Few days back, I had this awesome wallpaper on my iMac of Crysis 3 Hunter holding a gun, nicely made wallpaper with lot of thought given to detailing. Our graphic designer was passing by happen to see the wallpaper, He came towards the screen touched the screen where there were scratches on the gun, and admired the detailing…. “look at those scratches!”
The other day, I found my old iPod classic while cleaning a drawer, first ever Apple product I bought. It has a dent on the side. First thing I did was touching that dent and remembering how that dent was formed… It was nostalgic!
What do we see here, these dents and scratches are things that create negative feeling for an object but somehow they also generate positive emotions. There are numerous objects around us which are not perfect, faded old jeans with a impression near front pocket where we kept cellphones, favourite leather belt that gets better with the rough use, old tape recorder with aluminium body peeping out of the black paint through scratches. These all things generate emotions that certainly make us feel good if not happy all the time. We can identify our mobile device from similar looking other phones kept together. These imperfections make these mass produced products our personal product. Every dent has a story to tell!
Every object tells a story.
Henry Ford
We have objects in our house that are very old. As we keep using these objects, as we grow older, these objects grow older with wear and tear. They become a part of our lives. The nail-cutter we use at our home is actually older than me! I am proud of that nail cutter, I don’t keep it inside a drawer, I keep it on a table where people can see it. I tell this fact to every person who passes by it. I don’t even feel like buying a new ones that are available in market, specially designed with flowers graphics on it. Its old, doesn’t look very good but its been doing its job since very long time, It has become a part of our lives. Why do we feel great when we use or find our old stuff. We have a strong bonding with these things. It gets better with time as they grow older and older! This is the basic property which makes these objects very human. It makes non-living objects come alive. We exactly know each n every moment in this journey of that product, when it accidentally slipped of your hand and got a dent. These scratches and dents are like old photographs. They tell us a story same way as old photographs. It makes it our personal stuff as no one else knows how to read this story, with each dent and scratch it become more n more personal. It becomes an encrypted storybook full of pictures which only you can decode!
Emotional aspect is very important when you consider a design. Imagine two futuristic robots, one that never ages, and other one that grows older. Almost certainly everyone will say that the robot that ages and becomes older will generate considerable emotional response, that is the key aspect that makes a mass produced robot(futuristic!) a personal one. This is what makes every mass produced product more and more personal. One can argue that customisation will provide similar response in a design of a product. Customisations and Personalisations are very different processes. When you buy a car with some specific engine, colour etc. is a customisation and few people take this car and create an artwork on it, paint stripes, graphics, make it sound louder, tune its performance, this is what a personalisation is. Personalised products generate more emotional response than customised ones.
Every dent or scratch you have on your device tells a story, don’t curse it, you just have to try and read it for once.
