Major Project
Hand Training Product for Adult Piano Amateur [Read more]
Hand Training Product for Adult Piano Amateur
Click is a smart wearable device that can help users warm up their hands by dynamic movements and heating before playing the piano, or guide users to practice their fingers in their spare time by connecting to an APP. The product is comprised of two main parts - a wristband and a hand warmer, which can also maintain a standard hand posture, connected with a keyboard.
Core Problems in Piano Playing
In piano playing, people always find their fingers are not flexible enough when they start to play the piano after a period of lack of practice, especially for adults. Because the arm muscle ligament together with the finger ligament will enter the solidification when the hand is not playing the piano, even just one or two hours. Besides, when in winter, low temperature will also make fingers stiff.
Unlike piano professionals, piano amateurs usually lack the hand warm-up before practice and lack the appropriate finger training in usual. Some people may do the wrong behaviours to activate their fingers like stretching. Sometimes it may hurt their fingers in the long run.
Design Research
After the secondary research like hand movements surveys and ergonomic research, I brainstormed and came up with 20 ideas. With these solutions, I interviewed a total of eight users. The whole primary research process is mainly based on user interviews and competitive product test analysis. In this process, I adopted auto-ethnography, card sorting, scenarios, prototyping, and other methods.
Key Insights
After a series of concept screening, data was collated and analysed using different kinds of comparison tables. Key insights included:
1. Fingers should be trained and warmed up by dynamic movements.
2. Heating can help relieve stiffness.
3. Users prefer products with hand posture correction and professional guidance.
4. The product should be ambidextrous.
Finally, different specifications lead to the initial proposed design.
Design Iteration
During design iteration, I made different kinds of prototypes and conducted lots of evaluations. Some are physical models like wristband structure, supporting structure, keyboard shape, and the final prototypes. Some are graphic prototypes for online evaluation like wrist band appearance, light effect, colour style, and so on. I also made Arduino Prototyping for the basic electronic theory about the connecting between light and button. For material testing, I found some similar products with different materials. I tried to experience these materials and imagine what it will be like in my product. After a series of selection and improvements, my final design "Click" appeared.
Scenarios
Click is not limited to the environment. With or without a platform, users can train their hands in different ways, horizontally or vertically. After wearing the device and turning on, you can press the keys according to the light, and the training lasts for 10 minutes with each hand. Meanwhile, you can also customise the training mode suitable for themselves on the supporting APP. When in winter, you can also press the heating button for hand warming .
Key Functions
Click offers customers a whole new way to activate their fingers. Different from the existing products on the market, it is more in line with the behaviour pattern of playing the piano and can set the most suitable training speed according to the needs. Beyond that, it is not limited to the environment that enables users to train their hands anytime and anywhere.
In addition to warming up people’s hands by dynamic movements, Click also offers a hand warmer to keep hands from becoming stiff because of the cold weather. Besides, the warmer can also help users hold standard hand posture and slightly adjust the hand angle.
USP
In order to fit with more tastes, Click offers customisation service for users’ products. Customers can change the appearance of the product by changing the colour and material of the elastic belt and keyboard cover. Meanwhile, different shapes of the elastic band and different resistance of the keyboard cover can also be selected.
In addition, the supporting APP can provide professional guidance and testing for users. Specifically, the training guidance is based on professional piano basic books like HANON. Meanwhile, users can also personalise the training mode suitable for themselves, such as training time and speed. In order to make the training more interesting, users can also use the APP's music mode to activate fingers with their favourite music.
Yunqin Chen
Every bit of life is the source of my design.
I always believe that design comes from life. During my study in Loughborough Design School in the UK and School of Design and Art in Hunan University in China, I received different design education methods, which increased the breadth and depth of my design thinking and improved my skills in various aspects. I always like to explore and learn different areas of things, which provides me with a constant source of design inspiration. I am keen to find problems and design opportunities from the little things in my life. Design not only enables me to explore life and increase my creativity, but also enables me to know more about the stories behind some small things in life. I enjoy looking for inspiration from design research and talking to different users and also enjoy exploring all the possibilities in design iteration. I love to make all my design work well organised at last as well as present and share it with different people. I am about to start my career as an ID designer, and I hope I can always keep exploring life and being enthusiastic about design all the time.
Major Project
Hand Training Product for Adult Piano Amateur