Visual Storyboarding:

Anthropometrics, Innovation, and Designing the Process

Kevin Reeder, IDSA, Assistant Professor | Georgia Institute of Technology

Introduction

The movie industry heavily relies on storyboards as an effective way to visually describe the process of a movie. And for a good reason—the storyboard visually describes how the movie flows from beginning to end, how the characters are interacting and where transitions and/or gaps exist in the storyline.

The storyboard is an effective tool in industrial design as well. A storyboard visually describes how users will interact with the product from start to finish and depicts the individual steps in that process that need further examination and analysis. This detail examination, leads to innovative product solutions that successfully address a greater amount of anthropometric/ergonomic issues. In the classroom, when students employ visual storyboards, they are better able to focus beyond function and appearance and resolve a broader range of design objectives.

This paper/presentation will discuss visual storyboarding in terms of its value in communicating what the designed product will do and how people will interact with it. It will discuss visual storyboarding as a tool for identifying opportunities for innovation, examining anthropometric and ergonomic issues, and communicating project concerns to diverse product development groups. The paper/presentation will use examples from industry and student course work to support its premise.

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