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Kokomo Opalescent Glass

Kokomo Opalescent Glass is the oldest manufacturer of Opalescent Glass in the country. The make over 22,000 variations of sheet glass…and now they want to sell them online. The glass is made from a variety of colored glass and opal that determines the “type”, in a variety of textures and a number of different densities (the amount of light that passes through the glass). (this site has not yet launched)

Workmark

Wordmark was looking for an interface to allow users to create custom pieces of “word art”. They wanted users to type in a word, choose images that represent each letter, add symbols or numbers, decide if you want it framed and purchase the piece. (this site has not yet launched)

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Using Silverback, I recorded a short video walkthrough of the interfaces.

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The 24 Hour Web Project.visit the site

Small Box, (where I work) has begun a project to help a local non-profit twice a year. Summer of 2009 our team spent a very long night in the Second Helpings office researching, planning designing and developing and launching a brand new website all in just 24 hours.

Inverted Umbrella and Water Collector

What it is.

While visiting my brother in Portland, OR I noticed many outdoor spaces were left empty due to rainy days. Using an tradition patio umbrella was an obvious solution but I saw an opportunity for a more progressive, environmentally conscious design.

This inverted umbrella has several benefits.

protecting an outdoor space from falling rain

collecting water for reuse (gardening, toilets, etc.)

overlapping umbrellas can be used to cover a larger area

the inverted, upward shape reduces the feeling of confinement a traditional umbrella creates (when the water falls over the edge it forms a “wall” of water around  those below)

when collapsed into inverted triangle, its flat profile can be rotated to provide shade or let the sun through.

The Sustainable Stadium

What it is.

At a Colts game in my home town of Indianapolis, I noticed the potential energy produced by the crowd’s contant movement. This project seeks to harness that movement into electricity and encourage the production of that energy toward a completely sustainable event.

How it works

A stadium seat with a folding mechanism that propels a small generator ( like those found hand-crank radios), would create a small amount of power every time a crowd member sat down. The seats, which are already connected would from a power generating grid. With nearly 100,000 seats and constant standing and sitting at sporting events, the crowd would generate a huge amount of electricity.

The Digital Interface

The interface projected like the score of the game would offer the crowd real time accounting of the power being generated and crowd games, like “the wave”, would encourage even more energy production. Different sections of the crowd would also compete against one another, seeing whose section can generate more energy.

After conducting a number of usability tests, I found it difficult to explain the data I collected. I started looking for better ways to visually explain the data. I ended up finding the same software Hans Rosling created and showcase in his presentation at TED.

This visualization allows me to easily chart users by any number of metrics and demographics.

Here I have displayed a set of users who participated in a single task in a usability test.

What it means.

The x axis represents the time it took to complete the task.  The y axis represents the number of errors made by the user. The color of the circle represents task success (users often give up quickly) and the size indicate how often they use the internet. Any of these metrics or demographics can be changed to find or display and trends or outliers.

Try it.

For instance you can make the size of circles represent age and the color represent internet use. (you actually have to change them on the chart) We can see the large circles (60-80 yrs) are more blue and green (lower internet use), while the smaller circles(20-50 yrs) are red and yellow (higher internet use).