Rugby School Thailand Design & Technology Senior School

Design Ideas & modelling

Initial concept generation (design ideas)

Initial 2D or 3D sketches, modelling using CAD, physical materials can be used to gain feedback from clients prior to investment in further development or physical prototypes. These sketches are often quite rough but they can be used to identify those ideas with potential for development.

Designing & Modelling the Coffee 'pod' machine

Market Research

You are going to start this Assessment task through researching the coffee pod machine market, just like a real designer would if they were thinking about bringing a new device to market. You will look for the aesthetic and functional qualities that you think will appeal to your young, professional target market. In preparation for the assessment day you should create a new Page on your Site, titled Coffee Pod Machine, and add your research images and anything else you feel relevant to this page. You can use this page to help you during the assessment task.

Initial concept generation (design ideas)

You will use your sketching and rendering skills to produce one 'page' / sheet of Product Design Concept Ideas (a minimum of 3). These should be presented using any of the techniques that you have learnt. You can present design ideas as 2D ideas (from more than one view), or 2 point perspective views combined with cylindrical forms if you wish. You should apply rendering and materials using Procreate. If you work quickly you can even use 3D CAD (Onshape) to help you present some of your product design idea concepts.

If you are completely stuck for ideas then design the coffee pod machine for an existing company that doesn't currently make one i.e. Design a coffee pod machine for Dyson; Design a coffee pod machine for Apple; Design a coffee pod machine for Nothing; Design a coffee pod machine for Land Rover; Design a coffee pod machine for Aston Martin; Design a coffee pod machine for Lego, Design a coffee pod machine for Alessi; etc. If you choose to do this then you will need to research Design Cues i.e. what design aesthetic do those companies always have! You can also click the button below to see lots of Coffee 'pod' Machine Consept Ideas for inspiration.

Coffee 'pod' Machine concept idea examples

Example of a 'softer' coffee machine

12 examples of more radical designed coffee machines

block modelling / non working protoype

You will use a variety of modelling materials (predominantly foam and card) to produce a non working, aesthetic block model of your chosen concept.

Corrugated cardboard example

Modelling foam, modelling board, card and plastic model examples

Block modelling

After sketch modelling, designers may progress onto block modelling as ‘proof of concept’ or to explore form or function in more detail. Blockboard, Foam board and Styrofoam are all useful materials for making quick block models. They are not functioning models. They are predominantly used to get feedback with regards to the aesthetics and check for ergonomic accuracy. This is often referred to as Subtractive modelling, as you typically start with blocks of foam that you remove (subtract) material from. You can of course add materials to the foam.