Aura
PRODUCT DESIGN | PRODUCT RESEARCH
For this project I designed a watch that was fashion forward yet useful. My design included a metal clasp band with interchangeable watch faces. I wanted to create something that leaned toward more of a jewelry piece that could be worn with anything. After designing it in Illustrator first, the final rendering was done in Rhino 3D where it shows how my one interchangeable watch can look with each of its faces.
Project Statement:
Watch wearers are looking for a watch that feels like a piece of jewelry. Something that is sleek and elegant which can also go with any outfit.
RESEARCH
First, I needed some inspiration, so I decided to see what watches were on the market. I looked at all different types of designs and created this chart to graph the ones that stood out to me. I wanted to make sure I looked at all styles so I wasn’t limiting myself when it came to my own thumbnails. You can see the chart I made with 4 extremes: mild, wild, geometric and organic. This was so I could get a sense of the shapes and how designers have used them.
From there I took notes of the examples and aspects I liked before moving onto my initial thumbnails.
SKETCHES
I started by creating 50 thumbnails ranging from all extremes from my chart above. I challenged myself to complete these all within 20 minutes to make sure I was not overthinking and that I sketched the first things that came to me.
By doing this I am able to get original ideas, although they might not all be great, it gives me a lot of options for when I come back to them for inspiration.
Once I had my 50 thumbnails, I went back and chose 20 of them to sketch in more detail and in 3 different views. This is where I got more specific with my designs as well as practiced my perspective drawings techniques.
Then came the last step before rendering, Photoshop. For this part I took 2 of my ideas from the last 20 and put them into Photoshop with some design notes. I do this so when I go to render my final design I can reference my orthographics from these files to create my base. Although these are still rough, especially the colors and fonts, they were very helpful when it came to sketching in Rhino. I was able to trace my orthographics and create a file to open in Rhino where I was able to trace again in order to keep the same proportions.
3D RENDERING
This is where my final idea took shape. After joining my final ideas together, I came up with this interchangeable watch that comes with different faces.
I really enjoyed creating this in Rhino because not only do I get to see how my design looks from every angel, but I also get to play with the materials.
After experimenting with different textures and colors, I landed on a gold metal band with 3 different watch faces made of pearl, blue stone, and pink metal which all included gold detailing.
FINAL DESIGN
For my final design, I created an interchangeable gold watch band with 3 example faces. The goal of this design was to create a piece that allows users to not only wear it as a jewelry piece, but also match it to whatever they are wearing. Not only is this more consumer friendly, but also more environmentally friendly as well. With today’s issues of over consumption, especially in the fashion industry, we need more products like this which encourage users to buy less of the same things.
REFLECTION
Overall I felt this project did a great job at teaching me how to come up with original design ideas from scratch. Although I felt the process was long, I doubt I would have been as happy with my final design if I hadn’t done it all. I really enjoyed learning new software and 3D rendering in general, it is definitely something I would like to explore more in the future when it comes to product design.
I am interested in coming back to this and creating more graphics with either brand/marketing intentions or even just packaging to explore the product and its intended audience a bit more.