Concept development

In DMD 100, students are guided through the entire production of design projects through a careful orchestration of design thinking exercises and a set of rules or criteria that bounded the scope. The rules set in place made it so that the student could concentrate on the content of the project, rather than finding an appropriate scale and bounds for the project. In a capstone project, students are responsible for managing the design methods used in the project as well as the content and results of the project.

Developing a good design project concept

Required features of a good capstone project concept:

  1. Matches your interests
  2. Well scoped
  3. Strategically aligned
  4. Understandable by others

Features of impactful and relevant project concepts (Has one or more of the following)

  1. Identifies or solves problems for people, organizations, and businesses
  2. Invention and/or unexpected combinations to produce novelty
  3. Links to relevant cultural, historical, social contexts
  4. Explores moral and ethical issues or quandaries
  5. Aesthetic and theoretical explorations

Matching interests

What are you most interested in making? Are you a game designer or 3D animator? Do you want to make illustrations or pre-viz concept art for animated films? Or are you interested in UX design and research? The DMD Program's capstone course is the place where you can put everything you have into one project that can ideally be used for your portfolio. You will be working on this one project the entire semester, and so it is vitally important that you care about the project that you are making.

Scoping your project

You should scope your project based on what you can do, or if you are a fast learner, how quickly you can up-skill to meet the needs of your project's production. Some students come into capstone with advanced art and design skills, subject matter knowledge, and even some real-world experience. Others students come into the capstone course with far fewer refined skills and understanding. It's important that the capstone project matches existing skills and abilities, or requires only a bit more development than what you currently have. Overestimating your own skills or assuming you can master the requisite competencies and capabilities in time for production may result in bad outcomes.

Another scope consideration for project scope is the amount of production you can realistically accomplish. It's better to have a smaller, more well developed and communicated project than a large, multi-faceted project that will be overwhelming, poorly developed, not well documented, and perhaps impossible to accomplish in the time you will have. If your project is engaging with important critical or social issues, keep in mind that your project likely won't save the world, so try to have a realistic goal about what the impact will be.

Align your project strategically

The capstone will be a lot of work, and so undoubtedly, it should have as much positive impact as possible. It makes sense for many students to align their project outcomes with a future job role they are applying for. Other students may want to push themselves creatively as far as possible, and are looking for the best way to showcase their storytelling and visual communication skills. For others, this could be a good time to finally apply their skills they have been mastering in a particular software or technique. Finally, some students want to apply their skills in having a real-world impact of some kind, whether it's raising awareness of a cause or addressing an important need.

There are three main strategic questions you should be able to answer:

  1. Does this project align with what you want to make?
  2. Does this project communicate the capabilities and competencies I want to show?
  3. Does this project have the impact I want it to have?

Be accurate and clear

Is the project understandable by others? Articulating what you want to do clearly and completely can take some practice. Try to avoid hyperbole, generalist language, stereotypes and clichés, and vague explanations. For example, are you developing "an app" or simply proposing app wire frames of a fictional app for a UX case study? Are you developing a comic book, or a digital comic that never goes to print? A good way to test the clarity of your concept is to ask others to ask you what it's about. If you struggle to explain the concept or others struggle to understand your explanation, it's possible that you need to revise how you are talking about it, or the concept itself requires some refining.

Incorporating themes and issues in your project (optional)

A theme is a core idea (or set of ideas) that signify basic values, motivations and practices inherent in a project. A project lacking strong theme development tends to be shallow and without regard for cultural and community contexts, which will become apparent during discussion and critique. There are two typical approaches to identifying project themes. The directed concept approach refers to when themes are established and defined at the beginning stages of project development, and the emerging concept approach is were the themes are allowed to emerge and evolve during the production of a project.

Typically, an artist producing a project that focuses on storytelling of critical issues relies on their everyday observations, life experiences, and important moments to spark their ideas. It is helpful to carry a small notebook or store a running list of ideas on a mobile device. Ideas can leave your mind as quickly as they come, so it's important to develop a habit of recording your ideas no matter how small. Themes that the artist/design have direct interaction with are those they have most agency to make work about, and are more likely to result in more authentic and honest stories.

Situating (Directed approach):

  • "Top-down" approach
  • Process of deduction
  • Theory » Hypothesis » Observation » Confirmation

Concepts are directed through a mapping process either before or in the beginning stages of a project. An interpretation of outcomes of an inquiry will depend in part on the frame of reference of existing knowledge. What is known helps identify what is not. Situating is a method that opens up lines of inquiry commonly used to review literature and information sources in the public domain. Situating is a curatorial process for looking at existing things in new ways.

Revealing (Emerging approach):

  • "Bottom-up" approach
  • Process of induction
  • Observations » Pattern » Hypothesis » Theory

Themes emerge over the course of the project through an ongoing discovery process. A core purpose of inquiry is to discover new knowledge or the possibility of thinking about things in new, innovative ways. To reveal something relies on others experiencing a change of awareness or understanding. Revealing, therefore is not only a method of discovery, but requires multiple ways of communicating to target groups and others. Depending on your interests, you don't always have to develop the core theme or issue. Getting inspiration from design competitions and festivals is a good practice if you are unsure of where to begin:

UX, product, service and social design:

Graphic design, packaging, product design:

Game design:

Animation

New Media Art

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