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  1. Cybernetics Exhibition on Display

    Cybernetic models now on display at the studio.

    It’s spring showers outside, and inside the studio, we’re proud to announce a new exhibition from the Introduction to Cybernetics and the Foundations of Systems Design class. In this five-week seminar course, students were asked to present analysis and critique of interactive systems, services design, and design processes using the cybernetic model. The project culminated in an evening of presentations with faculty and guest critics.

    A big thanks go to our partners at Soundscreen Design for donating their delightful ReFRAMEs. Inspired by the insurgence of gig posters in the music community, ReFRAME is a simple and convenient way to showcase art without spending a fortune. We love these easy-to-use frames, and look forward to swapping out student work as projects conclude for the semester. Thanks Soundscreen Design!

    Learn more about ReFRAME.

    If you’d like to partner with MFA Interaction Design, get in touch with us at interactiondesign at sva dot edu.

  2. Student Awarded NYWICI Scholarship

    Stephanie Aaron is one of the selected few to receive a prestigious scholarship from the New York Women in Communications Foundation this year. An arm of New York Women in Communications, NYWICI is the largest foundation for communications scholarships for the tri-state area. This annual scholarship is awarded based on academic achievement, work experience, need, demonstrated leadership, participation in school and community-service activities, statement of goals and more.

    In addition to recognition amongst the industry’s biggest names, such as Oprah Winfrey, Katie Couric, Tina Fey, Sheryl Crow, Ina Garten, Gayle King and more at the Matrix Awards, Stephanie will be presented by Brian Williams of NBC’s “Nightly News” with her fellow scholarship winners.

    Students who wish to apply for consideration of this scholarship in the future may visit NYWICI for a full list of requirements and download an application.

    Congratulations, Stephanie!

  3. Jennifer Bove: How to Design an Experience for Experience Designers

    Jennifer Bove, who co-chaired Interaction10 this year, shares her insight on the design process for the conference in Fast Company. From mini-village venues, combating the rain, to the “little things,” Bove talks about the joy, and the challenge it is to design for designers.

    We thought through the lifecycle of the event, in light of the needs and motivations of the 600+ participants at the event, in their various roles from attendees and speakers to sponsors, volunteers, and conference staff. We used our empathy as designers to imagine what was important to each user at each stage of the experience.

    ”...conference lunches were served family-style in the Olde Pink House Restaurant, which also hosted one track of the conference program.”

    Read the article from Fast Company

  4. Video: Liz Danzico on Improvisation and Design

    Chair Liz Danzico’s talk on Improvisation and Design from Interaction10 is now online.

    People are improvising. Whether intentional or not, designers are putting forth opportunities for people to engage in frameworks, giving them connections to take advantage of (or not). This session explores how these frameworks take hold and what the opportunities are for interaction designers.

    All IxD10 videos and slides, including faculty Chris Fahey’s talk on “The Human Interface,” can be found here.

  5. Karen McGrane: “Tell a Story with Your Work”

    Karen McGrane chats with Radio Johnny’s Jeff Parks on what today’s UX firms look for, and what aspiring designers need in order to land the dream job.

    The skills that you have in UX, and trying to put yourself in the shoes of the person looking at your product, work just as well when you’re trying to get yourself hired or when you’re trying to evangelize your role within your company. Try and imagine yourself as product…It’s like you’re a product trying to solve a problem in someone’s life.

    Listen to the show at Radio Johnny

  6. Video: CreativeMornings with Allan Chochinov of Core77

    Last month, the department had the honor of hosting CreativeMornings with Allan Chochinov. Thanks to SwissMiss for organizing the event, the wonderful Roland Lazarte for filming, and all those who made it out despite the snow storm and school closings for some inspiration in early AM.

    CreativeMornings with Allan Chochinov, February 2010

     

  7. Behavior Sensing: Robert Fabricant on “Augmented Mindfulness”

    At last week’s SXSW Interactive Festival, attendees heard from faculty members Rachel Abrams, Robert Fabricant, Chris Fahey, Chloe Gottlieb, and Jeffrey Zeldman, while others—from Liz Danzico to Karen McGrane to Jason Santa Maria—were in attendance.

    While we wait for more reflections and recaps from the five-day festival, Robert Fabricant is already digging deeper with a short video explanation on “Augmented Mindfulness,” a concept he brought up in his talk at SXSW.

    See the video and view slides from his presentation at design mind.

    Slide 16 from “Design for Awareness: Mobile Technologies & Health.”

  8. Evolving the Glass House Conversations Online

    Derek Chan, part of the Glass House team, recently stopped to talk with us about the team’s progress on the Glass House Conversations:

    With the team going through the information architecture phase of the project, the revised direction we went with, which took elements from both earlier conceptual directions, “The Exchange” and “The Table”, became the students’ focus for a few weeks. As we delved more deeply in the architecture, we ensured throughout our process that the concept of the site remained easily recognizable, while also providing key structural elements that could help support it for returning and new visitors.

    The team explored multiple rounds of wireframe designs and discussion. As the site evolved through this phase, we were also thinking of how the site would function on a day-to-day basis. We debated questions such as, how users would interact with our conversation model, what role past participants at the Glass House would have, and how technology would drive all of our proposed functionality in a scalable way. All of these questions and concerns were eventually rectified as we pointed at the essence of the site – what is a conversation, and what does it mean to have one? Ultimately, a lot of the complications faded as we thought about this some more, because as great as a lot of our ideas were, many seemed to have gotten in the way of just having a simple conversation.

    Originally, we had taken “The Table” direction’s idea of hosting three conversations at once, each on a different timer. The big change was that we ended up simplifying things by just hosting one conversation at a time, (which was similar to “the Exchange’s” conversation model). The one question a week became our new core component to the website, and soon after, the design of all other pages fell into place to support it.

    We explored different ways to experience a conversation. The simplicity of the one-conversation-a-week model afforded us to experiment with new methods of displaying that conversation. We ended up with three models: the free-form conversation, the debate model, and the video conversation. Each of these models had their own unique visual metaphor and functional elements, but with enough consistency amongst each other to remain true to the website concept.

    The production of all subsequent sub-pages happened over the course of the next week after the decision was made to go with the one-conversation-a-week model. The team is in the Design phase, creating visual compositions of the Glass House Conversations site.

    Wireframe sketch for a Glass House Conversation homepage, demonstrating an active and past conversations. 

  9. Keeping Tabs on “The Tablet”

    Photo credit: Gene Lu. Dot Dot Dot Lecture Series take place at the Galapagos Art Space.

    With iPad’s first day pre-sales figuring at 120,000, it may not be surprising that last week’s Dot Dot Dot “The Tablet” was our most successful event yet. If you missed the talks by our wonderful panel of experts, stay tuned to the blog for a video recording of the event soon. Meanwhile, speakers Matt Jacobs and Alexis Lloyd have summarized key points from their talks, and if that weren’t enough to relive the night, they’ve also made their slides available.

    Thanks to those who came, nerded out, and maybe even left with a book on user experience design from our gracious sponsor Rosenfeld Media. We hope to see you next month for “The Entrepreneurs.”

  10. Liz Danzico on Jazz, Improv, and Lessons Therein

    In the latest issue of Interactions Magazine, Liz Danzico breaks down the value of improvisation for designers in an essay entitled “From Davis to David: Lessons from Improvisation.”

    From its roots, to present day applications adopted by leaders in the arts, design, and online communities, to improv’s effect on the present day information consumer, Danzico points out that improv is, “in fact, a structure. As loose as its name suggests, its very constraints liberate participants. These constraints, and the potential freedom, are what make improv rich for designers to examine.”

    Read the full article at Interactions.

  11. Interaction10 New York Redux

    For those who missed Interaction10, including Chair Liz Danzico’s talk on improvisation and design, and faculty member Chris Fahey’s presentation on the human interface, the department will be hosting IxDA NYC’s Interaction10 Redux this Saturday. The event is sold out, but you can try the waitlist in case space opens up.

    All IxD10 videos and slides can be found here.

  12. Student Apps Project Featured in GOOD Magazine

    In her latest design column for GOOD Magazine, Alissa Walker shares the goods on an apps project students created for the Interaction Design Fundamentals class last semester. Initially inspired by the NYC BigApps competition, students developed different concepts using at least one source of data from the NYC.gov Data Mine.

    Read the column for student concepts and insight from faculty Chris Fahey for the NYC BigApps project. Find out more about this assignment in our new projects page created by Katie Koch.

    Clint Beharry created NY Loves U based on Richard Layard‘s Big Seven factors of happiness.