It’s interesting seeing the link or similarities emerging between the 3D/ industrial product development (architecture included) and the applications/ solutions/ products/ software/ devices that we deliver to our clients in the Internet environment.
But it’s not about building ‘websites’, although the Web is a platform for the useful and useable services on offer, it is about the ‘idea’ and making those same considerations when developing any industrial/ product design: Can we build it, is there an infrastructure in place that can support it (business or electronic), does the consumer want it, is it useful and usable?
We have always believed ‘innovation’ is not something acknowledged from across a room on a screen. The design or brand communication as a device can draw you in, but only when the user uses can the real innovation – or disappointment – truly unfold.
This doesn’t apply solely to interactive information environments. With architecture, product design or fashion, it’s only when you use that door, pour that cup of tea or wear that suit that the real value to the user becomes apparent. The user experience is key.
So it is no real surprise that as the digital media/ Internet development industry awakens to the needs of the user rather than the needs of its contemporaries in design agencies, that the assimilation between building successful interactive services and building 3D space or products is going to be made.
Let’s hope it doesn’t end at the graphical representation of virtual towns, cities or urban landscapes as ‘the interface’.
Daniel Bonner
Creative director
AKQA
- Industries in this article
- Brands in this article
