Enchanted Water Bottle
An experimental product-interaction design project
My team and I set out to ‘enchant’ a water bottle with an animated interaction. We designed a simple mechanical assembly to make the water bottle come alive, and rock back and forth.
Design Tools Used
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Sketching
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User Mapping
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Prototyping
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Cardboard Models
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3-D Printed Models
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Mechatronics
1st prototype
2nd prototype
Developing a rocking mechanism with scrappy prototyping
We pursued a rocking water bottle concept with simple prototypes. With the help of these models, we designed a simple rocking mechanism that used a servo.
3rd prototype
I refined the geometry of the rocking surface and minimized the electronics' enclosure size with these quick prototypes.
Our concept evolved from a cardboard mechanical proof of concept, to a compact 3D-printed assembly.
We developed the code for the Arduino on a breadboard, then assembled the electronics into an enclosure.
Exploring playful, animated and feasible ways to enchant the bottle
Concepts for 'enchanted' interactions with the bottle.
I sketched concepts to make the bottle come alive with movement. My team and I then converged on a rocking water bottle concept, which I designed the mechanism for.
I designed a simple assembly to rock the water bottle, using a servo.
How the bottle works
The water bottle comes alive gradually, by progressing through a series of events that increased in noticeability.
Bottle sits still
Bottle starts timer
First Notification: Low light
45 minutes without drinking
Second Notification: Rocking
60 minutes without drinking
Drink from bottle
Timer resets
Defining the bottle's interaction and product requirements
We worked out the timing for the interaction with the bottle on a whiteboard. The decisions we made during this process guided our sensor selection and microcontroller programming.
Outcome
Over the course of two weeks, my team and I developed an enchanted water bottle from sketch, to cardboard prototype, to functioning visual model.
The progression of actions above are accelerated for illustrative purposes.