DCG Student Assignment 2014

Daledge

So today we got the project for the year and it's a reusable water bottle, I decided to start early, meaning tonight so if anyone at all has any advice I'd really love to hear it.

Thanks in advance.

Exo

The SEC has yet to post the assignment notes on examinations.ie. Regardless, sound's very interesting. Better than a stupid lectern which we had last year. By the way, it's "2014".

Since I'm repeating, I'll tell you that there's no need to rush. I started and finished mine in November/December and achieved top marks for my project - played around with SolidWorks for 3 months! I have all my SolidWorks/Photoshop/resource files from last year, might take less time than before.

Daledge

I'll be keeping an eye out for that. Haha yeah sorry about that. Thanks for the advice, and would you be able to recommend a particular program for doing the actual layout and presentation of the project?

Exo

I personally used Photoshop to design my project, since I have experience using it and had access to it. But keep in mind, that it must be done within school parameters (according to the SEC). A lot of students last year used Microsoft Office Powerpoint since it was widely available and simple enough to use - and they seemed to do well, as long as you make it your own and presentable since marks go for presentation.

If you can't be bothered with creating it on a computer for whatever reason (SolidWorks can annoy you at times, tempting to throw the computer across the room), you could sketch everything if you have talent. For the actual sketches, tracing will suffice since we're not all born into becoming genuine artists.

It'll all be scanned (if you sketched the entire project; you can scan your sketches for certain sections if you like but you must provide originals within the SEC pouch, on the day of completion) - printed, compiled into a .PDF, and burned onto a disc so whatever you end up doing won't matter if it looks exceptional.

iFreeley

Know what I'm doing for the concept design so far, still haven't decided on a bottle to remake, awful project to say to least!

Exo

Don't bother with remaking. It's the most idiotic thing to do given the time frame. You have to basically duplicate over half your project and redo sections to suite a remake. Improvement is more than sufficient.

iFreeley

I meant for the first bottle, find one on the internet to re-do on solidworks? Model it off that.

Exo

Pretty much. Take two bottles off of the internet (don't forget to reference with numbers & links at the very end when taking images), compare and contrast between them and choose one to build in SolidWorks. I'd suggest to just play around with drawing models right now and see what can be done.

It'll be interesting to see people model the bottles in SolidWorks due to the thinness of the plastic. And they thought lecterns were difficult enough.

iFreeley

Haha I know, I did the lectern last year I'm repeating! I made a little water bottle last year as part of my concept design, just drew half it and use revolve boss base I think, then shelled it and coloured it clear and stuck a colour for the cap, very very very basic took no more than 10 mins!

Exo

The lectern was the SEC trolling us. Sounds simple enough, I just made a cup holder on my lectern - why didn't I think of that! Would be a neat little addition, a cup even. I think the trick part will be the screw cap (if that's the type of bottle you're going for - with the actual ridges & making the cap glide around the top of the bottle - sounds like a lot of work already).

A snap-on could work..

iFreeley

I loved the one last year, ill try find my memory stick and post a pic of my concept, was very proud of my idea Yeah if ya could pull that off it'd be impressive Doin the bottle is fairly simple like, have to find some way to make it complex!

Exo

".. add a cup holder to it, and maybe a shelf too." - every student last year.

iFreeley

Haha ya everybody copying eachother!

TheConorDunne

iFreeley wrote: »

I loved the one last year, ill try find my memory stick and post a pic of my concept, was very proud of my idea Yeah if ya could pull that off it'd be impressive Doin the bottle is fairly simple like, have to find some way to make it complex!

As he said, stand out. Venture into the unknown 30+ pages on google, Your design can be bat s*** crazy as long as you justify it. Do lots of drawings/sketchs on your outputs to make them stand out. I spent around 4 hours on each output and got an A2 overall.

I'll try to find my memory stick and put up my lectern outputs so yous have an idea :P

damoPL

Solidworks..... ugh

Exo

Eager to see the official project briefing - but I have a fair idea from last year. ".. bla bla, water bottle .. bla .. how can it be improved .." etc. SolidWorks is the most enjoyable part! Can't wait to get my fingers into it again, haven't used it since January, on the Friday afternoon at the project deadline. Talk about a close call.

teacherhead

Exo wrote: »

Eager to see the official project briefing - but I have a fair idea from last year. ".. bla bla, water bottle .. bla .. how can it be improved .." etc. SolidWorks is the most enjoyable part! Can't wait to get my fingers into it again, haven't used it since January, on the Friday afternoon at the project deadline. Talk about a close call.

"Since I'm repeating, I'll tell you that there's no need to rush. I started and finished mine in November/December and achieved top marks for my project"

Which is it?

Start as soon as you can, spend the time on it. Have your ideas sorted before you go near solidworks and then tear into it.

spurious

It's usually shortly after the schools re-open in January.

Exo

teacherhead wrote: »

"Since I'm repeating, I'll tell you that there's no need to rush. I started and finished mine in November/December and achieved top marks for my project"

Which is it?

Start as soon as you can, spend the time on it. Have your ideas sorted before you go near solidworks and then tear into it.

Rushing, as in starting as soon as possible and then dragging it along through the winter holidays & into January. I'd rather spend my time working on improving DCG related things for the exam in June. Starting early, you'll drag on and always want to tweak and change things - hence wasting precious time. That's just the way I look at it, and how my situation was last year.

iFreeley

Anyone started yet?

Daledge

iFreeley wrote: »

Anyone started yet?

I have, I've a rough draft of output 1 finished but I'm ahead of almost everyone in the class so I don't know if I'm going a little too fast.

brendantuffy

the curse is tryin to find a bottle with 5 parts

teacherhead

brendantuffy wrote: »

the curse is tryin to find a bottle with 5 parts

Split the body in half along the mould line. It wouldn't be innacurate.

seavill

teacherhead wrote: »

Split the body in half along the mould line. It wouldn't be innacurate.

That would be some stretch in claiming it to be 2 parts, also if there is only one mould line that is still one part formed

There are obviously bottles out there with 5 parts or they would not have been able to give it as a project but if one of my class came ot me with that suggestion I would say that wouln't be a runner however I'm sure you would find as many teachers who say the opposite

soupyryan13

I have most of my output 1 draught finished and I began modelling my bottle yesterday. I think the reusable water bottle idea isn't the worst thing they could have given us. Our school bought water bottles for us as there is only 4 higher level students in my class so we bought ones with filters in them (they made up 5 parts) and they are actually pretty complex designs. It's a pity that we can't do any of it at home because I'd love to just get it finished and concentrate on other subjects.

Eurovisionmad

Hey everyone, I decided that I'd drop in here and give ye a few nuggets of help. I did DCG last year with the horror of the lectern and came out the other side with an A1 overall (and I really did feel I did awfully in the written exam so I've a strong feeling my project brought me up!) so I must have done something right!

Firstly it's extremely advisable to get a copy of Solidworks from your school so you can practice on your home computer and work out the kinks so when you do get precious time in school to work on your project you're clear what you need to do and there's no problems or delays, as time in school to work on your project is very scarce! Do spend a lot of time this side of Christmas working on your project, you won't have too much to do with regards to the actual LC so you will have time now to work on it! Personally I came up with quite a complicated concept design which took a good few long nights to work out! Also as the deadline approaches your always going to have so many little things like presentation etc to work out!

When you're researching existing designs and concept designs, the internet isn't necessarily the be all and end all, anyone can google something and copy and paste a piece of text! I slightly cheated in this respect and took a lot of pictures from the internet and printed them on photographic paper, and hand-wrote any text next to it, that way it looks like you went out and really researched the topic and made an effort rather than just sitting at home on your laptop. Another big thing is sketching, practice it A LOT! Nice sketching with really intricate colouring/shading really screams hard work rather than a few computer printed photos.

With regard to a concept design (which I'd recommend rather than the improvement on an existing design as it's easier to pick up marks.) go for something really off the wall, something the examiners have never seen before and would never think of! I based mine on the 2012 London Paralympics, so the actual lectern itself was based on the structure of the Olympic stadium and the microphone was based on Oscar Pistorious' running leg (which sounded like a good idea until of course he murdered his girlfriend :rolleyes: )

Lastly presentation does make a difference, I had a template and colour scheme on every page which I suppose added to the aesthetics of it! Do look and try and get your hands on other peoples projects from previous years (I found a few on the Boards threads of previous years, where I got a few ideas for my own) and take various bits that you like and amalgamate them together to use in your project. Of course don't hesitate to PM me if you want a copy of my project, I'm sure Spurious won't let me post it publicly so the balls in your court and if you've any questions I'd be more than happy to answer

PS There is light at the end of the tunnel, 6th year flies! And college is as good as everyone says it is, I'm in Med in UCC and you couldn't pay me to go back to secondary school!

thebigolefool

Welldone Eurovison Mad your lectern was pretty cool. I also did the leaving cert last year and achieved 92% in the project overall. The parts that really let me down were my sketches big time as I achieved full marks in every other section of the project bar the sketches even though I got my girl friend to do these sketches which I taught were class but obviously the wa*ker correcting my script taught not. I myself am back repeating, as I missed out on my course unfortunately. I really did go crazy on the whole solidworks my concept lectern was a briefcase which could fold up and become a lectern it was absolutely horrible over 30 limt mates alone just to solve the rising mechanism as it worked somewhat like a chery picker motion (on brackets). I would have some advise for people tough your first model should be that of a simple (well moderately) bottle but do it accurately and correct, try and aim for minor detail done in anal detail then zoom in on these little finicky bits for your photoview work. Don't worry lads this project is so much more easier compared to that of last years. Best of luck

jimbob1255

How is everyone else doin their compare and contrast page 2??

steven_b16

well lads just found this, i have output 1 done and on compare and contrast now. we have a teacher who is just out of collage so he is only learning as he goes, so dose any one have pics of the layout of output 2 im not really sure what its supposed to look like.

soupyryan13

Really starting to dislike this project now this is the bottle I decided to design
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Spearmark-Housewares-Freeze-Bottle-Freezer/dp/B004B8U6Q0/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1382640950&sr=8-2&keywords=spearmark+water+bottle+freezer+stick

At the beginning I was up for the challenge but at this point I am sick of it. I only managed to finish the main body of the bottle today and I have been at it since the week after we got the brief.
The outputs aren't too bad struggling to fill up the compare and contrast pages but I'll get there soon.
Is anyone else finding that this project is taking up too much of your time ?

Mdeane

Right lads as far as i can see there is some terrible advice been given in this thread but also some good stuff by eurovisionmad and thebigolefool.

Someone said something about only spending a month or two at it so you dont waste time tweaking things, madness, thats what this project is about, doing things and changing them to make them perfect. Personally i dedicated all my study time between around this time and Christmas solely on this and my construction project, and left proper study for after the DCG deadline. Yes this made for terrible mock results but they count for nothing so don't worry you will have plenty of time for everything else. (Just to clarify here i got an A1 in DCG and an A2 in construction and gained almost a hundred points between mocks and the LC to get me a good bit above 500 which was way more than expected this time last year, so it does work).

On the solidworks side of things, as someone said earlier pick something simple and be anal about the detail (On mine i cut the power symbol into the button and modeled all the pins in any plugs, usbs, jacks etc.) , remember there are frig all marks going for difficulty of your modelling, but you need to show your talent so show off these little details in your presentation. Stay away from curvy surfaces as there an absolute pain to model. There is also absolutely no need to make any fancy moving bits work, as long as you explain the concept in your portfolio, think of this as a pre production design brief your giving to a company who will then deal with how it works, its not your problem so dont get hung up on it.

For presentation powerpoint is perfect, its easy to use and easy to access, if you know how to use it well you can make some pretty effective layouts. While laying out your portfolio, keep it in your head that this is a design project. You need to make yours stand out, pick a colour scheme and stick to it, (I used two, blue for the first part and pink/purple for the second (be bold) but there was a clear and marked transition between the two sections), make sure it has continuity, (i.e. same size font, title in the same place on the page), use a border. One point that really annoyed me with other peoples portfolios was their pictures looked really out of place, I took every single photo i used and brought it into photoshop(use gimp if you dont have access) and made the background white, then gave them all the same frame, this stopped them looking out of place and tied them together aswell as making the whole thing neater.

If i was doing the project this year i would be going down the route of a new design. Someone said this means you have to do some of the project twice, yes but you'll be awarded for that. I honestly dont see how you're going to come up with any improvements drastic enough, (but if you have a really good idea by all means use it) so i would recommend picking a theme, (running, football, nature, driving, cars, picking your nose, whatever your into). Design your bottle based on this theme, I picked the 2012 olympics which was still fresh in my mind at the time, and based it on the already prominent design features in the equipment and signage used (google london 2012 and you'll see that they use "shards" everywhere). This worked for two reasons, 1. It showed i had an interest in design and that i noticed the design cues, 2. It gave me something really solid to work off, I was able to trace the designs for say the logo or podium back to press releases and could discover how they were created then apply the same method to my own design. Also remember that the product should really be useful, so dont let its practicality slip.

Sketches are crucial. I was only alright at sketching as in i could shade but could never get the shapes just right. So i decided to print out pictures and roughly trace the bits of them i was struggling with, then finished and shaded them in by hand. This is one area that will take alot of redoing, if you do one that's half decent but you don't think makes the cut, do it again but keep it incase you cant do any better, i made the mistake of throwing away some of my better pieces. Also don't be afraid to throw in random little sketches to explain ideas, especially in the second part, even if they're a bit crap, Its a handy way of filling space, for example i got a whole second page out of my compare and contrast just by drawing the details of the two pieces.

If you take anything from this post let it be that this is a design project. This means a few things, 1. Your focus should be on the concept of the design not on how it works so to speak, 2. Make it look like you have an interest in design 3. Layout and design related content are way more important than a load of text so dont write things for the sake of writing them, explain and justify your ideas then leave it at that.

After that its up to ye, have fun with your idea while presenting it in the most professional manner possible. I dont envy yer topic, yes its not great but we all thought the same bout our lecturns and secretly i think we all learned to love them.

If ye've any questions or anything pm me or reply. G'luck.

Jesus didn't realise that was such an essay, hopefully someone gets something out of it.

brendantuffy

Mdeane wrote: »

Jesus didn't realise that was such an essay

any chance of a summary concentration isn't my high point

Huell

well lads how are the projects coming along?
I'm doing my part b with a new concept of nature but im still not sure if im happy with the final design. What are you lads up to?

jimbob1255

finished my solidworks today thankfully. Not happy with my bottle either tho but am thinking they can hardly take marks away for a 'bad design'. Like as long as your bottle isnt outrageously impossible to work or isnt incredible stupid it cant be a bad bottle can it??

yayakolo

I've just started my compare and contast.:eek: Im so far behind:(

seavill

yayakolo wrote: »

I've just started my compare and contast.:eek: Im so far behind:(

What have you been doing in class since the brief came out?

jimbob1255

yayakolo wrote: »

I've just started my compare and contast.:eek: Im so far behind:(

well done.... ur doin well

yayakolo

I have my solidworks stuff almost done:). what did everyone do for adjustments?

Exo

One week to go.. I'd say it's time to make a start xD don't worry, I've got this.. I'll go down the modification route since I've a few improvement ideas. Doesn't necessarily need to be erratic in comparison to other designs, it's how you make do with design/function elements and implementing them into your given design. That's my take.

Huell

printing up tomorrow but no sketches done! :O I followed the marking scheme line for line and put huge effort into my bottle I hope to god I get an A from this subject because I really need it.

Huell

Pressure is creeping up on me,i hope to be scanned and binded by wednesday. I made the bottle as complex as i could have made it and now sketching it is not going to be fun but once im finishe this project i will be chuffed

soupyryan13

Jeez Guys the pressure is on now went into school today to get some more done but my god I'm feelin the pressure... My second bottle was based on a rugby ball with a kicking tee for the lid but it's turning out to be a bit more difficult than i thought. Looks like there will plenty of late nights in school ahead...

Exo

It doesn't need to be as complex as you may think. You'd be surprised to see what projects get A grades; if you follow the marking scheme you'll be perfectly fine. Less is more. That's 110% of what they're looking for. I'll have to enquire about the examination numbers on the project, since I'm an external candidate. Last year we put our name & DOB on the cover page (and maybe our exam numbers on the disc).

yayakolo

I still have all my sketching and a mood board to do for part b. might be doing an all-nighter on Thursday :L

Huell

Everything done except renders for final bottle which take >60 mins because there is 42 parts :L im becoming so stressed though because i feel im going to lose marks somewhere

Exo

With 42 parts, you've only increased your chances of screwing up somewhere by probably 400% (major approximation)! They can only allocate so many marks; basically degraded each parts worth by 4, on average. Don't stress, there's nothing worse. It's only a feckin' bottle ;D I'll be in the school computer lab until the kick me out tomorrow evening.

I have around 11, of which 5 were taken from Part A. Still have sketches to do, SW is done. 13-14 HD renders took me a good while! Probably unnecessary, could've passed with 800x600.

Put in a good exam and you'll be fine regardless of how you do in the project, you're bound to score reasonably well if you followed the minimum requirements.

Huell

See one of the parts is revovled around and i used circular pattern so it takes up 36 :L i printed and binded today one of the slides came out just alright but sure what can ya do? I doubt they can take marks off me for a dodgy printer. Handing up everything tomorrow to get it done with,followed the marking scheme and done everything they told me so im praying for an A1

Huell

lads whats the deal with the pdf version of your file? my school does not have an a3 scanner so will just pictures of the pages do?

Exo

Ah right that makes more sense. They won't, they'll have a .PDF version of your project regardless. Make it your business to get it scanned and saved as a .PDF (at some book/stationary store perhaps), I'm staying up all night to get it done for tomorrow since I have a huge number of study periods tomorrow. I'll sleep on the floor, in the corner of the computer room lol.

yayakolo

Doing all my sketches now should be a fun night. :L

Donalc701

ive left out the reference page on the pdf file, any ideas how much marks i will be deducted