads. As a result he developed a self-constructed vehicle system designed to empower the farmer to move their products in a more efficient and timely manner. By doing so, the new vehicle has the ability to increase the income level of farmers above the international poverty line of $2.50 per day.

Lei Zheng used his thesis to integrate advertising with in-vehicle infotainment systems. Lei partnered his IVI system with Google. As a brand, Google is the undisputed search engine king. Using Google as a brand partner, a new system emerges – Google Drive.

He also extensively studied the human-computer interaction aspect of GPS and navigation systems to understand how people’s searching behavior greatly informed the best use of advertising. Advertising offers automakers a way to keep manufacturing costs – and final costs – for customers at a reasonable price.

]]> http://blog.ccsmfa.com/2011/12/05/empowering-rural-india-through-transportation-by-spencer-chamberlin/feed/ 0 http://blog.ccsmfa.com/2011/11/07/the-taiwanese-home-lifestyle-in-2020-by-mei-wen-sun/ http://blog.ccsmfa.com/2011/11/07/the-taiwanese-home-lifestyle-in-2020-by-mei-wen-sun/#comments Mon, 07 Nov 2011 20:48:03 +0000 dank http://blog.ccsmfa.com/?p=277 Mei-Wen Sun is originally from Taiwan, but if you ask her, she is an American. For her thesis, Mei-Wen combined her love of both cultures into the next emerging market: Smart Homes for 2020.

There are many factors Mei-Wen took into consideration when developing her initial concept, including how rapidly the Boomer generation is aging and how China will be the biggest construction market in 2018. In the Asian lifestyle, Confucianism plays an important role in life, and the home is a miniature version of society. However, the Smart Home system was originally based on a Western lifestyle. In her thesis, Mei-Wen designed a Smart Home for the Taiwanese market because there is a high level of acceptance of new technologies. By focusing first in Taiwan, the Smart Home business can expand into China second. Mei-Wen’s Smart Home combines the best of Western technology with the Eastern way of life.

Troy Baker thinks outside of the box. So far, in fact, that he’s out of this world.

Troy’s thesis stemmed from a brand extension project from the second semester studio class of the Interdisciplinary Design MFA program. For the studio class, Troy wanted to pair the outer space tourism business with the best place on Earth, Disney World. What he ended up with was the Celestial Harbor Experience.

For his thesis, Troy expanded the Celestial Harbor Experience into two parts: how to make it a permanent vacation destination and the business case for a space tourism establishment.

But how do you push the limits of a space vacation? Troy designed the station to include degrees of weightlessness, simulated gravity and a living ecosystem to make the Harbor sustainable. The Celestial Harbor Experience pushes the human exploration story into the next chapter, so we can continue to write the story of our humanity.

Hyeon Jung Shim, a recent graduate of the MFA Transportation Design program, wrote his thesis about at what’s next in vehicle segmentation. By looking at social trends, past trends, economic and political influences, Shim forecasts what the next segment will be. Also, Shim explored how the current and previous segment definitions have hybridized into new segments. Shim concluded that looking into the past is an important step for determining the future.

What if a car could grow with you? What if upgrades and maintenance could be ordered via a phone application? Nikunj Jain, a recent graduate of the MFA Transportation Design program, explored how we could make an impact in car waste by reducing the number of times we buy new cars.

Many of us remember our first car and how much we loved it. What if you could keep that car for the rest of your life? You could have a 2-seater sports car at age 16 and add a back seat and more trunk space for a family of 4 at age 35. Because we become emotionally invested in our vehicles, we should want to keep them with us as we age. Nik designed a car with a rich sensory experience because the more your vehicle can be integrated into your life, the more indispensable it becomes. Increasing the vehicle’s lifespan would greatly reduce pollution and waste during the production phase.

Pune is home to companies such as General Motors, Volkswagen, Skoda, Mahindra and Mahindra, Tata Motors, Mercedes Benz, Fiat and Force Motors. Several colleges of art and design are located in Pune, India, including the new automotive design program at DYP-DC.

“I was always interested in design but didn’t know how to get into it. I went to a small high school in Ohio and didn’t know being a designer was a career option. I found the MFA Design program when I was looking for a way to get into design-thinking. I knew the program was what I needed to advance my creativity. The deal was sealed when I read about the partnership with University of Michigan Stephen M. Ross School of Business.

My undergraduate degree is in visual journalism from Kent State University. I studied a bit of writing, editing, photography, design and info-graphics. After college, I took an internship at the Detroit Free Press where I was hired as a full-time news designer. I designed the news and business sections, where topics ranged from the auto show to the UAW strike and to the Kwame Kilpatrick mayoral scandal. Over the summer, I interned with the marketing team at Dodge, part of Chrysler, LLC.

Currently I’m working on my thesis: reducing childhood obesity by targeting snack time in elementary schools. The image below represents my extensive research phase, done in the fall 2010 semester.

After graduation, I plan to pursue a career in service design with an emphasis in design research.”

The Design Graduate Studio’s objective was to design a new museum experience. We came up with the idea of making an itinerant museum, made out of tensile fabrics with a lightweight and modular metal structure that would allow it to be as portable and as customizable as possible. It would travel from city to city showing the history of both local and global urban art, making the visit unique every time. Once inside, the visitor would have an audio visual experience like no other. HD projectors filling the ceilings and walls with images using 3-D mapping technology, make the visitor feel as if they’re on the inside of an art piece. The main concept is to make art more accessible and attractive to the general public. The project was developed by Justin Famularo, Rick Chen and I on our first MFA semester at CCS.

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El objetivo del primer estudio de la Maestría en Diseño fue diseñar una nueva experiencia en museos. Nuestra idea principal fue diseñar un museo itinerante, que al estar hecho de telas tensionadas que cubren una estructura metálica liviana y modular, le permiten ser sumamente portátil. El museo se transportaría de ciudad a ciudad mostrando la historia del Arte Urbano local y global, haciendo de cada visita una experiencia única. Una vez dentro de la estructura el visitante se introduce en una experiencia audio visual única donde las paredes y techos se llenan de proyecciones en alta resolución dando la sensación de estar dentro de una obra de arte. El concepto principal es hacer más accesible y atractiva la contemplación del arte para el público en general. El projecto fue desarrollado por Justin Famularo, Rick Chen y yo en nuestro primer semestre de la Maestría en CCS.

“This year I took a trip to the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. It was a head mash of franticly meeting people and trying to get up close to the hot new devices. A cabbie told me that this year had a better turn out compared to last, but I couldn’t really tell; both years seemed to have been equally crowded. To be honest, there weren’t a lot of eye popping technical advances, but instead many tablet derivatives. This year was all about “iPad like” devices. There were touch screens everywhere you looked.

Brook is an entrepreneurial designer with nine years of experience specializing in the transport and product industries. He has worked on a freelance basis for companies like: Decathlon, Puma, VW, Toshiba, Nike, Microsoft, Hewlett Packard, Motorola, BMW, Panasonic, Marvel Comics, Frog Design, Phat Farm, Victorianox/Swiss Army, Astro Studios, Fila SpA, Adidas AG, Mattel/ Hot Wheels, Vision Streetware, Disney, and those are just the ones he can remember.