CG technologies for supporting cooperative creativity by industrial designers

According to the Japan Industrial Design Promotion Organization, a good design is defined as one that features creative appearance (color, shape, pattern), that offers excellent functionality, convenience, and maintainability, that is made of suitable materials carefully chosen to assure safety, and that is reasonably priced. And the abilities of an industrial designer are said to be those of integrating sensibility, imagination, creativity, visualization, and coordination. This theory has been analyzed based on some product design projects. These analyses have revealed that ideas are embodied after the verbal abstraction of images from little hints that occur in one's mind in everyday life, and that these ideas are embodied in illogical scenarios. Especially the implementation of computer graphics (CG) has been found to boost the effectiveness of visualization to collaborate with the other members in the design process. Future designers will be acting in broader ties with external experts, collaborating with them and carrying out usability assessments via the Internet.