The next best thing
In this assignments we were tasked to come up with a digital solution for the problem you will find below. We had to accomplish this feat through:
"How might we" questions: we did it this way to test our brainstorming progress,
problem and solution storyboards: to see if we can tell the problem with story telling.
Pitching: learn how to pitch / hook the listener / show that you made a unique solution.
To summarise:
A nervous person that is in a hurry catches a red light. On top of that, the bridge is opening, guaranteeing that this person will arrive late.
Problem:
How might we make the waiting process more tolerable?
My solution:
We make use of the items available at every bridge crossing, namely: a traffic light. While waiting for a boat the pass, you give people to do something, not only that you also help people calm their nerves. That something is: Breathing exercises.
The way we can do that is: The waiting progress goes as normal, but after the bridge is fully lifted/swinged the traffic light starts demanding actions. With the top light it shows you an action, in our case its "Breath in through nose", "hold your breath" and "Breath out through the mouth", meanwhile the bottom light shows you how many seconds the action should take. With a big waiting line, people in the back won't be able to see the actions. Worry not, thats why we use the 3 colours already available in a traffic light. Red: breath in, yellow: hold and green; release.
My reasoning:
I like this solution a lot because: We don't only help our persona in this situation, but also everybody at a red light. Also on further research I found that, to do this we need a LED traffic light, which is placed very fast, cheap and are the preferred traffic lights nowadays.
Also just because it's there, doesn't means it forces you to do these exercises, but the ones who need it can make use of it.
THE PROBLEM
Brainstorming
‘Figure 1 Reproduced form [swing bridge in action]
Copyright owner unknown.
Retrieved from
https://www.networkrail.co.uk/stories/film-goole-swing-bridge/
(2022) shows a swing bridge in action
‘Figure 2 Reproduced from [baracule bridge in action]
Copyright owner unknown.
Retrieved from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mystic_River_Bascule_Bridge
(2023) shows a baracule bridge in action
‘Figure 3 reproduced from [lift bridge in action]
Copyright owner unknown
Retrieved from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pont_Jacques_Chaban-Delmas
(2023) Shows a lift bridge in action
‘Figure 1 reproduced from Astonishing X-men #7 (March 2018)
Art by Mike Deodato Jr.
Retrieved from
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professor_X
(2023) Shows professor X
Figure 2 (Brugopen, 2023) Available on 8/12/2023 from https://brugopen.nl
Figure 3 (Brug-open, 2023) Available on 8/12/2023 from https://www.brug-open.nl/wanneergaatdebrugopen
Figure 4 (MarineTraffic, 2023) Available on 8/12/2023 from https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/home/centerx:3.275/centery:50.832/zoom:14
Figure 5 (zelzatebrug, 2023) Available on 8/12/2023 from https://www.zelzatebrug.vlaanderen/
My top 3 Ideas
The solution
Self-reflect
What did i learn from this exercise?
When you start brainstorming, its not a bad idea to write everything down. Not all of my solutions were digital, but knowing that there is a non digital solution out there, all you have to do to it, is digitalise it. Also realising that every problem has at least 2 solutions has helped me a lot in the past and in this exercise.Also, very important I learned a lot about bridges and marinetraffic.
What challenges have I met?
To me the biggest challenges were making it in English. It was't a necessity, but i really enjoyed this challenge. I also found it hard to visualize the actions: how can you visualize an action so that everyone understands. Lastly i don't know how to make a visualisation of a brainstorm look more interesting. I didn't want to cut things out, because i wanted people to see everything i came up with and the unordered mess was actually what helped me come up with my top 3 solutions.
