Jamin Hegeman

  • How I Became a Designer

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    This post is inspired by Jack Moffet’s Mystory, which was inspired by a recent IxDA discussion on when/where/how you decided to become a designer. To answer this question, I could go through my life story—army » engineering » poetry » journalism » web producer » editor » web developer—but that would be rather long and…

  • “Emergence” (book review)

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    Steven Johnson’s “Emergence” attempts to connect the lives of ants, brain activity, urban interaction, and software to show how decentralized and bottom-up interactions emerge as an intelligent swarm. I was at first skeptical about the book, as it seemed to take a very scientific view, which I am wary of given my thesis on design…

  • My Blogs of 2007

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    Dan Saffer just posted his list of the best interaction design blogs this year. Missing is his own blog and mine (just kidding about mine—but perhaps one day). Given grad school time constraints, I don’t follow many blogs these days. But here are a few I have found either insightful or troubling over the year:…

  • What is the experience?

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    Designers often argue about whether we’re designing an experience or designing for an experience, and ponder the more philosophical aspects of having an experience. Is an experience something designers shape? Is it something participants make? Arguably, every experience is unique. But if this is true, what do we mean when we talk about the experience?…

  • Thoughts and Feedback on the UPMC Service Design Project

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    Last week during finals, the four teams from the Designing for Service class presented their process and solutions to the class and invited guests, which included folks from University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC), for whom we were designing. During the presentation I took notes on what I thought were interesting ideas that were either…

  • Lampie: RFID and Sensor Lamp

    Lampie: RFID and Sensor Lamp

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    Final Project Making Furniture Interactive Carnegie Mellon University Fall 2007 Abstract The more complex the artifacts we interact with become, the more we personify their behavior. The goal of this project was to explore interacting with a small, playful form and the emotional connection between a person and an artifact. I chose a lamp, and…

  • Service Design Deliverables

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    After 13 weeks of working with the UPMC Neurosurgery Clinic, directed by Dr. Amin Kassam, we have decided to produce a small communication design piece. Compared with other projects, which have mostly focused on technological solutions, producing a booklet feels a little uncomfortable. I catch myself thinking, “This is it?” Well, actually it’s not. In…

  • Thesis Paper Abstract v3

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    After my Thanksgiving thesis paper writing blitz, I realized I needed to once again revise the abstract to more coherently attempt to express the aim of my paper. While I’m still not 100 percent happy with it, the following abstract represents my latest direction for my paper. It is difficult to talk about the design…

  • Graphic design is art, says Paul Rand

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    I don’t know if this is new, but it was new to me and I just watched it. Paul Rand talks about graphic design, and says that design is art. I’m pretty sure I don’t agree with him, but it’s kind of interesting to hear his perspective and see the array of designs.