Actually, in manufacturing companies, Industrial Design has a central role in acquiring competitive advantage. First of all, Industrial Design can improve the quality of new products, differentiating them from competitors’. On the other hand, Industrial Design can shorten the time-to-market, optimizing the design process.
Only a few years ago, the typical design workflow started from handmade sketches, to fix concept ideas, and it ended with final technical drawings. Recently, this workflow has changed because nowadays, CAID softwares are a key tool involved in every step of the design process.
Computer Aided Industrial Design is defined as an activity where engineers, designers and also students, use specialized interactive computer systems as their assisting tools in order to formulate and solve technical design problems and to communicate the resulting problem solution. Therefore CAID should be considered as a human activity performed by designers and doesn’t refer to the system itself.
Nevertheless -looking closely the designers’ work during the design process- a big gap can be observed between the concept idea and the final 3D model. How can we explain this mismatch?
The problem of CAID softwares use is very complex because the Industrial Design is a non-linear process that involves user’s creativity.
Despite the obvious importance of the CAID training for Industrial Designer, existing learning strategies are not fulfilling expectations and needs. The training approach is often based on courses provided by suppliers and based upon a specific software product. This way of learning produces incoherent information and often an ineffective use of available technology.
This approach to software learning reflects on final product design, affecting the shape itself: the software has overcame designer’s idea instead of being a tool in his hand.
The problem of a “software driven” education to Industrial Design is rapidly growing, together with the 3D tools diffusion into small-medium enterprises. However, Industrial Design is a “way of knowing”, with potentialities just partially explored and only recently considered by the scientific community .
Starting from the contributions of Shön, Oxman and Cunliffe that outline the boundaries of design knowledge, the paper will underline the need to redefine the educational tasks of designer instruction, through the shift from an artefact production orientation to a cognitive-constructive approach.
In particular, Computer Graphics studios of Design School at Politecnico di Milano plan a study path which is the clear expression of an “inductive approach” of teaching. Courses are characterized by the presence of both theory and practice, often integrated inside specific learning unit. In this way the 3D model becomes the device to explore and learn theoretical issues, methods and tools.
The final goal is to obtain a workflow more designer-centered and tool-independent.