USE OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN THE PRODUCT DESIGN PROCESS. IMPACT ON THE DETAILS DESIGN STAGE
Year: 2024
Editor: Grierson, Hilary; Bohemia, Erik; Buck, Lyndon
Author: Marquez Cañizares, Juan Carlos
Series: E&PDE
Institution: Tecnologico de Monterrey, Mexico
Page(s): 115 - 120
DOI number: 10.35199/EPDE.2024.20
ISBN: 978-1-912254-200
ISSN: 3005-4753
Abstract
The product design process involves a set of stages, however, there may be many methods that can be used to resolve the different stages of the process, which will be conditioned by the nature of the project or its magnitude. Beyond this, in most cases the time will come when the color, texture, finishes or final appearance of the product (CMF) will have to be defined (Ugale et al., 2022), so there is a tendency to make iterations of the possible combinations of these elements with the idea that the product achieves the function as expected, that the user can interpret and perceive it in the way desired by the designer and it is at this point where Artificial Intelligence tools (AI) could impact by simplifying the process. In this sense, this research aims to identify the impact that applying the Gencraft® artificial intelligence tool would have in the details design stage and its implications in the teaching-learning process of students of the Bachelor of Design (Bailey, 2023). To achieve the purpose of the research, a sample of 22 students from the sixth and eighth semester of the Bachelor of Design at the Tecnológico de Monterrey, Mexico, was taken to use the Gencraft® tool in the design stage of details of their projects, instructing them to progressively add the prompts until the generated images were close to the product they had already designed, paying attention to the CMFs suggested by the tool up to a total of 12 prompts. Once the exercise was completed, a survey-type instrument was applied to the students to assess the impact of using the tool and the potential it could have within the design process. With the analysis of the information, it was possible to identify that the eighth semester students have had much more experience in the use of AI for the design process than those in the sixth semester, however, most of both groups agree that the tool used It could also have a lot of value in the conceptualization or ideation stage since the images generated look like product renders. With respect to the CMFs, the majority agree that the main contribution is the final appearance part and a little less in the color part. The students also stated that despite the number of prompts they provided to the tool, there was very little coincidence with the design they had already defined in terms of the final configuration. With this research it was possible to identify that the artificial intelligence tool used is considered positively by the students within their learning process and as a useful element within the design of products. On the other hand, it was observed that the students began having some difficulties generating the correct prompts or making the tool generate images that were closer to the product design they already had. Likewise, it was evident that they did take the images generated by Gencraft@ as a reference to define the CFMs of their projects.
Keywords: Higher Education, Process Design, CMFs