Beyond Storyboard_Tay Kim by Tay Kim

BEYOND STORYBOARD Storyboarding as Front-End Research Tools by Learning from Comics

TAE YONG KIM master of european design / 2014 Glasgow school of ART

Beyond Storyboard Storyboarding as Front-End Research Tools by Learning From Comics

Kim, Tae Yong (Tay) Master of European Design Thesis / 2014

In writing my thesis, I have contracted many debts. I should like to thank my two supervisors, Stuart Bailey and David Sweeney, for encouraging me to think more about the topic and then offering constant assistance while this thesis was being written. I appreciate all the interviewees and research participants who shared their precious time and experience to the thesis work. Finally, I would like to thank my family members and loved ones, my wife and two daughters for their patience and support!

Contents 1. Introduction

Visual Design Methods and Tools 2.1.

Changes in Product Design

2.2.

Visuals

2.3.

Narratives

2.4.

What do ‘story’ and ‘visual’ have to do with design

3. Storyboards

3.1.

What is storyboard

3.2.

Storyboard in design process

3.3.

Develop – Deliver phase

3.4.

Discover – Define phase

Beyond Storyboard

4.1.

Storyboard as research tool in the front end of design process

4.2.

Learning from Comics

4.3.

Testing the hypothesis

5. Conclusion Bibliography References Electronic sources Unpublished sources Figures

1. Introduction We live in a rapidly changing world, and this rapidly changing world requires the constant rethinking of our engagement with the world. One of the means we use for this is design, which is, in its very nature, a function and agent of change. The very definition of ‘product design’ has changed as the distinction between the digital and physical are blurred; more and more tangible products are being connected with intangible services from mobile phones to cars, and also from thermostats to houses. In these changes, the scope of product designers’ work has moved away from the design of objects into the design of services and experiences. With the change of product design comes a new way of working. Today, designers are required to communicate complex systems of product features as well as the interaction between users and these products. Designers have used diverse tools and methods in order to design their complex products and services, ensuring they are working on the needs of users in during the design process. These tools come from a variety of fields, such as marketing, anthropology and psychology and so on (Sanders, 2012). For designers, ‘visual’ language is an essential part of design, many design tools and methods consist of visual and word combinations. Storyboards are one of many visual-based methods which are employed in diverse fields of design. The storyboard is a great medium for communicating the interaction between users and products (Buxton, 2007). They are used to depict the flow of a story and to propose ideas to stakeholders in the latter phases of the design process. However, there is not enough research focused on storyboard methods in the front-end design phases. This is the area that my thesis project engages with

The aim of this research is to provide an overview of storyboards based on design professionals’ interviews and related findings from desk research, before moving on to discuss how it can be used as a research tool. The study will focus on its potentials as generative research tools and engagement technique with non-designers, while exploring and learning from ‘language of comics’. By doing this, the thesis will seeks to open up a new perspective of storyboard in design process, based on the research findings and insights.

â&#x20AC;&#x153; Designers are required to communicate complex systems of product features as well as the interaction between users and these products. â&#x20AC;&#x153;

2. Visual Design Methods/ Tools HELLO, I’M TAY KIM A PRODUCT DESIGNER.

THESE INTANGIBLE PRODUCTS ARE AS IMPORTANT AS TANGIBLE ONES.

THEY ARE REQUIRED TO DESIGN WITH THE COMPLEXITY. HOW...

OF COURSE, I DESIGN FOR OBJECTS, BUT...

CONNECTED PRODUCTS INCREASED COMPLEXITY OF INFORMATION.

ALSO, I DESIGN USER EXPERIENCE & SERVICES.

ALSO DESIGNERS CO-WORK WITH A BROADER RANGE OF PEOPLE!

VISUALS AND NARRATIVES CAN HELP WITH THE COMPLEXITY.

2.1. Changes in Product Design When we say ‘product design’ people may have a restricted idea of this process: that idea is inadequate because the field has expanded dramatically. Still there are many people who understand ‘product design’ just as a synonym of ‘industrial design’. The design of products is no longer restricted to form, function, material and production. Design is now focused on the interaction between people and technology, and products serve as platforms for experiences, functionality and service offerings (Buchanan, 2001). As Buchanan indicates, the scope of products has expanded beyond the simply physical. Nowadays the focus of product designers has moved away from physical objects to experience (or user experience) which becomes one of the most common terms in the fields of interaction design, service design, and of course user experience (UX) design and so on. All of these can be incorporated under the umbrella of a “user-centred design” approach (Keinonen, 2008). Much has been written about user-centred design (UCD) and its importance to the product design process. I see myself, for example, as a user-centred product designer and the scope of ‘product’ in my previous projects is not limited only to the design of physical objects, but more on people-centric practices; these include designing services for mental patients’ recovery process and improving in-car entertainment experience. For me products are enablers to supports peoples’ experience whether tangible or intangible forms. Now my perspective of product design is more on people as users. However, this development has increased the level of complexity, because the people-centric approach is not a simple task to access their hidden needs. Moreover, with the development of technology, we live in a more connected world than ever before. That connectivity increased both the accessibility and the complexity of information. Complexity is an inherent challenge in all levels of our life, from one’s new

smartphone user-experience (UX) to government’s policy-making process. More designers needed to collaborate with other people from outside of design fields. Today, designing these complex and connected products or experiences requires a cocreative mindset. (Philips, 2012) A successful product design project also requires integrating stakeholders as early as possible in the project development process. (Stickdorn et al. 2011) Therefore, designers needed to break free from the strictures of their own expertise and open themselves up to a multidisciplinary way of working. Innovating with a broad range of stakeholders — from scientists and economists to psychologists and potential users as well — can increase their chances of success. Through co-creating with a wider audience, they could find new pathways to the most compelling solution to the complexity. In this change, the expectation of product design is higher than ever before and designers are urged to challenge complex issues in our society. There are emerging interests and experimentation on ‘design’ in order to challenge the complexity. Tim Brown, CEO of the well-known design firm IDEO, claims that design is not just about creating elegant objects. In one presentation on TED, he says that we need new products that balance the needs of individuals and society as a whole; new ideas that tackle the global challenges of health, poverty, and education (Brown, 2009).

2.2. Visuals Can visualization help us live with complexity? As can be seen in the above, design, as a creative problem-solving tool, has expanded its boundary. Since designers have worked with users or clients from outside of the design fields, they are required to communicate the complexities of their findings and ideas from the beginning to the end of design phases. As designers, we enjoy the journey of discovery, in making relationships between intangible ideas or data and the formal elements that make an idea or data accessible in design process (Baskinger et al. 2006). One way to grapple with the developing complexity of the world, and of the role of design, is with visualization methods. Evert Lindquist (2011), a professor of public administration at the University of Victoria, Canada represents a growing number of people trying to make sense out of the visualization revolution. He writes, in a paper on the subject: “In the 21st century there has been widespread recognition that complexity is a challenge in public policy development… One way to grapple with complexity is with visualization in order to engage staff and communities in recognizing complexity and identifying strategic directions.” - Lindquist, E. (2011)

It is no wonder that visuals come before words. The child sees and understands visual language before it can speak (Berger, 1997). Visualization is, seemingly, an unproblematic and accessible medium for communication. It is vital to see differences between visual language and spoken language. Horn (1998) wrote one of the first compressive books about visual practice called Visual Language: global communication for the 21st century. He defines visual language as the integration of words, images,

Figure 1. Leonardo da Vinci’s sketches

and shapes into a single communication unit. Early inventors and designers such as Leonardo da Vinci, have, throughout history, used visual language as a basic tool to aid thinking (see figure 1). Journals or notebooks become the place for having meetings with yourself and developing your skills in visual language. Leonardo da Vinci used his notebooks as methods and tools to help his ‘visual’ thinking process. However, today’s designers use the visual methods and tools more for communicating with other people. The visualization and visual language like drawing or sketching is natural for designers, because they have an inherent talent or are educated as visual thinker. The main intent behind any visualization is to capture and document the thing being visualised, in order to allow for a better communication of the product and the idea. Designers’ language drawing is not used only for illustrating ideas, but more importantly in order to ’express’ their ideas from their thinking process (Brown, 2009). They are good at visualization for turning data or ideas into visual information to make it more accessible to a wider audience. Designers’ ways of visualization have many forms. As a product designer myself, I also use diverse visual languages from doodles in my notebook, to concept sketches and infographics.

2.3. Narratives

- Cochran, Larry R. (1990).

“ Humans explore their worlds through story. ”

EXPOSITION

LIN

ION

CLIMAX L FA

A journalist Robert Wright (2000) mentions the importance of storytelling in his provocative book Nonzero, in which he suggests that our consciousness, language, and society has developed an intimate relationship with technologies of storytelling throughout the 4000-year history of human society. In addition, Larry R. Cochran (1990), a professor of Psychology at the University of British Columbia, points out how we live in story. In his writing, he argues that individuals are born into the stories of their family and community, and continue articulating these stories until they die. He also suggests that stories are metaphors for life: They have a beginning, a middle, and an end. He says,

All celebrated authors seem to have mastered this structure, arranging their writings in five acts to include an exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and a final outcome. These five acts attract us to engage with stories. In addition, many researchers found that storytelling evokes a strong neurological response. Paul Zak’s (2012) research tells that our brains produce the stress and the relaxation hormone during different moments in a story structure, which allows us to focus on the moment and empathize with the story.

AC T

We explain things through narratives. Storytelling is one of many abilities what differentiates human beings from animals (Mankell, 2011). No matter what discipline we’ve learned, no matter where we live in, storytelling has a central place in our lives, and an anthropologist John D. Niles refers to this as Homo Narrans (Niles, 1999). Stories have been told throughout history. There are numerous stories across different cultures and generations, such as Bible and Aesop’s fables, which are just some of many widely known examples in history, of ways that man has attempted to locate his place in the world. Still we rely on stories to put our ideas into context and give them meaning.

It is true that we share our experience through stories, whether they are verbal or written forms, and people are attracted to the stories. In order to understand the nature of story, it is necessary to first look into its structure. Stories and even short narratives have a certain flow and structure which allows readers or listener to feel involved with the stories. There are many frameworks to explain how stories are structured. We can analyse any story into smaller parts. According to Freytag’s Pyramid, any story can be divided into five parts, or acts, which some refer to as a dramatic arc as shown in the figure 2 (Sykes, 2012).

ING

It is no wonder that visuals help designers’ communication because it is the DNA of the design discipline. In this chapter, I describe another form of medium - narratives or stories - to support the design process.

Stories also help us to understand ourselves and other people, help us make sense of the world and enable us to communicate our experiences and understandings with others. (Merriam, 2009)

RIS

Can Storytelling help with Complexity?

FINAL OUTCOME

Figure 2. Pyramid of Freytag’s (1863) - structure of story

2.4. Visuals and Stories What do ‘Visuals’ and ‘Stories’ have to do with Design? We all know that people use stories to make sense of the world, to communicate, and to influence other people. Hence, it is not difficult to see that designers apply storytelling into their practices. Brown (2009) mentions that the human capacity for storytelling plays an important role in user-centred design approaches. Stories in their many forms (film, novel, comics) continue to influence and delight us. Designers also adopted the value of storytelling, but more importantly, developed the medium of storytelling into ‘visual’ formats — ‘visual stories’. As demonstrated above, people understand visual information much better than they do words or numbers. Hence, for designers, it is natural enough that they use visual stories to communicate with others. In my research interviews, one User Experience Design Manager at Robert Bosch stated that an importance of visualization in the design process. “ Visualized concept scenarios [stories] have the advantage of becoming a document for creating shared vision within the design team, and for better communicating the value of a design to clients. ” - Shilpa Bhat at Robert Bosch, personal interview.

The Illustrated scenarios are one of many examples which show how designers shaped the storytelling into the form of visualization method. These kinds of methods that combine visual and story are observable elsewhere in different design processes. As we have seen, there are many design methods to support their various design processes. Designers need methods and tools to assist their reflection (Bødker et al. 2000).

This perhaps leads us to a question: which ones are the appropriate methods to deal with the complexity of product experience and the multidisciplinary way of working? However, there is no simple rule about determining what research methods and tools to employ into a certain phase of the design process. This question is not answerable in any simplistic way. According to the article of Boess et al. (2007), storytelling can also be visualized in a storyboard in which you can explore and explain the use of your product or service to others. In my experience, while practicing and studying design, I see ‘storyboard’ as one of the great methods that brings benefits of both visual and storytelling into different design phases. In my projects, storyboards help me in different ways from presenting ideas to explaining the design process itself. However, when conducting the literature review, there are not enough approaches to explore the value of storyboards as design methods, while user journey and blueprinting is one of the most researched topics in that sense. In the following section, I will focus closely on the storyboards in design as well as on how storyboards are applied as valuable methods to support the different phases of the design process.

â&#x20AC;&#x153; The designersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; skills in visualization had a positive influence in motivating stakeholder participation and stimulating creativity among people from non-design backgrounds.â&#x20AC;&#x153; - Han, Q. (2009) -

3. Storyboards STORYBOARD IS A GREAT TOOL THAT COMBINES VISUAL & STORY.

HOW DO THEY USE THE STORYBOARD IN THEIR PRACTICES?

MANY DESIGNERS USE THE TOOL TO PRESENT FINAL OUTCOMES.

I’M NOT SAYING EVERYTHING SHOULD BE DONE IN STORYBOARD

FOR DESIGNERS, IT IS ONE OF MANY GREAT TOOLS. AND THEY USE THE STORYBOARD IN DIFFERENT WAYS!

SO, I TALKED WITH SEVERAL PROFESSIONAL DESIGNERS IN THE FIELD.

ALSO USE IN RESEARCH PHASE.

AND MORE DIFFERENT PHASES, THE TOOL TAKES MANY ROLES!

3.1. What is storyboard Storyboards are all around us. Companies everywhere are already using storyboards for manuals, home pages, information booklets, and more. They tell their stories and sell their message through storyboards, comics and other forms of graphic storytelling. It is already in every aspect our daily life. IKEA and LEGO have used illustrations for their construction manuals because they require manuals that are easy to translate and can be followed by anybody very easily (see figure 3). IKEA and LEGO’s manuals are just some of many graphic storytelling formats are around us. In this way, we become familiar with visual storytelling - storyboards. The term ‘storyboard’ is used in the diverse fields as well as in product design, so sometimes it seems it’s more a buzzword than a commonly understood idea. To understand it better and to understand the method behind it, we first need to go back in history a bit. Storyboards originated from the movie and advertising industry. Storyboards are a well-known tool in the film and animation making process and in the world of advertising: they have been used in diverse formats for almost as long as film and animation have existed (Hart, 1998). According to Christopher Finch in The Art of Walt Disney (1999), storyboarding was first used by Walt Disney for the 1928 animation film, Plane Crazy. Their animators drew up panel-to-panel drawings, to communicate how the characters were to appear before the development of the film. For filmmakers, storyboards are defined as pre-visualization techniques as below (Katz, 1991).

“ ...illustrations displayed in sequence for the purpose of pre-visualizing an animated or live-action film. It is essentially a large comic of the film or some section of film produced beforehand to help the directors

and cinematographers visualize the scenes and find potential problems before they occur. ” - Katz, S. (1991)

In the filmmaking process, storyboards are used as a step in the making process, in other words, not an outcome or a final product itself. The point is that storyboarding in the film industry is different from storyboards in design. In the following part, I will discuss first how designers define the storyboards and how they use the tools in different way in the design process. There are some attempts to provide a definition of what is a storyboard in a diverse range of design fields, such as, product design, UX and HCI (Human Computer Interaction) and so on. According to Truong et al. (2006), storyboards are defined as a process of describing a user’s interaction with the system over time through a series of graphical depictions and textual narrative. In general, storyboards consist of sketches or pictures which provide a quick and easy visual description of a product scenario in a particular sequence of events (Buxton, 2007). The method has many formats and styles and is now widely used in different design phases as a communication medium. In the initial phase of the research, I tried to define what the storyboard is about in product design. However, it was too broad to limit the method into one sentence, and my attempt is an on-going process that will not end anytime soon. It is, as most things are, a developing narrative.

Personally, my interest in storyboards has started from my own experience of, and observation of the existing practices in the field of product design. Storyboards have supported my design processes a lot while studying and practicing design. Most of my storyboards (see figure 4) consisted of several panels that illustrate, almost like comic strips, the sequence of events a user might experience in using a newly purchased electronic device, controlling a household robot, or browsing a website etc., Figure 3. IKEA, assembly manual

Figure 4. Storyboards in my previous projects

STORYBOARD IS A GREAT TOOL THAT COMBINES VISUAL & STORY.

I’M NOT SAYING EVERYTHING SHOULD BE DONE IN STORYBOARD

STORYBOARD IS A GREAT TOOL THAT COMBINES VISUAL & STORY.

I’M NOT SAYING EVERYTHING SHOULD BE DONE IN STORYBOARD

FOR DESIGNERS, IT IS ONE OF MANY GREAT TOOLS. AND THEY USE THE STORYBOARD FOR DESIGNERS, IT IS ONE OF IN DIFFERENT WAYS! MANY GREAT TOOLS. AND THEY USE THE STORYBOARD IN DIFFERENT WAYS!

SO, I TALKED WITH SEVERAL PROFESSIONAL DESIGNERS IN THE FIELD. HOW DO THEY USE As it mentioned earlier, the distinction between THE STORYBOARD IN the physical and digital has become blurred. More WITH SEVERAL PROFESSIONAL DESIGNERS IN THE FIELD. THEIR PRACTICES? SO, I TALKED HOWare DOrequired THEY USEto deal with complex product designers THE STORYBOARD IN as the flow of systems of product features as well THEIR PRACTICES?

experience between users and these products. In this change, designers needed an appropriate medium to deal with time. Storyboards are considered as a great medium for communicating the complex interactions by combining the benefits of visuals and story in time. Tim Brown, CEO at a design consultancy IDEO, claims that this point in his book, Design By Change (2009), MANY DESIGNERS USE THE TOOL TO PRESENT FINAL OUTCOMES.

Andrew Young Creative Director SNOOK

ALSO USE IN RESEARCH PHASE. László Herczegh Design Director Fuelfor ALSO USE IN RESEARCH PHASE.

MANY DESIGNERS USE THE TOOL “ TO Designing time is a little different from PRESENTwith FINAL OUTCOMES.

designing in space, the design thinker has to be comfortable moving along both of these axes. ” - Brown. T. (2009)

In this part of deepening the topic, I will share research findings about designers’ storyboarding in their current practices as well as trying to explore the potential values of the method in the latter part.

Shilpa Bhat Design Manager BOSCH

Mike Walker Junior Planner PLAN

AND MORE DIFFERENT PHASES, THE TOOL TAKES MANY ROLES! Justin Kim Chieh Hwei Service Designer

Design Director

ENGINEDIFFERENTPHILIPS AND MORE PHASES, THE TOOL TAKES MANY ROLES!

Figure 5. Interviewees’ position and companies

3.2. Storyboard in design process There are no obvious phases in which the designers should use the storyboard in the design process. Storyboarding can be a useful method in several design phases, including the research phase, the design communication or documentation phase. This section will examine the uses of storyboarding in the current design practice. Why do product designers use storyboard? And what do their storyboards look like? These are the hardest questions to answer because (of course) it depends on many factors. In my research and observation, I found that the storyboard takes many forms. In practice, designers use the storyboards in different ways and in different design phases. Some designers use their storyboards as a final deliverable to show their ideas in timeline in executive presentations, while some use it as a process tool like its use in film making process. In order to know design professionals’ views and experiences in their current projects, I initiated contacts with several professional designers in the wide are of the product design field. A mix of designers with product and service-based products agreed to take part in this research. The interviewee’s positions ranged from an entry-level designer, and a mid-level project manager to a design director. Their company sizes also varied from design consultancies to in-house design teams. Their companies originate from UK (Plan, Engine, Snook), Germany (Bosch) and Singapore (Philips, Fuelfor), and all are well-known companies in their field (see ficure 5). Many interesting findings were collected in the conversation with professional designers and their in-depth experience of using different design methods. From the interviews, I could see for myself how storyboards can be applied at different stages of the design process with my own eyes. In order to explore and to discuss their different views and practices

of storyboarding, it will be helpful to represent the findings into one of general design process. The ‘double diamond’ design process model is a widely understood in product and service design field introduced by UK Design Council (2005). The process model divided into these four phases from the beginning to the end of the process: Discover, Define, Develop, and Deliver.

Discover

Define

Develop

Deliver

Figure 6. The Double Diamond design process model (UK Design Council, 2005)

3.3. Develop - Deliver phase This is the latter half of the design process where a product is developed, and then presented to the clients. This stage is one of the most common and typical places for storyboards as communication medium in development process or final presentations. This is why I start to discuss this latter phase first. Unlike storyboards in filmmaking, in the fields of product and service design, a typical use of storyboards is to present final design outcomes or specific solutions. One interviewee exactly points out an importance of the tool as a communication medium. In the interview, Chieh Hwei, Design Director at Philips Design Singapore, stated that:

“ We found storyboarding is one of very useful tools we used in scenario creation phases. This visual description of a product helps design team or other people to understand our design solution in compelling ways. ” - Chieh Hwei at Philips Design, personal interview

As he notes, the main role of storyboarding is to present or to refine ideas with others. The tool allows stories about user experiences to be brought to ‘the people’ in the design process. In another interview, Mike Walker, Junior Design Planner at Plan, shares his experience of the tool during both university and work. He views storyboard as a tool that helps to communicate the use of service products or interactions through engaging stories in visually compelling ways. He said,

“ … also used for communicating intangible and abstract user experience with other team members.

A low-fidelity of storyboard about a user and context enabled an in-depth analysis as well as a source for pre-visualizing a photographic storyboard. … I usually use A3 or A4 sheets with six panels, and in the development process one panel can be expanded into another 6 panels by adding more details. ” - Mike Walker at Plan, personal interview

Applied as such, storyboard as a communication tool allows a deeper analysis of certain points of user experience. This aspect of storyboard is one of main benefits. Shilpa Bhat, Design Manager at Robert Bosch said that their team also apply storyboards in this development phase. Once designers (researchers) are gathered together for a project meeting, there needs to be a process for selecting the product ideas that are strongest and hold the greatest promise. In this process, storyboards, in the form of scenario-based doodles, help this session while sharing everyone’s thoughts. There are so many different ways and qualities to storyboard. Stick figures and doodles are fine, because they also tell stories. Designers don’t need to be able to draw an anatomy of the body to effectively story tell. Andrew Young at Snook, Creative Director and Service Designer at Snook, mentioned that designers can make storyboard with cut-out images from magazines or using skilled computer graphic techniques. He said that it is all about being creative in the ways that they do that. However, when storyboards are created in this communication or presentation process, the fidelity and quality of storyboards is highly important. Doodles and stick figures are fine for communication purpose within a design team, however generally they are not as effective styles in client presentations. Anything a designer present to stakeholders is likely

Motivating patients to see a better future There is an opportunity to intervene early and make

patients believe in their future care

Experience & Emotion Anticipation: The Transfer Ticket uses the the metaphor of travel

Patient journ shows releva contact deta of past and future clinics

to evoke the positive thoughts associated with reaching a travel destination. The details displayed on the card help the patient’s future vision as they anticipate the next step in their care.

A sense of belonging: Making the referral more tangible and materially

Scenario 1

to have more polish than internal communication documents. To create a visually compelling storyboard at the latter parts of the design process, sometimes designers need to have some level of adequate or professional drawing skills. However, not all designer have strong drawing skills. Sometimes the storyboarding can be a timeconsuming job in this especially ‘busy’ project delivery phase. Justin Kim, Service Designer at Engine Service Design, says that they often work with external professional illustrators to create highquality storyboards at the end of the project phases (see figure 8). He also pointed out why applying storyboards can be a better choice in terms of project budget.

valuable makes the patient feel considered as an individual. The patient feels like they are being reached out to and have a place to belong within their new destination.

HOSPITAL

Emergency Conta

National Crisis Nu

01019 5202

Mon-Fri 09-06, Sat 15-0

Feeling secure: Lauri has been treated in inpatient care by Nurse Sue since 2005

Sun 15-22

The hospitals They have a meeting where they Whenever the patient is out isofdeciding carethat surroundings

Crisis Prevention F Foreigners

his care into the they can look at their ticket and feel securecontinuing - when next step.

Weekdays 9-15

Nurse Sue has been with Lauri through the whole of his treatment in his current ward. Nurse Sue knows lauri best.

Lauri is ready to move forward. .

inform Lauri about his options and together make a plan for

noone else is there, the ticket is with the patient. The practical function of the card gives added security by offering advice and contact details.

Nurse Sue confirms Lauri's place in the next step in his care. Now Lauri just has to wait. Lauri and Nurse Sue begin

094135 0501

The ticket st emergency c and is kept b patient

Lauri waits for a while as the preparations are being made. Lauri leaves.

to make preparation for Lauri's Sami’s Transfer Journey Using Transfer Ticket: leaving day.

“ Compare to other formats such as short film and animation, I think storyboarding is a more costeffective tool. Involving freelance illustrators in the last week of the design process allows us save a lot of time and money. ” - Justin Kim at Engine, personal interview

Figure 7. Mike’s storyboarding in Develop and Deliver phase

Referral Request Process:

Referral Request

Clinic A

Negotiating meeting times via telephone or Pegasos

Figure 8. Engine’s storyboard in Deliver phase / © Engine

User Inspired Design ‘11: Design and Psychiatric

Project by: Tamara Amalia, Sanna Tuononen, Otto S Professor: Turkka Keinonen

In addition, storyboards, as opposed to against other tools available, it doesn’t even require that much time in comparison. In the figure 9, this bar graph shows a modified chart of one created by Vertelney, L. et al. that illustrates how much skills and resources are required by some of these tools (Vertelney, 1990). The chart is a bit dated, as skills such as prototyping have become significantly easier, but as you can see, creating storyboards is one of the cheapest options. There are hundreds of design tools that designers use in the design process. One of the service designer’s jobs is to make intangible service features into tangible formats, journey map, persona, or storyboards become more important tools (Visser, 2013). In many cases, designers generate a storyboard by casting personas in stories to show the benefits of the solutions in terms of a certain character of the story. The value of storyboards can be maximized when it is combined with other relevant design tools. Andrew Young at Snook, considers storyboarding as one of the most useful tools across different projects and in design phases. He indicated,

“ … Design tools are almost like a jigsaw puzzle. For example, if you use storyboard together with persona, journey map, or something else, then you can dig-in to create quite coherent presentations. This certainly allows your audiences to really understand what you are doing. ” - Andrew Young at Snook, personal interview

As he, states the tool has a lot of possibility for customization to support the presentation while merging other design tools. For instance, if a designer shares storyboard in the client presentation without first providing a context about who the character is, or who the user is, or what the product

is, it can be difficult for audiences to follow. (see figure 10, 11) Likewise, storyboarding from my own experiences, helped as a presentation medium. The tool was a great advantage, because the most of my product concepts were complicated. When the audiences and clients see the concepts in “visual stories”, they are more committed to understand than if they were reading it from text.

“Storyboards not only help the product designer to get a grip on target groups, context, product use and timing, but also in communication about these aspects with people involved in development.” - Lelie, C. (2006)

One downfall of Lelie’s study on storyboarding is that it focuses simply on the basics of the development process and not enough about the research phase. In my opinion, the storyboard in user research phase is just as important as the project development itself. This point will be explored in the next chapter.

SCRIPTS

*SKILLS AND RESOURCES NEEDED

DRAWINGS STORYBOARDS WIREFRAMES VIDEO ANIMATION INTERACTIVE PROTOTYPE SOME

A LOT

Figure 9. Comparing with other tools (Vertelney, 1990)

ROLE OF STORYBOARD

Figure 10. Snook’s storyboards in ‘Bridge’ project / © SNOOK

DESIGN PROCESS

Figure 11. Snook’s storyboards at presentation / © SNOOK

3.4. Discover - Define phase This phase is first half of the design process. It begins with a broad range of research to explore and to interpret more about user needs or hidden problems and other related issues, such as market or technology, and so on. In this phase, a designer takes many roles, acting as a researcher and a facilitator while involving various people: users or potential users, field experts, and stakeholders including clients. Lots of tools and techniques are available to conduct research and start the design process. Storyboard is one of them. From the reading and the qualitative interviews, I found that there are two categorizations of storyboarding application in this front-end process: involvement and inspiration.

has frequently been used as one of the tools in the user research phase. They also call storyboard as “sacrificial concept” which is scenario-based questions with ‘very’ initial ideas (Ideo, 2009). Shilpa pointed out why storyboarding is a powerful tool to communicate early ideas to potential users.

“ When I conducted the user search the tool was very useful because the moment that people looked at the storyboard they were able to relate to the idea. Suddenly future users could criticize or appreciate certain things about it. People tended to be more imaginative when they look at the comic strips.” - Shilpa Bhat at Robert Bosch, personal interview

The first application of storyboard in this phase is to involve the users or stakeholders in order to get valuable insights prior to the product development phase. Design literature in the field of traditional product design has said relatively little about the stakeholders, while much is written and argued about the ‘end-user’ perspectives (Keinonen, 2009). Collaboration with stakeholders was a bit of an unfamiliar task to designers in the past, both when the scope of the product was narrow and when it was not.

As she noted, the nature of storyboarding is helpful for enabling users to engage with the research. Designers can share ideas just simply sketching and doodling them out and they can imagine the scenario as a designer. However, sometimes when they are talking to non-designers who could be customers or sales managers, etc., designers often have difficulties when they communicate their ideas with non-designers. The flow of the story can make them more involved into the design research.

Today, however, collaboration and stakeholder involvement become essential tasks for designers, because of the intangible and complicated nature of product and service design as was pointed out in the introduction of the thesis. By involving both users and stakeholders directly, the chance of success was much higher from my experience and observations.

As discussed above, one of the main values of storyboarding in user research phase is to create a dialogue between the designer and the user. Design researchers already know that face-to-face, opened and semi-structured interviews (Carspecken, 1996) are important methods of data collection in the research phase.

Storyboard can be a powerful medium in this user or stakeholder involvement. One of my interviewees, Shilpa Bhat, Design Manager at Robert Bosch, shared her experience of storyboarding in their recent project. In their design process, storyboarding

In my experience, I used the tool to encourage conversation with former psychiatric patients in Helsinki (Kim, 2012). In this project, I found that conducting interviews with vulnerable user group needed different strategy approach in term of

participants’ perspectives. My colleagues and I created a set of storyboard cards as an engagement research tool. The storyboard-set was to get rid of the stereotyped images of the mental patients, as well as to develop sensitivity in listening to other people and understanding their experience. The tool became a light and playful medium for the dialogue between designers and participants. Like this case, storyboarding can support a dialogic process in more engaging ways.

Figure 12. Storyboarding for Sacrificial concept / Robert Bosch

In the same ways, more designers use storyboard formats when they facilitate workshops with non-designers. Today, designers are seeking and experimenting with new tools and methods for their human-centred design processes (Sanders, 2005). In this process, the storyboard can do far more than just its role as a communication medium. Through the process of their creation, and the conversations that they facilitate, they can also be a key driver for problem framing and inspiration (Buxton, 2007). László Herczegh, a founding partner and Design Director at Fuelfor, apply the storyboarding tool in many ways for collaborating with non-designers. László has worked as a product and interaction designer in the healthcare industry for over 15 years. In his experience of collaboration with nondesigners, sometime he asks workshop participants to share their stories and ideas in visual forms: doodles or drawings. He mentioned in the interview,

“ …I recognize very often, drawing is a big worry for non-designers when they’re asked to express their ideas or stories into drawings. ” - László Herczegh at Fuelfor, personal interview

Figure 13. Storyboards for dialogue – MindMate, a recovery support for mental patients

For this reason, they are often required to generate ‘toolkits’ in order to support non-designer’s

storyboarding process. For instance, the Fuelfor team experimented with a visual-storytelling ‘toolkit’ when they facilitated design thinking workshop for healthcare professionals in Singapore. The workshop was planned to introduce healthcare industry professionals to the design methods, tools and value of using design thinking for healthcare innovation. In order to achieve the goal, the team generated a ‘Story-Set’ which consisted of paper dolls to help their co-design workshop. The tool was beneficial material as engagement tool for supporting nondesigner’s storyboarding process (see figure 14).

Figure 14. Story-Set toolkit/ © Fuelfor

In addition, Andrew Young at Snook agreed with this aspect of storyboarding as a tool for active engagement activity, and he mentioned,

“ I think storyboarding is fantastic tools for engaging with people. We encourage everybody we work with to tell their own stories. Even if they can’t draw a simple stick figure in the storyboard, it still can give them something to refer to their ideas. ” – Andrew Young at Snook, personal interview.

Another category of storyboard uses in the first half of the design process is to inspire or to verify designers themselves. In this early design phase

the designers try to get a holistic idea of the user, the stakeholder and the environment of use. They then want to work independently and interpret the subject in order to create the surprising insights, which are demanded in ‘designerly’ thinking (Schön, 1983). Storyboarding also supports this designer’s reflective thinking process: interpreting and synthesizing what they found in the early research phase. The Design Director at Fuelfor, László Herczegh, explained storyboarding as a reflective tool for user research in a sensitive field such as a hospital or a hospice. On one occasion, their team conducted design research in rehabilitation clinics, in which they were denied permission to take photographs or to employ any other recording medium. So designers had to prepare tools, in order to help record the research process, what they actually see for the visit. The field research team consisted of one design researcher who conducted interviews and he has an observer. To observe and record findings visually, the designers created a flow template which they could just sketch some kinds of cartoon - different boxes for different steps (see figure 15). By using this technique, they were observing and synthesizing at the same time, and more importantly, they could verify their findings with people through the quick sketches or cartoons.

“ I immediately show the storyboards to doctors and nurses who I was observing, then chat whether this is right what I observed and what I recorded… Is it actually right? … Did I focus right things? … Did I miss something? …” – László Herczegh at Fuelfor, personal interview

In all field research, it is very important to document what a designer or a researcher observed during the interview and the visit. As he indicated above, if designers see findings from ‘photographed’ scenes in the definition phase, they can see everything, every single details which may not be relevant for them. When designers see their own sketches or cartoons, it can actually inspire themselves as well as being an efficient medium in the synthesis process.

Figure 15. Storyboarding frame for field research/ © Fuelfor

What László and their team did is to sketch or cartoon in real time what is happening. He explained that it was a really fluent process, as instant verification of designers’ findings. In his experience, he found that the sketches and cartoons in this sequential flow could be a better ‘documentation’ tool. Again, he stated in the interview,

“ … It was out of necessity, but actually we found it was really powerful and I see it is sort of storyboarding. In the photograph, you can see everything you can see contexts, also you can see what the actions and what is happening. In some way, you would need to synthesize it after the field research to cut out everything in the photographs that are not relevant for your interest. ” – László Herczegh at Fuelfor, personal interview

â&#x20AC;&#x153; User roles may vary from proactive participation where users contribute to solving and framing design challenges to passive roles where designers instead interpret user data without any direct engagement with the user. â&#x20AC;? - Keinonen, T. (2009)

4. Beyond Storyboards IN THE EARLY DESIGN PHASE, STORYBOARDS ARE USED FOR ENGAGEMENT TOOL WITH OTHERS. NON-DESIGNERS

BUT, MANY NON-DESIGNERS HAVE FEAR OF DRAWING!

HOW CAN WE HELP THEIR STORYBOARDING PROCESS?

I CAN’T DRAW. ...I’M NOT A DESIGNER! MY DRAWING ISN’T NICE TO SHOW TO OTHERS...

... HOW CAN WE BRIDGE THE GAP BETWEEN THEM? ... IS THERE ANY KIND 0F TOOL TO SUPPORT NON-DESIGNERS’ DRAWING?

COMICS ARE A POWERFUL COMBINATION OF WORDS AND VISUALS. AND THEY CAN BRING ADVANTAGES TO STORYBOARD!

STORYBOARD CAN BE MORE POWERFUL AND ACCESSIBLE TOOL BY LEARNING FROM COMICS.

COMICS ARE A POWERFUL COMBINATION OF WORDS AND VISUALS. AND THEY CAN BRING ADVANTAGES TO STORYBOARD!

4.1. Storyboard as research tool in the front end of design process This chapter described the storyboard used in different design process for professional designers. Different design processes have different styles and characteristics of analysing, developing, communicating, or involving other people in storyboard uses. In the interviews, I found that the tool has many roles. One of the most interesting aspects of storyboards is that it can be employed as an engagement and reflection tool with nondesigners in the early design phases. As it can be seen in the figure 16, there was a clear distinction between storyboarding for discovering and storyboarding for presentation. This finding was really an eye-opener, knowing what great potential storyboards have and how important it is to involve the users or stakeholders that are confronted with a designed project or service. In other words, the potential value of storyboards is in the discovering phase, used as a tool to express stories of the users or stakeholders. As can be seen in the previous section, it is easier and more fun for the non-designers to articulate their experiences relevant to a particular objective in a workshop, by storyboarding it. This is where the value of storyboarding for an active engagement with non-designers lies. However, in the literature review on narrative/ story-based user research tools, I was surprised that there are few articles on such methods. Scenarios and storyboards are widely used methods in the design process, but they are usually created by the designers, not by the participants (Diana et al. 2009). The non-designers tend to hesitate at drawing their ideas in comparison to designers. Of course, it is no wonder that visualization is the key characteristic of the sketching process for designers (Buxton, 2007). Some cognitive psychologists indicate that the ability to draw is a distinct skill that developed with practice, and is significant to their cognitive style

(Tversky, 2002). With drawing, designers think in visuals. However, for non-designers, drawing can be a hidden psychological barrier for them. All children draw as shown in the figure 17. As young children, we had no fear of drawing and putting our work out in the public domain. But as adults we have grown extremely self-conscious of our abilities and inabilities and now fear being judged. In the research, all interviewees stated that many of the workshop participants had a fear about drawing and showing their story to other people. One interviewee mentioned,

“ Many times in workshops, the brave ones would draw stick figures, but they just think ‘that’s not very nice’ so they don’t want to show the drawings to their managers. We also designed the tools in a way that people to have their own outcome and their own creation but still a certain level of quality as needed. ” - László Herczegh at Fuelfor, personal interview

The participants with non-design or art backgrounds tend not to be visual thinkers, unlike designers; they need some tools ‘to visualize’ the ideas. And that’s where storyboarding as research tool can come in. Then, how might this research support their storyboarding process? In the following chapter, I will explore more possibilities of storyboard tool with a broader audience in the early design process, by learning from another visual narrative medium, ‘comics’.

31 SCRIPTS

*SKILLS AND RESOURCES NEEDED

DRAWINGS STORYBOARDS WIREFRAMES VIDEO ANIMATION INTERACTIVE PROTOTYPE SOME

A LOT

ROLE OF STORYBOARD

DESIGN PROCESS Figure 16. Diagram about research findings

Figure 17. My 3-year-old daughter Ina’s drawing

4.2. Learning from Comics As can be seen in the previous chapters, storyboards can be constructed in a number of different ways: from photographs, and photorealistic illustrations to comics and doodles. I found that the most common is the comic-strip format, in which a designer will create a series of illustrations that tell the story of the situation being examined. Even though the name of the tool ‘storyboard’ derived from the filmmaking process, ways of using the tool by designers have more resemblances with the visual languages in cartoons, comics. In the research findings, the comic-strip style of storyboarding is a compact and engaging way to communicate to different stakeholders during the design phases, but more importantly in the earlier design process. In the following section, I will explain how storyboard can be a more valuable as a research tool, by learning the language of comics from the research findings. By understanding the language of comics, storyboards can maximize its values and possibilities in the design process.

some properties of comics which allow us to bring its benefits to storyboarding as a research tool. Firstly, accessibility of comics is the most important aspect as a medium. Comics are popular visual storytelling medium, and IKEA and LEGO’s manuals are just some of many applications. Because of the nature of its easiness and visual language, some people consider comics to be “just for kids”. However, in the last decades, a rise of comics dealing with more serious subjects has emerged in diverse fields. Comics are widely used to communicate some complicated ideas in more digestible and playful ways. For instance, Google also created comics when they launched a new Web browser, Google Chrome (see figure 18). With the comics, they wanted to explain complicated features of the product in easier ways. Through the comics Google could share the technical story and help people understand why they launched the new product in a digestible way.

Will Eisner, an American comics artist and writer, who wrote the book Comics and Sequential Art - his book title was the first time that comics were described as sequential art, which is really what a comic is. In this book (Eisner, 1990), he calls,

“ … Art that tells a story by putting a number of them in sequence.” - Eisner, W. (1990) Figure 18. Comics of Google Chrome/ © Google

By that definition, the earliest drawings and illustrations in history, such as cave paintings and Egyptians’ wall paintings, can be considered as comics (McCloud, 1994). Like storyboards, comics are a medium that combines the strengths of words and pictures to create compelling visual stories. There are

Almost like Google’s case, in Figure 19, a South Korean consumer electronics company, LG, also applied this advantage of comics to communicate with a wider audience in the company blog.

valuable than ‘photographs’ when he synthesized the findings with his cartoons from the field research.

The second unique property of comics is as an imagination tool. In the book Understanding Comics (1994), Scott McCloud discusses the idea of abstraction. He describe how in comics, comic artists can abstract details in characters so as to allow the readers to bring heir own imagination into the story.

The next property of comics is in the power of expression. A picture, as the saying goes, is worth a thousand words. In comics, pictures give words richer meaning. In Comic and Sequential Art, Will Eisner (1990) explores the application of facial expressions as a vocabulary. The use facial expression can tell more than words. In comics, the same words, expressed with the same font, emphasis, dialogue bubbles, and facial expression can represent additional meaning, as shown in the figure 21. By applying this simple technique, everyone can build a story with emotional expression (Eisner, 1990). In a similar way, a simple line can show some kinds of movement. In many comics, the lines do not actually represent anything physical but convey something moving. Comics have the advantage of expression that convert our stories into visual forms: senses, emotions, thought, behaviours and so on. By applying these techniques into storyboarding, it is possible to let people – whether they are designers or not - represent whole aspects of a story in more efficient ways.

Figure 20. Comic for imagination - level of abstraction

Similarly to his explanation of the idea (McCloud, 1994), here I drew three versions of my daughter’s face with differing levels of detail. The lack of details, namely the level of abstraction, makes it look like nobody and everybody. On the right side, the drawing is much more detailed and leaves little room for imagination as to who is being represented. By reducing the amount of detail in a drawing, comics can encourage and stimulate the reader’s imagination. As one of the interviewees (László at Fuelfor) pointed out, this property of comics is more

Figure 21. Example of facial expression (Eisner, 1990)

Lastly, the layout of comics is one of the important aspects that many storyboards are already applying in different forms. Comics generally consist of boxes to show the progression of the story. Each of these boxes that contains the drawing and words is called a panel or a frame. A panel is not necessarily rectangular in shape. The space between two or more panels is referred to as ‘gutter’ (McCloud, 1994).

As he indicates, the space between the panels the gutter - is one of the key languages in comics because it allows the readers to become involved in their story in more actively. This narrative possibility of the gutter invite readers to imagine time and space in quite unique ways that other forms of textual consumption do not (Dittmer, 2010). Hence, participation is a necessity for its readers (Eisner, 2008). A British comic book artist, David Gibbons mentions the benefit of comics as an involvement medium for the readers (Salisbury, 2000). He says, “ I loved the idea you could tell story in pictures, and that a reader could get so involved in it. ” - Gibbons, D. (Salisbury, 2000)

Figure 22. Comics show the power of ‘gutter’, (McCloud, 1994)

Comic book artists visualize and tell stories through panel-to-panel images. Their language varies from one artist to another artist. However, the panel and the gutter between panels are one of the elements in the common language of comics. The comic book artist and writer Scott McCloud says, “ The Heart of comic lies in the space between the panels where the reader’s imagination makes still pictures come alive. ” – McCloud, S. (1994)

Figure 23. Drawing - the reader of comics as participants (Eisner, 2008)

This chapter has explored the four key aspects of comics: accessibility, imagination, expression, and the layout of comics. During researching in depth on both storyboards and comics, I had a hypothesis, which will be discussed later in the next chapter. The hypothesis was: the storyboarding workshop is more beneficial when the activities and the tool of workshop are based on the language of comics.

Hypothesis_ The storyboarding workshop is more beneficial when the activities and the tool of workshop are based on the language of comics.

4.3. Testing Hypothesis How can the storyboarding tool contribute in the front end of design process, while support non-designer’s visual-story sharing process? By learning from the properties of comics and applying the benefits, the storyboarding tool can have more advantages where non-designers share their ideas through quick drawings. The hypothesis is: the storyboarding workshop is more beneficial when the activities and the tool of workshop are based on the language of comics. In order to test the hypothesis a workshop with non-designers was facilitated. The aim of the workshop was to explore and test storyboarding as an engagement tool, while sharing the problems of the current website in terms of users’ point of views. The title of the workshop was “Thinking Users Stories in Comics”. The term ‘storyboard’ was not used, primarily because of the accessibility of comics. The participants were from local churches - a senior pastor and a volunteer at Korean Church of Glasgow and the aim of the workshop was to improve their old website. Both of them are non-designers. As non-designers, it was first time for them to use storyboarding. To support non-designers’ storyboarding process, a couple of tools and activities were carefully structured. In the workshop, I worked as the facilitator to help them work cooperatively. I started by introducing my project with an introduction of comics to let the participants know the main tool of this workshop. Then the participants started to think roughly about their stories in the brainstorming session, in order to ideate and categorize different user-types and their stories. One of participants was interested in the introduction of comics. However, when I asked him

to draw, he said, “ That sounds really cool, but I can’t draw. ” This was the first response, even though I explained that the tool doesn’t require any formal artistic training in my introduction. It seemed that the participant still thought he would be ridiculed if his sketch looked like a child’s one. Then as a next step, I offered different tools for ‘tracing’ that can support their storyboarding process. The first storyboarding tool was analogue: a set of drawing templates such as related objects, environments, and paper dolls with movable joints, etc., On the other hand, the second one was digital tool - smartphone and tablet - with a photography filter app. By using these tools, the participants could share users’ stories in visually and verbally. In fact, this tracing idea for drawing was not a new approach. Tracing is one of the quickest and most effective methods for creating comics. For comic book artists, a light box plays a similar role to support their works. Bill Buxton (Buxton, 2007), a principal researcher at Microsoft Research, introduces how he uses tracing skills to make compelling visual stories. What he did was to take digital photos, or scans of images, then load them into a computer drawing program to make digitised sketches. In this case, the tools were different, because I generated tracing tools while bringing the advantages of both digital and analogue methods. During half an hour, the participants could visualize and share users’ journey on the website. As a result, the tools worked very well to give the participants a support when they drew the comicstrips on the A3 tracing papers. In this process, the tools helped them minimize the psychological

barriers for their drawing activity. Overall, the tracing techniques - whether it is the analogue or digital made their drawings have more correct positions, poses, and proportion. The participants felt confident in their own comics-strips and they said it helped the verbal storytelling. In addition, one participant preferred the digital tool, with which he could use to trace his stories on the digital photos (here a smartphone app - CamScanner is used). Then he stated, “ I could take any photos or find any images on the web to guide my drawings. I assume some illustrators use these kinds of tools… ” On the other hand, the participant mentioned that the analogue tool with basic paper templates was also helpful, but he said it was too simple to express some details such as genders and clothes. He mentioned, “ The paper tool was playful with moving joints, but I found it difficult to trace a woman. ” One of the issues which I noticed from the workshop with non-designers was that, knowing ‘what to draw’ was really the most difficult part, even though they did the ideation session. The transition from verbal communication toward compelling visualstorytelling, an additional tool like scenario form may help to focus drawing efforts and solve the dilemma of not knowing exactly what to draw. The additional tool take be a very basic forms, like letting participants help the process by just writing down main contents of the storyline: product and user experiences into key points, situations, and scenarios, etc., Another finding was that the participants took

to the term ‘comics’ easier than they did the term ‘storyboard’. In addition, the introduction of comics’ language was a necessary session to let them understand its basic language, so that they could think and refer to what they learned from the comics. In summary, the couple of workshop activities and the tracing tools that were explored for testing the hypothesis that no switch has occurred in the values of storyboarding as research tool with non-designer. In comparison with the template tools, the digital tracing tools really helped the visualisation process with less limitation, because the participant could ‘take’ any scenes or ‘search’ any images as reference images. Moreover, I explored a new opportunity of these tracing tools for designers themselves. As a designer I found that the tracing techniques could be an effective tool to share my ideas, but more importantly to be used for training purposes. Today, product and service designers, practicing with usercentred design, come from a variety of backgrounds. During my study across three different design schools in Europe, I have often experienced the fact that many designers express their ideas only through written notes, wireframes, and very simplistic doodles. Some of the design students I’ve met express frustration for their sketching skills. By using ‘the hybrid tool’ of digital and analogue tracing, it can have an advantage as a practicing tool for entry or junior level of product design students.

Figure 24. Workshop photos - Storyboarding activities

â&#x20AC;&#x153; By learning from the properties of comics and applying the benefits, the storyboarding tools can have more advantages where non-designers create and share their ideas through quick drawings. â&#x20AC;&#x153;

5. Conclusion Visual and storytelling are, it seems, worth a thousand words. This thesis has attempted to sketch out the main characteristics of the visual narratives in the product design field. For product designers, storyboarding is a medium to communicate the complicated and the multidisciplinary nature of their project. For this reason, storyboarding is a widely applied and developed tool across different phases in the design process as well as in numerous forms. Storyboards as a design tool has worked well because it provides a visual language that sets a common ground for all stakeholders what cannot be seen in text. The literature reviews and the qualitative interviews lead us to the distinction between: storyboarding as a discovering tool and a presentation medium depends on the process. What stands out most from this research is the value of storyboards in the early design phase, where the professional designers employ its hidden possibilities as research tools. The main benefit of storyboarding as a research tool is the ability to engage and inspire designers themselves with a broader audience in the frontend design process. It can allow people between designers and non-designers to explore and share their ideas in a quick and visual manner. As we have seen, the main purpose of latter part of the thesis has been to find the value of storyboarding as a research tool as well as to explore advantage of the tool by learning from the language of comics. The hypothesis led us to facilitate the testing workshop. By involving non-designers in the workshop, I revealed new considerations for how to create a convincing tool for storyboard in order to bring the advantage of comicsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; language, as well as sustaining the participantâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s engagement and creativity.

In addition, the insights of the workshop point to new areas of the storyboarding application for future research and design iteration. Lastly, it is to be hoped that this thesis will be a step toward a richer understanding of the possibilities of storyboards as design research tools and activities.

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Wikispace. (2003). Leonardo Da Vinci Used Science Notebooks. Retrieved March 27, 2014, from http://sci-wikitific.wikispaces.com/Leonardo+DaVinci Zak, Paul. (2012). Empathy, Neurochemistry, and the Dramatic Arc: the Future of StoryTelling. Retrieved April 30, 2014, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1a7tiA1Qzo

Unpublished sources

Figures

Kim, Tae Yong (2012), Strategic approach to co-design with vulnerable user group - UID project paper, Department of Industrial Design, School of Art and Design Aalto University, Helsinki

Figure 1.

Leonardo da Vinci’s sketches (Wikispace, 2003)

Figure 2.

Pyramid of Freytag’s (1863) - structure of story (Wheeler, 2010)

Figure 3.

IKEA, assembly manual (IKEA, 2006)

Figure 4.

Storyboards in my previous projects

Figure 5.

Interviewees’ position and companies

Figure 6.

The Double Diamond design process mode (UK Design Council, 2005)

Figure 7. Storyboarding in Develop and Deliver phase by Mike Walker Figure 8. Storyboard in Deliver phase / © ENGINE Figure 9. Comparing with other tools (Vertelney, 1990) Figure 10. Snook’s storyboards in ‘Bridge’ project / © SNOOK Figure 11. Snook’s storyboards at presentation / © SNOOK Figure 12. Storyboarding for Sacrificial concept / © BOSCH Figure 13. Storyboards for dialogue – MindMate, Recovery support for mental patients Figure 14. Story-Set toolkit/ © Fuelfor Figure 15. Storyboarding frame for field research/ © Fuelfor Figure 16. Diagram about research findings Figure 17. My 3-year-old daughter Ina’s drawing Figure 18. Comics of Google Chrome/ © Google Figure 19. Comics of LG Electronics’ company blog/ © LGE Figure 20. Comic for imagination - level of abstraction Figure 21. Example of facial expression (Eisner, 1990) Figure 22. Comics show the power of ‘gutter’, (McCloud, 1994) Figure 23. Drawing - the reader of comics as participants (Eisner, 2008) Figure 24. Workshop photos - Storyboarding activities

STORYBOARD IS A GREAT TOOL THAT COMBINES VISUAL & STORY.

HOW DO THEY USE THE STORYBOARD IN THEIR PRACTICES?

MANY DESIGNERS USE THE TOOL TO PRESENT FINAL OUTCOMES.

I’M NOT SAYING EVERYTHING SHOULD BE DONE IN STORYBOARD

FOR DESIGNERS, IT IS ONE OF MANY GREAT TOOLS. AND THEY USE THE STORYBOARD IN DIFFERENT WAYS!

SO, I TALKED WITH SEVERAL PROFESSIONAL DESIGNERS IN THE FIELD.

ALSO USE IN RESEARCH PHASE.

AND MORE DIFFERENT PHASES, THE TOOL TAKES MANY ROLES!