Hello All,
My name is Rebeka Hall and I am a level 2 student currently studying Product Design at the University of Leeds.
As part of this course I am taking part in a module entitiled : Advanced Consumer Electronics, which is basically the whole reason behind me creating this blog. I hope to explain to you about my concept and how I have gone about designing it 
(I hope it isnt too much of a bore fest for you ;P)
WHERE DID IT ALL START?
IN A GALAXY NOT SO FAR FAR AWAY....
So as you can see from my brief description I have been asked to create an educational game that will explore the matters of force and trajectory. Not only have I asked to design the housing for the game and the graphics, but also the electronics for it. Although this was a dawnting task at first, it was made quite simple by being able to using technology such as the MYDAQ. This snazzy bit of equipment allowed me to create a simple circuit that mimicked the circuit that would be created inside the housing giving the product function.
I started my project by conducting research into what it was that was wrong with existing products in terms of functionality, but also in terms of being communiative with deaf children.
It appeared to me that there were not many games out there that were specifically made for deaf children i.e. the games relied heavily on sound output for interaction. And although they were games out there for children in terms of educative games for trajectory, they were many issues with them including: lack of interaction and concentration needed. Therefore they werent very stimulating.
From this I created a requirement list of what my product: MUST DO...SHOULD DO... and COULD DO...
I then generated several concepts of which I evaluated and choose the one with the most potential.
So heres a picture, or a sneak peek if you will, of the concept created.
AND NOW FOR THE "INTERESTING" PART, DON'T GET OVER EXCITED, DON'T LOOSE YOUR HEADS... if you weren't already shaking with excitement that is
After creating a housing for the product and generating some simple graphics, I moved onto creating the electronics for the product.
I did this my using a breadboard and a mydaq. For this there were a few key features that were used to allow functionality of the game:
Extension
Elevation
Rotation
Fire
Hit target
Game on
Below is a picture which shows the circuit created.
As you can see it is a relatively simple circuit which uses components such as:
LEDS, button, potentiometer, switch, resistors, motor.
Each component was carefully selected to suit the design created for deaf children. For example LEDS were used to show when the product is on and also light up the extension and a motor was used to indicate that the child had hit the target.
LEDS= extension, game on
Motor= hit target
Potentiometer= extension, elevation
Switch= swtich between elevation and rotation
Button= fire bird
In order to demonstrate that my product worked a popular game was produced, angry birds (YAY), allowing me to test and make adjustments to the breadboard. So now its that really cringy time were I upload a video of me chatting on about my product etc etc etc.... ENJOY !!!
The concept demonstrator was successful .. BIG CHEER !!!
AND THEY ALL LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER
THE END