Digital Prototyping Techniques and Speculative Design
I once had a teacher who told me something in the like of - be careful of what you create in film, because if you can create it in fiction – it can be created in real life. And quoting a poet called William Blake, “What is now proved was once only imagined”, connects, in a way, to what my teacher said. Be careful of what you create, because the world as we see it right now was once just imagined. This essay will focus shortly what digital prototyping is, and connect that to speculative design. It will also present in what manner digital prototyping techniques can be appropriate, desired or even problematic for speculative design approaches.
Prototyping and Speculative Design
When a new design or product is in its first stages one can use prototyping as a method to understand a given situation or concept. Prototyping with a question of how the design and product can be used or perceived in the future, without knowing the answer. A well-made prototype can answer that question, both in how the future could look like and how people will interact with the times to come. In my experience with prototyping I have learned that anything can be a prototype, and that there are many tools in which to create one. Physical prototyping techniques using physical material, such as cardboard, a sketch drawn on a piece of paper or even a brick. Digital prototyping techniques however can use less concrete material, such as images, programming or video-making. The tool this essay will focus on mostly will be the digital tool of creating videos. When using video to prototype one posses the “ability to create and demo impossible situations” (Nilsson, 2018).
Speculative design is a socio-scientific and socio-technical approach, with focus on “address(ing) the contextual issues that can turn a technology into a product” and can “in turn modify the human experience of that technology”. This compared to other approaches that are more techno-centric, where they have their focus on “what technology can do” while “ignore(ing) the contextual factors” (Malpass, 2016). Speculative design therefore focus more on the society than other approaches does. How the issues in the world can turn technology into something that people buy, and how the feelings toward the technology change in that turnover. In some way, Malpass’ definition of speculative design is similar to why we prototype. They might not answer a specific question, but they both can give a glimpse of what the future could hold and how people will behave with it.
Continuing, Malpass describes how speculative design can be used. He speaks of two ways in which to use the speculative design approach. The first is to see what advances there are in technology in the present and then placing that technology in the future. How could the future look, with the technology we have available and recognize today? The other is to not be constrained by the advances in technology right now, but to reimagine what it could be. What kind of advances in technology could be available in the future that we do not have now? Both of these tell us that using speculative design is, in a way, to question what is possible.
Designing the future with present technology
When designing for the future with present technology we need to know what technology is already available and how it is being used. Voice recognition, touch screens and electric cars are all something that we see more of in the present that we live in. The technology in our society moves quickly and the human evolution is trying to keep up at its heels. Examples of how we might use the present technology to display an image of the future can be by using smartphones and interactive info screens throughout a city. Depending on what we decide to use them for, we can create something specific, by using digital prototyping techniques such as photo or video rendering programs. Through prototypes we can see our present technology in a future setting.
A while ago me and some others worked on a project where we wanted to display an interactive video throughout a major city. There was no money or time to install new screens solely for the purpose of showing our video. Instead, we needed to see what technology was already available for us to use, so that the project could proceed. Walking around in the city we had chosen gave us a vision of how our project could be implemented in the world already moving around us. Using ad-signs at bus stops or info screens placed at different sights in the city provided us with the displays needed. In this particular example, we could use the already known technology to display our project.
Through the use of rendering programs, working with video or images, we can create a piece of the future, and what it could hold, with the technologies already available. Photo and video rendering programs can make fictional futures concrete and graspable. With the use of special effects and tricks, one can create the illusion of a future not far from the present we are in today. If the wish is to place the present technology in the future, one way of looking at how it could be implemented is to look at how the past technology has been placed in our present. Make it easier to look forward by looking backwards. How did the people in the past imagine the future?
If we take a look at older movies, say from the 1980’s till the 1990’s, where they tried to imagine what the future would hold, there are almost always one thing that they present as being the most valuable and non-dying device. The fax machine. The fax machine was invented more than 150 years ago, and has been looked at as an “idea of instant communication”, according to Jonathan Coopersmith, author of the book Faxed: The Rise and Fall of the Fax Machine, here quoted in an article by BBC about why fax machines are not dead, written in 2015. Maybe this was why, even in the late 90’s, the fax machine was the image of the future of communication. It had been the thing introducing the world to the wonder of instant communication. We can now conclude though, without much research, that the fax machine is now rarely used and ready to be retired. But from this we can now try to make a guess on what the future might hold. People thought that the fax machine would last long in to the future, further away than we are now. This can show that we are not really aware of where technology can travel and what we can do with it. We can guess, and maybe as we go further along towards the future, we can guess more accurately on what technology can do for us in the days ahead.
Re-imagining the future
When using speculative design practices there is a concept and an approach one can use called Design Fiction. “Design fiction as an approach speculates about new ideas through prototyping and storytelling. These are like props or conversation pieces that help speculate, reflect and imagine.” and it is also something that “brings together product design, science fact and science fiction” (Malpass, 2016). Connecting this to what I mentioned in the beginning, by the use of video prototyping we can create impossible situations (impossible in the world and time we live in now) and make them believable. For example in older movies, specifically sci-fi movies, we can see this tool being used. Not for showing a product or a concept, but showing a future that might come. For example, going back to 1989, when the sequel to the famous sci-fi movie Back to the Future was released we can see many elements showing how a possible future could look like from the writers point of view. From flying skateboards to hands-free gaming consoles to wearable technology. Comparing that to the present we live in today, most of the things came true. Air boards, motion based games and smart watches is something that we experience and can use every day. Although, when the movie came out, these things were only considered science fiction.
Continuing, in the TV series Star Trek, from 1966, we can also see technology foreign to the late 1960’s but not as foreign to us in the late 2010’s. Tablet computers, wearable communicators and voice interfaces are examples of what was visible in the Star Trek series. The same, or similar, technology we easily see on a day-to-day basis. The question is, though, are these technologies that are part of our society now created because our evolutionary track made it happen or are they created because we saw it in a movie? If the latter is the case, what is not to say that even the worse set technology advances will come true (and maybe even create a world that we do not want to see)? In an article containing the discussions of a panel called Trek Talks (named from the Star Trek franchise) made up of astronauts from NASA, one can read how the series had influenced and inspired them to pursuit a career in space exploration. If this is possible, what is not to say that the technology in some movies can inspire someone to create something useful to society or maybe even something that will destroy us?
Problems
Above I have presented ways in which using digital prototyping techniques, such as video making, can be appropriate or even desired when designing speculatively. But there are also situations when using digital prototyping techniques can be problematic. As with all things, problems can arise when something is not used properly. With digital prototyping techniques such as video, having lack of skills can ruin the moment of illusion and make-believe. The products or prototypes in the video can be lacking in realness and believability. Other issues with video prototyping is though, if the product or prototype is too believable and could-be-dangerous as, for example, the agonizer in Star Trek. What if, as similar to the NASA astronauts mentioned above, someone feels inspired to create that particular device?
“Your imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions”
- Albert Einstein
Here you can see a quote by Albert Einstein. By using your imagination, you can create the future. This is where the speculative design approach can cause issues. If almost everything we can imagine can come true, as written above, we need to address the issues of the protagonists in the imagined stories of sci-fi, or any other kind of movies. The misuse of the time travelling car in Back to the Future or the agonizer in Star Trek. What if, in some near future, all the not-so-cool gadgets come true? Stephen Hawking said something in the likes of this in an interview with WIRED. He said, “I fear that AI may replace humans altogether. If people design computer viruses, someone will design AI that replicates itself. This will be a new form of life that will outperform humans.”
What if we imagine something that would make human life as we know it replaceable? What if we would imagine something that would break apart our world as we know it? This is where speculative design and design fiction can be problematic. As we have seen above, in the example of the movie Back to the Future, objects or products in movies predicting the future of technology creates a wave of interested parties wanting to make those technology advances true. If however, film makers and other video creators would show us a believable future containing destruction and mayhem, what is to say that no one will try to create just that?
Conclusion
Using the tool of making videos to show a possible future might end up in devices that we could not have invented by ourselves, for good or bad. One has to be careful of what we create in movies, because seeing as many older sci-fi movies have successfully “predicted” future gadgets, we can conclude that anything is possible to create if one only uses his imagination.
References
Published
Malpass, M. (2016). Critical Design Practice: Theoretical Perspectives and Methods of Engagement. The Design Journal, 473-489.
PowerPoint
Nilsson, J. (2018). Video Prototyping [Powerpoint slides].
Websites
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https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096874/?ref_=tt_rec_tt
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https://awakenthegreatnesswithin.com/50-inspirational-quotes-on-the-power-of-your-imagination/
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https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/9810.Albert_Einstein
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https://www.wired.co.uk/article/stephen-hawking-interview-alien-life-climate-change-donald-trump
Quartz. (2016). Here are all the things Star Trek accurately predicted. Retrieved 2018-07-17 from
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http://www.startrek.com/article/trek-talks-nasa-star-trek-boldly-go-at-sdcc