One button to control your life around the house
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Project
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This Joint Master Project was carried by five Industrial Design students from three different master programs, each having their own competences.
My contribution to this project was mainly focused on the user-product interaction. Doing user research throughout the whole project.
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Joint Master Project
February 2015 - July 2015
Company: HomeWizard
Design a new product for HomeWizard that help them grow their customer base, by making home automation more accessible for the early majority
- Design goal
The micro suction tape at the back of the HomeWizards enables the button to be placed all around the house. For example, you can have a button to activate the moment 'dinner' at the dining table, which switches the table lights on and lowers the thermostat. Another Mini can be located next to the couch to activate the moment 'watch television', dimming all lights and closing the curtains.
Settings can be adjusted through the application. A new enhanced version of the application was made to improve the user experience, by changing the flow. Even though the app's existence is essential for setting up the system, adding new devices and adjusting settings on the go, it is envisioned that home automation has to become more responsive.
HomeWizard Mini is one step in the direction of smarter home automation systems, reducing the amount of steps that have to be taken to activate 'moments' to only one press of the button.
Usage
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System
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Current home automation systems often control groups or separate devices with custom presets or trough the use of an mobile application. HomeWizard Mini on the other hand, adds a physical presence of your home automation system to your house.
The system introduces 'rooms' as a new level of interaction between 'home' and 'devices', which allows the user to activate different settings for their 'moments' in each room. Moments can be, for example, eating dinner or watching television. Since the buttons are small and can be stuck to almost any surface, it can easily placed anywhere in the house. This way, home automation seamlessly integrates in the daily routine, without interfering or being too obtrusive.
Hover to reveal button placement
Group project:
Alexander Weiss
Arthur Vogel
Joost Bianchi
Julian Neef
HomeWizard Mini, a small radio controlled button that can be placed everywhere in the house and activate your home automation devices to their corresponding settings.
Home automation is a general term for controlling electronic devices around the house, using wireless means or based on input parameters generated by the user or the environment. HomeWizard is Dutch company that develops home automation devices ranging from door sensors to IP-cameras. These products are linked together trough a central hub and can be configured and monitored with a mobile application.
The goal for this project was to help HomeWizard grow their customer base from 14.000 to 100.000 people. The current market that is interested in home automation consist mainly out of a small group of tech savvy people, even though home automation exists for more than 30 years. High cost of ownership, poor manageability, inflexibility and the difficulty to achieve security are the biggest thresholds that prevent home automation in reaching the early majority in the market.
© Max Tak, 2015
