Alex Rowe
Illustrator & Children’s Book Artist
Prompt
Design a functioning bicycle for dogs.
Supplies
Process
1.
Examine how a bicycle works.
2.
Choose from these 5 dog breeds: Border Collie, Shih Tzu, Greyhound, Dachshund, Bernese Mountain Dog, or King Charles Cavalier.
3.
Look up a video of your chosen dog breed moving and analyze the motions.
4.
Draw a series of quick gesture drawings in pencil from any dog video.
5.
Sketch and brainstorm ways that a dog bike could function.
6.
Final design should be a clean drawing using pen.
Examples
Amelia Rozear
Intern
“In my entire experience as an art student thus far, I have never once tried (or have been interested in) creating prototypes or product design. I’m honestly not sure why, maybe a lack of knowledge as to what would be considered practical, appealing, and functional in real life.
This dog bike project ended up being just a small drawing that I am not sure how to feel about, but during the process, I thought more about function and purpose then I have for any other drawing I’ve made. By researching for hours about my specific dog and its movements and how bicycles actually work, I was able to truly connect with my product idea– enough to put a bit of an artistic twist on it, to make it out of the ordinary.
Even though I feel a bit frustrated with the end result, I am very glad to have completed this project and the process behind it, and I definitely think it will assist me in future projects.”
Julie Sharpe
Project Assistant
“This project reminded me of when my friends and I would design vehicles and machines in elementary school. Although I haven’t designed objects in a while, I enjoyed being able to learn from previous skills.
I struggled with making the bike seem like a plausible machine, but was able to find inspiration from looking at the work of industrial designers. I liked that the project did not require me to have an extensive knowledge of mechanical parts, but allowed me to exercise my creativity while working with a real-life subject.
In the future, I would like to apply what I have learned in this tutorial to designing more objects and machines.”
Cindy Qiao
Project Assistant
“This was such an interesting project and process because I’ve never really done a prototype for something like a bike before. A lot of the designing process relied on the stuff I had to do beforehand, like research what kind of dog breed I wanted to use, and its body type and shape and movement.
I think that all those different variables that went into designing this bike made it both more interesting but also more difficult. Instead of caring about aesthetics and the overall look of the bike, what was more important in this project was the functionality of the actual product. This project required me to approach creating something in a much different way than I’m normally used to. There was a lot more planning and researching involved. I think one of the biggest problems I faced in this project was getting away from the normal idea or image of the standard bike.
And even though I had a hard time trying to figure out an efficient design, overall, I thought this project was a good introduction to making prototypes and designing products.”
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