This briefs aim was to discuss where design belongs in the future and begin to situate my own future practice through the creation of ‘design fictions’. With the challenge of creating a piece of design fiction, either a product, service or system, which would contribute to the success of a fictional mission set in 2025 heading towards Harmonia, a dwarf planet hidden in shadows of Mars.
There were many elements that could provide success of a mission to space, but I choose the health of the astronauts as a main element: without healthy astronauts to perform the necessary tasks a mission would be a failure. This started to play into the vision I have of the future, I see design going hand-in-hand moving sterile technological design into more warm, human-focused designs, especially in health care. From this, I created ‘AppleHealth’, a monitoring, predication & mitigation health care system which uses two implants (one neural and one contact lens implant) to constantly track the user’s health. I wanted to take the chance in this project to learn about UI design and be able to incorporate story telling. Indeed, I choose to set it as an Apple product as I see the future of space being private funded businesses but also due to Apple’s recent health innovations that I can see making a huge impact, like they have created in the past, in the future. The system functions by itself with no input from anyone else, removing the ethical debate around astronaut surgeon and crew relationship interference. The system focuses on health care 24/7, anywhere. Health data is extracted via the implants and processed in the HealthCloud. A customised healthcare experience is produced by the system, able to alter exercise, diet, schedules to aid as well as altering the habitat for certain healthcare uses. The user accesses the system via any digital monitor which pairs their implant up, allowing the HealthOS to load the correct user. The system provides their information displayed in a widget style Apple now utilises but, in a style, which was trend predicted for the future: neomorphism (flat design with 3d lighting such as highlights and shadows). While also making use of a traffic light colour coded health alert system which is a widely used representation of alter levels so becomes instinct for the user to understand this new Apple interface. At points in the mission, the use may have no access to a screen and as such the lens implant provides an AR experience of a condensed version of the HealthCentre in which health alerts can appear like notifications to alert a user and be used either via Siri or arm gestures.
