Week 17's Visualisation Exercise

Focus on the form, not just the “contents”, but you can include some soundbites-snapshots. What are the elements that make up the thoughts in your mind? And how do they work with/on each other.

For example think of something you love and hate--how are they represented differently in your mind (i.e. is it an image in colour, and with sounds, with emotions? Are the images located in different locations, etc. What happens if you change some aspect of the image (size, colour, replacement, add sound etc).

The elements that make up the thoughts in my mind are disembodied, metaphorical or abstract representations of everyday figures I come across. They are all represented in roughly the same way--their difference lies in the way they make me feel. Figures that I dislike make me feel discomfort and anger whenever I visualise them, while figures that I like make me feel comfort and smoothness when I visualise them. Figures that are neutral usually make me associate them with the events I came across them in.

What does HTI mean to you?

HTI is a compilation of simple and effective design ideas that are taught to us in HTI lessons. The objective of these lessons are to expose us to these ideas and slowly help us understand them in as layman a way as possible. It is supposed to be light, and the exploration that it encourages us to do should be simple, non-threatening and enjoyable.

Why are you not/motivated to do the weekly assignments for HTI2?

The topics that we explore in HTI2 are topics that are very foreign to me, and the depth that we have to plunge into these topics is scary, to say the least. Perhaps it is because of my lack of understanding, but I do not understand the point of most of the exercises and pondering that we have to do. We keep having to "dig into our unconscious" in order to tap into our sources of creativity--a method that I find very difficult to do. I feel as though HTI2 is trying to get us into a singular, standard frame of accessing creativity instead of helping everyone find his own way.

Nonetheless, I feel I will do my weekly HTI assignments if not for the weight of the other assignments that are also hanging over us. We are constantly bombarded with alot of assignments in our second year, and the amount of work that we have to do to complete each HTI journal is no help. The depth that we are required to explore into each topic by ourselves is extensive, to say the least. I take about 4 hours to write each entry on average, and half of the time I take is spent on reading to understand the topics so that I can adequately answer the questions. Most of the questions that we are asked simply ask for too much from us, and it is hard to find the motivation to do them after finishing our other assignments during the weekend.