Computer Graphics in Industrial Design: a teaching experience

One of instrumental subject taught at the Bachelor of Science in Industrial Design at the School of Design of Politecnico di Milano is the Computer Graphics Studio. During this Studio students learn to shape their ideas and their projects and also to represent them by means of a tool that is very hard to use, especially at the beginning. Indeed, the main problem that occurs, when using a new modelling software, is that the student simplifies his ideas because he is not able to produce more complex shapes: as a result the majority of project is featureless not for luck of creativity, but for luck of technical skills. Industrial Design cares of how a product looks, feels and how it works. The peculiarity of this subject leads up the School of Design to have an “empirical centred” didactic approach, though not forgetting theoretical aspects. Nowadays the Industrial Design project workflow is mainly based on the development of 3D digital models, because they are able to cover all the process, from the original concept design to the final manufacture step. For this reason, Computer Graphics issues are a fundamental element to complete young designers' education that could help them to represent ideas all along the design process, from the first draft to the detailed final product. This paper reports the experience of a teaching team that has been working for long time on the definition of the Computer Graphics Studio course program. All the program contents are accurately chosen and planned, from the 3D modelling software choice to the topics discussed, according to stated principles. This teaching method proved to be effective to improve not only students' technical skills, but also professional and cultural qualities of young designers.