Tag: PDD
Not so plain Planes – Part 3
Doesn’t it always happen… there I was bemoaning the fact that modern aircraft look so boring in Not so plain Planes – Part 1 and then fate plays its tricks! Graham Lacy, PDD’s Technical Director, and I were sitting having a drink with a business associate one evening after DSEI at London ExCeL recently. We were close to London City Airport and had become accustomed to the sound of aircraft regularly taking off and climbing overhead, but one aircraft stood out from the others with a higher-pitched, almost whining sound.
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Surgical Innovation – Pioneering doctors and devices
Surgery is a fascinating branch of medicine; rooted in science, yet still very much a craft and (whether we like it or not as a patient) frequently dependent on the skills of improvisation by the surgeon and their team. Surgery has come a long way since its early days but the pace of innovation has anything but slowed down. On the contrary, new technologies are creating new possibilities to improve safety and efficacy of procedures, and cost pressures are creating an imperative to achieve more with less.
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Brainsex – What do you think?
A recent trip to an evening of short-talks hosted by The Future Laboratory at the suggestion of a colleague resulted in me being utterly transfixed for six minutes by Dr Anne Moir. The subject? Brainsex!
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How design can change the world
In order for the world to evolve we as designers must set the precedent.
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PDD in context: London Design Festival 2013 highlights
“Drink some coffee and hammer up some drywall!” That’s what we did on the day before we opened up our pop-up space (three times bigger than last year!) to welcome visitors at the London Design Festival 2013.
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Evolution of advertising space and where does it lead?
Passing through Gatwick Airport recently, something caught my eye. Having cleared security I continued on, looking up at my gate number on the departure board. As I scanned down the illuminated display for my destination, something caused me to double-take…
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Has Augmented Reality finally come of age?
The other day I overheard someone in the supermarket telling their friend that they had spent the weekend killing zombies all over their house. It turns out that these weren’t real zombies (quietly relieved) but characters in a smartphone game that uses augmented reality (AR) technology to make it look as if the un-dead are creeping up the stairs and clawing at your windows in droves. That reminded me of a new marketing campaign I had read about that could place brightly coloured dancing animals all over your box of breakfast cereal just by pointing your phone at it. As I walked down the aisle in the supermarket I was struck by just how awful a prospect that is.
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Keeping it local: PDD at the London Design Festival 2013
The Creative Matrix is filled with brightly-coloured sticky notes as the PDD LDF team furiously sketched ideas for what we could do with the impressive 1,200 square feet of gallery space on Redchurch street. At last year’s LDF, over three days, we ran 2-hour Human-Centred Design (HCD) taster sessions in a small gallery space on Redchurch Street. This year, we secured a gallery three times the size for seven days-and we wanted to make the most of it.
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Not so plain Plances – Part 2
After an intriguing look into what is becoming a homogenous look for commercial aircraft in our previous blog, ‘Not so plain Planes – Part 1’, we are going to be taking a peek at and altogether new look and feel of aircraft soon to take to the sky.
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‘Mono-cultures, Biomimicry and Ethnography’ – Heather’s blog featured on EPIC 2013
The EPIC Conference is aimed at promoting the integration of rigorous methods to better understand human behaviour, in order to enhance business performance. We are very happy to be sponsoring EPIC 2013 at the Royal Institution of Great Britain this year, which will be taking place during the 16th -18th September. Heather’s recent blog ‘Monocultures, Biomimicry and Ethnography’ is currently featured on the EIPC 2013 website.
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Not so plain planes – Part 1
Intercontinental commercial aircraft used to look very different in the 1970-90s – the Vickers VC10 with its four rear-mounted engines and high tail, and of course the Aérospatiale-BAC Concorde with its dramatic delta wing and ‘droop snoot’. From the US there were also tri-jets in the shape of the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 and Lockheed TriStar, once competitors to the distinctive Boeing 747 ‘Jumbo’.
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Intimacy of nature, humans and space
In 2009 I volunteered in the curatorial team for the Shen Zhen & Hong Kong Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism \ Architecture. One of my tasks was to help architect Sou Fujimoto prepare his speech on ‘Primitive Future’ (also the title of his book). At the time I knew little about him or architecture, but as a person who is crazy about all forms of art, I embraced this dream opportunity. I was working through some admin duties as he began to deliver his talk. He was very calm and measured, exuding the same aura of Zen that seems to emanate from all of his architecture. I found myself compelled to stop what I was doing and to listen with the rest of the enthralled audience; I found his concepts and ideals extremely interesting and inspiring.
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Driving the alternative: renewables and energy storage
We have discussed energy issues before here at Pulse. Energy conservation has a vital role to play for people, planet and profit. Previous recession recoveries have been based largely on industry, consumption and energy intensive activities. Increased awareness of climate change and environmental damage intensify the energy debate.
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TV at the crossroads
I recently saw an interesting tongue-in-cheek statistic in the Wired Magazine (March 2013) commenting on what people look for in a TV; 4% wanted improved features like gigantic screens and ultra-high 4k resolution, whilst the remanding 96% wanted the ability to find what to watch, when they want to. Is this highlighting a disconnect between manufactures and users? Are the 72 inch ultra-sharp screens now sitting with the six bladed razors and the 24 megapixel compact cameras in the quest for features over utility?
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Does Skeuomorphism still have its place in our tactile interfaces?
Skeuomorphic interfaces (another fancy word to describe a digital interface that emulates the physical world), seem to have been sentenced to death. With Apple also making a move towards a flat-looking iOS7, we appear to be heading towards a simpler, cleaner visual language for digital interfaces.
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Design for China: Western Brands
‘What is Design for China?’ is a series of three blogs where we will be taking a look at design targeted at the mainland Chinese market. In our first instalment in the series we focus on how some Western brands are creating designs specifically for this increasingly discerning market.
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Do We Give Ourselves Enough Time To Think?
There was a time when I was a ‘weekend commuter’. The 3 hours journey home on a Friday evening followed a predictable course both geographically and mentally…
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Progress By Playing
It’s not often artists are allowed to experiment with expensive processes, probably because artists play, and playing doesn’t give a good a return on investment as say rapid prototyping for mass production would. But a research and development consultancy based in Cardiff have shown that allowing people to ‘play’ with these technologies can help open up new processes even for designers who have been using these tools for years.
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