For stage four Quick Prototyping we looked to local industry professionals leading the charge in developing unique new products from LYIT’s campus incubation centre Co-Lab. Thank you to Patsy,  Dara Burke of Showhouse VR and Redmond Herrity of Blue Metal Pig Design for giving great insights and tips on this key stage of the creative process.

After more excellent presentations from each of our school’s groups it was time to get our hands dirty. Guided by our fantastic mentors LYIT’s design department staff Fiona, Mark and Sharon and graduate Redmond, alongside the DICE_TY team, students created 3D models and drawings that visualised their ideas in time for our next session, next month.

We were up and moving from the off today for our IDEAS session! First thanks to LYIT’s wonderful Dr. Isobel Cunningham and ex Riverdance dancer for our Ceili dancing session. Leading by example, Crona, Tena and Isobel then demonstrated the benefits of acting out and bodystorming a Malin Head scenario before the teams created their own.

After a presentation from 5 more groups, Sally Murphy of Murphy Communications got us thinking about the power of story in her interactive afternoon session.

It takes a village... We were so fortunate to benefit from the rich insights and experience of many local stakeholders on our second day - our trip to Malin Head. We were also very lucky that the 24 minutes (the average amount of time spent my visitors at this Wild Atlantic Way) were dry. After break out sessions with 5 key stakeholders in the area, the group of 100 students were dividing into three groups by facilitators Wall2Wall Music - percussion, melody and lyrics. In two brief hours, they impressively came up with a theme song based on the research to date and their experience in Malin Head. Watch this space for the single release ; )

After all the planning it was fantastic to finally meet our DICE_TY Academy participants.
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This day concentrated on stages 1 & 2 of the UNIQUE process - Understand and Needs. We were very fortunate to have UX - User Experience Specialists from the Dublin office of a local business lead the morning session. Students learned about the importance of listening to stakeholders and future users and to get an understanding universal design and identifying the needs of your target market.

Our thanks to Paul Hannigan, President of Letterkenny Institute of Technology (LYIT) and Máire Aine Gardiner of Failte Ireland/Wild Atlantic Way for launching the initiative.