'How to.....' - Self Evaluation

• What problem did you identify?

How to buy a diamond engagement ring

The problem we found was that men find the process of purchasing a diamond ring for there special female difficult and all the information was very formal, complicated and high detail that wouldn't make much sense to the uninformed and would be very time consuming.

• What evidence did you find to support your decisions?

I did gather lots of research into buying diamond rings from online websites such as a variety of jewellers, askmen, advice websites, budget websites,newspapers etc. All of them were aimed at men some more formal than others and others were men actually asking for advice as they were struggling. All the sites were highly detailed and filled with complicated information to all the different aspects to purchasing a diamond.
I also asked some men for the personal experience of finding a diamond ring and it really varied in context but they didn't really understand the details and asked alot of questions if they were unaided by there female. It appeared to us that alot of there purchases were ill informed and they just 'knew' which when purchasing a very exspensive piece of jewerelly isn't the best.

• What methods did you use to gather your evidence and what forms did it take?
  (categorise your research using terms primary, secondary, quantitative and qualitative)

I asked people close to us as a form of primary qualitative research to gather evidence of personal experience of buying an engagement ring.
I went online to find seconday quantitative and qualitative research into the different aspects of diamonds as well as tips/hints, vocabulary, imagery, format, and font of our 'how to..'

• What methods of research did you find useful and why?

In gathering information about diamonds that i originally had no knowledge about i found the internet very useful as it did go into detail so i could really understand in depth about purchasing diamonds.
I found the method of asking men for there personal experience useful as it gave an honest insight into men actually going out and buying the ring. It gave a real clear view on how men go about the process and as a woman who has never been through the process or witnessed it i found it very useful to see there opinion on it.

• How did these inform your response to your problem?

Our research really informed us in our problem as it let us no how personal and quite emotional the process can be for men. These led us to change our format from a booklet that could probably be left around and seen by others to a more secretive process of a website that leads to a downloadable app which is password protected or a printable wallet sized booklet for the non tech. It also help us in our imagery and design of the website/app/booklet as it led us to keep it really simple and to the point information wise as well as our diamond imagery aka pictograms. This would make it easier for them to understand and give a simple visual aspect for them to connect the complicated information with leading them  to make an informed decision budget wise as well as get the perfect ring to propose.

• What methods did you encounter as problematic?

Getting people to respond for the primary research of there personal experience was difficult and finding a large amount of people who have proposed or are in the process of was also problematic.

• How did you overcome this?

Kept asking them to reply until they eventually did..it worked.

• What research could you have carried out that would have proved more useful?

We could of created a questionnaire asking specific questions to a larger audience of men who have and havn't proposed to get an idea wether they have any original knowledge about diamonds if they havn't proposed or if they have what happened during the process. This would of given us a good amount of data to work with qualitative and quantitative. We could of also used this to build up some statistics and focus our idea quicker. It could of also been useful as we could of used quotes and tips from men in the website to create a bigger rapport with the users.
We also could of looked into the tips and hints we found online by going into a variety of jewellers and asking the professional opinions as well as witnessing it for ourselves.
For example:
Seeing what colour they show diamonds aganist white/black etc?
Black apparently shows diamonds appear more colourless (the better expensive colour) whereas white shows there true colour.
Seeing whether there honest about price and information on diamonds such as popularness

I think i contributed to the group giving alot of research as it was my original 'how to..' and with my knowledge of the subject helped everyone else understand more about the aspects to it along with there own research. I also gave some intial design ideas for the booklet creating a few pages of layout for different subjects with imagery and information text. We then all formed as a group with our inital ideas after our crit and really came together cutting down all our work to what we were going to go with design and idea wise. This lead to us all splitting up and focusing on different parts keeping the same design logic. I created symbols for several sections of the 'how to..' and wrote up the information for those in an informal manner directed at men. Using the layout that Abbas made for the website i put mine and his work together to create website pages and passed my work onto Sam to put in to the app design he'd made up.
I think we made some good and informed decisions as a group and as individuals as we all really began to understand the process of purchasing a diamond through our collective research and put it into a practical piece of design that all visually connected and worked for our purpose (as reaffirmed in the crit).

List five things that you have learnt about the design process over the last two weeks.

1. Gathering valid primary research is difficult in a short period of time
2. Working with a group with people with different design ideas is a challenge but fun and interesting
3. The research is more important than the outcome as without it the outcome doesn't have any purpose or reason
4. Understanding the different kinds of research is complicated
5. To be a good designer you need to go out there and source knowledge about the aspect your designing about.
   List five things you would do different next time.
   
   

1. Generate different kinds of research from different sources
2. Form as a group more regulary and keep in contact more
3. Set out a process order as a group and check it off together instead of jumping into design with lack of research
4. Set out tasks with equal responsibilty and give everyone a chance to voice opinions on the design and idea
5. Do more design development and ideas