Portfolio Alice Dubourg

ALICE DUBOURG

Industrial Design Portfolio 2021

Hello!

I am Alice Dubourg, a designer and engineer from France. In your hands is a showcase of the projects I'm the most proud of - but I'm sure the best is yet to come!

I hope you will enjoy the reading of it.

Mike

DanceNote

Bonfire

p.6

p.20

p.28

Save The Mummy

Cue

CV

p.40

p.54

p.70

PRODUCT DESIGN

Designing a rice cooker for the european market.

Politecnico di Milano Design Studio February - June 2020

Alice Dubourg Paul Cozma-Ivan Clara Esteva Mihriban Nihan Koç

RESEARCH The goal of this design studio was to design a rice cooker.

We collected information to constiture our counterbrief with: • a benchmark, • a synthesis of online reviews, • a product testing, • a product teardown, • a survey (~100 participants).

I was responsible for the last three points.

The survey was rich in testimonies and insightful for the specificities of european and asian markets.

According to our results, an average asian household already has a rice cooker, whereas almost no european does. Moreover in Europe, people are less likely to wait for more than 20 minutes for their rice to cook, whereas in Asia people declared themselves ready to wait about 40 minutes.

Another important point was taken into account before choosing our counterbrief: none of the member of our group ever lived in Asia (France, Romania, Turkey, Argentina).

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Counterbrief We want to design a rice cooker suitable for a young european household of 2 to 4 people, that cooks in less than 20 minutes and is adapted to their lifestyle.

Size: 4 cups (0.9L) Technology: Induction heating and pressure cooking

Features: Cook; Keep warm; Deep cleaning; On/Off Materials: Food grade

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CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT

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After having explored a few crazy ideas (like the Batman concept, where the rice cooker could hang upside down under a table as storage, or the Hedgehog concept, for which peaks on the surface rose when the heat could be dangerous), we converged towards a feasible rice cooker with an expressive interface (the name Mike is actually inherited from Mike Wasovski from the animation film Monster & Cie) and we developed it to the furthest we could!

One of the main drivers of Mike's form is the "volcano" at the top of the appliance.

Indeed, one of the key elements of research was a testimony of someone who got burnt accidentaly approaching their hand to the steam escape of a rice cooker. Having the volcano shape allows to create a space for the steam to dilute itself into the surrounding air, and for its temperature to drop, before being reachable.

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FINAL CONCEPT

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270 mm

270 mm

300 mm

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PROTOT YPING

In spring 2020 it was the first wave of Covid-19 and full lockdown in France, so we improvised prototypes with what we had at hand in each of our households. My partner Mihriban in Turkey had a 3D printer so she did a small, smooth Mike with a functionning hinge. I had paper and glue so I did a 1:1 scale model, very useful to evaluate proportions in a kitchen, with reference to other appliances.

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MODE OF USE

1. Plug in the rice cooker and turn it on.

2. Select the recipe (type of rice, eventual veggies) and the amount of portions.

4.

Pour the rice and the water following the proportions displayed by the screen.

5. Close the lid to allow cooking mode.

The LEDs around the screen indicate how much is left to be added.

6. Start cooking.

Here we go!

3. Press the button to open the lid.

7. The LEDs turn red when cooking, and green when the rice is ready.

8. Grab your spoon and... Bon appétit!

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TECHNICAL DEVELOPMENT

The articulation of the inside components and of the external structure challenged our initial form and material choices. In our group work repartition, my main tasks were the lid, with the pressure regulation, and the hinge between the lid and the main body.

Steam escape Pressure regulation Shell with LEDs Insulation Internal structure Cooking pot removable lid

The hinge had several constraints: we needed to block the rotation so the lid would not bump in the wall, while having the lid's center of mass insuring stability of the open position and being able to take the cooking pot out of the cooker.

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This development period phase of the project represented for me a lot of hours modeling inside components and assemblies on SolidWorks, a familiarization with retailers' websites and participation in discussions about materials, draft angles or self-tapping screws, be it in a group meeting or in a review with the professors.

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Mike is a rice-cooker for a young european household. It works thanks to induction heating and pressure cooking. It features an innovative interface and a friendly look.

USER INTERFACE

Rethinking the user experience and user interface of a dance website.

La Fabrique de la Danse Internship mission January - March 2019

Alice Dubourg Project manager & web developper: Alexandre Legay

DanceNote is a website that allows choreographers to store and share their shows with collaborators such as dancers, students or dance company administrators.

The shows are organized in panels, each panel being associated with one choreography in the form of a video. The video can be taken and synchronized at several angles, allowing the dancers to better understand the movements, be it for correction or rapid learning of a new piece.

The choreographer can also add comments that display during the lecture of the video, and documents or pictures that complement the comprehension of the choreography.

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RESEARCH DanceNote has been launched in 2014 with the creation of the company La Fabrique de la Danse. The young start-up won several challenges and grants for the idea behind the website, that allowed to finance its first development.

However, after 4 years of activity, the website didn't generate revenue, and the user base was still small. My first task was to make an onboarding and try using the website myself. Then, a serie of more than 50 phone interviews with returning users or non-returning users, as well as a concurrence analysis, allowed me to target the problem more objectively. I would then use this information to suggest and implement a new interface.

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Adding a video: OLD PROCESS

PROTOT YPING REFORGED PROCESS

I had to rethink several uses of the website.

For instance here, the loading of a new video by a choreograph.

While the former process involved three different pages of the website, the reforged one involves a single pop-up. It is though still possible to proceed by the former version, first the project then the video.

I did the new interface on Photoshop and then assisted the developper for implementation.

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DanceNote, the website for choreographers to share their work with their dancers, has been reshaped to simplify the process of uploading videos and avoid confusions.

The website is available at: https://dancenote.fr/

PRODUCT DESIGN

Designing a community barbecue.

Politecnico di Milano Design Studio September - December 2019

Alice Dubourg Simone Minini Aditya Ashwin Amin Taosheng Zhang

RESEARCH The goal of this design studio was to design a barbecue.

To constitute our research, we used: • an analysis of trends, • a benchmark, • a survey.

The survey allowed us to assess that no matter the country, barbecues are used in a convivial context, often in family or small groups of friends, during the warm days, outdoor. The most popular heating method for individuals is charcoal.

A first observation drawn from our trend analysis is that this traditional western image of barbecues, in a personnal garden among friends, is challenged today by the exodus in towns.

In urban context, the majority of inhabitants does not have access to a garden.

On another theme, for a lot of major towns, there is an increase of ethnic diversity and therefore a diversification of food habits. This last point particularly echoed in our international group: coming from China, France, India and Italy, our personnal experiences with barbecues differed, and a common wish was to create a barbecue that could showcase these differences and share them in a convivial experience.

Another noticeable trend is about the sharing economy: particularly in a urban context, coworking spaces, ride sharing apps but also co-living offers multiply (before the covid outbreak).

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Counterbrief We want to design a barbecue for a co-living community, that allows families to cook simultaneously and share a convivial experience while respecting their food habits.

Size: serves 8-10 people Context: On a shared terrace, not mobile Heat source: Charcoal

Features: Different types of grills and compartimented areas No sudden flames Ash and grease collectors

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I D E AT I O N

Starting from this counterbrief, we generated several ideas such as cooking vertically to avoid the grease falling on the charcoal and generating flames, or having a table integrated in the barbecue to ensure conviviality. Another angle of approach was to explore typical convivial activities and reimagine them as a barbecue experience. These ideas generated two concepts that were abandoned: the Tetris and the Caroussel.

The Tetris highlighted the conviviality of barbecue with a collaborative game experience but was a bit tedious regarding the mode of use.

The Caroussel used vertical cooking and permitted ideal showcasing with a rotation of the grill but added complexity with the rotation mechanism and might have caused problems for certain smaller pieces of food.

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SInce the grease falls vertically, the angle of the logs permits to place the charcoal aside from the silhouette of the grill and therefore heat the food while having no grease falling on the burning charcoal, hence avoiding sudden bursts of flames.

The concept we chose to further developp is inspired by the convivial experience of a fire camp (the original ancester of barbecue?). Each "log" of the appliance is a cooking spot, and the center serves as a plaque for a proper fire, for instance during winter.

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CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT

Critical points of development that lead to the final shape were: • Materials, manufacturing and assembly; • The ash and grease collector, which evolved from a cupboard to individual recipients hung from the top of the log; • The space below the center bowl, in the first iteration unreachable, that would then host a table to put grills, thanks to the spacing between logs; • The addition of a hook that allows cooking by hanging, for instance for cheeses or hams; • The stability of the barbecue and the draining of potential water.

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MODE OF USE

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As our barbecue is of important height and weight, it was critical to assess its transportability, and the possibility that a customer can assemble it on their terrace.

The barbecue weighs 85kg and, dissassembled, can fit in a box of 1,6x1,0x0,7m, which passes through a common door.

The design of the feet and of the middle table are thought to ensure that the assembly is possible.

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F I R ST ASS E M B LY

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Bonfire is a community barbecue that provides a convivial experience to its users and gives them the possibility to enrich themselves from the differences of their neighbours.

GAME DESIGN

Save The Mummy Imagining an interactive museum visit for children in an immersive space.

Politecnico di Milano, i3lab Elective project October 2020 - February 2021

Alice Dubourg Mary Gopanchuk Stefano Riva

CONTEXT Our goal for this project was to design a virtual visit of a museum in an immersive space called the Magic Room.

The Magic Room is a square room that serves as a portal to virtual activities. It is installed in an elementary school, and is constituted of: • a front and a floor projection; • interactive objects such as the Smart Sphere, that can recognize tagged objects; • Kinect sensors; • ambient lights; • speakers.

i3lab, the client, wanted to add a virtual visit of a cultural museum to their panel of activities.

Considering the final users would be children in elementary school, we rapidly settled for a theme around Ancient Egypt Antiquities.

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In our game, Seti the Mummy awakes with the arrival of the children in the Museum. We learn that he can only find peace if the children help him cross the museum to the last room of the exhibition: the entrance of his pyramid.

GAME SCENARIO

To go from room to room is not a simple walkthrough though: the doors are locked and guarded by ancient gods who will not allow ignorant children to go further.

Moreover, Anubis, the god responsible for the death ritual, is quite annoyed to see his authority defied and tries to slow down the progression of the small group.

THE NILE

THE TEMPLE

THE PALACE

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GA M E ST R U C T U R E

One "theme room" of the Museum (the Nile, the Temple or the Palace) is a traditional museum room with archeological artefacts and associated basic informations.

However, the items in the room are interactive and not meant to be simply looked at: • 6 artefacts display more broad knowledge about ancient Egypt; • 2 artefacts launch a mini-game.

The 2 mini-games each give a half of a key. This key corresponds to the door at the end of the room, and the guardian of the door can be invoked only when the key is completed. Once the guardian awoken, he or she asks a question to the children. The answer to this question is in one of the dialogs associated with the items of the room. If answered correctly, the children and Seti can go to the next room.

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The game is played by a group of 4 children The Navigator Goal: Controls movements in the virtual room Mean: Position on the floor The Selector Goal: Interacts with objects in the virtual room Mean: Hand movements The Spiritual Assistant Goal: Keeps Seti awake through rituals Mean: Mimics position of hieroglyphs projected The Bag Carrier Goal: Prevents Anubis to steal the tokens Mean: Jumps on Anubis' head projected on the floor

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CHARACTER DESIGN

Our work repartition, from the moment we knew what we wanted, was straightforward: Mary Gopanchuk would be in charge of the mini-games, design and content; Stefano Riva, as a computer engineer, would do all the coding, articulate the different parts of the game together and care for the specificities of the Magic Room; and I would be responsible for the museum rooms, content and implementation, as well as the main narration of the game through dialogs.

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I drew the characters as characters I would have enjoyed as a child: funny, full of personnality and a bit mischevious.

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ENVIRONMENT DESIGN After a complete virtual visit of the egyptian section of the Louvre, intensive sessions of browsing through the collection of the Museo Egizio di Torino, and a suspicious activity on Sketchfab around the collections of the Harvard Museum of the Ancient East, I finally constituted a curated collection of 67 items.

Pyramids

Egyptian toiletry

Famous Pharaohs

Furniture of a Palace Hieroglyphs 48

A few items of the Nile Room 49

THE NILE

THE TEMPLE 50

THE PALACE

DIALOGS

After having gathered a lot of information about myths, daily life and geography of Ancient Egypt, I wrote and recorded the dialogs of the game. I sollicitated friends to embody the gods and Anubis, and I did myself the voice of Seti.

An Egyptian mummy, talking in English, with a French accent!

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Save The Mummy is a game for children in an interactive space. It fosters learning about Ancient Egypt through sight, hearing and movement, and familiarizes children with the sometimes intimidating museum environment.

This project was a lot of fun to make, and I hope a lot of fun to play. For a demo, do not hesitate to ask me!

PRODUCT DESIGN

Designing a screening device for blood donations.

Politecnico di Milano, Delcon Design Studio September - December 2020

Alice Dubourg Paul Cozma-Ivan Clara Esteva Mihriban Nihan Koç

RESEARCH The goal of this design studio was to design a device for the blood donation integrating the measures of: • body temperature, • pulse and tension, • hemoglobin concentration in the blood.

The device is aimed at the North-American market.

"I wait about 2 hours outside of the donation bus, the people behind me get rejected because the bus cannot take more persons before the end of the shift.

In the end, I am not even allowed to give because I do not have enough hemoglobin."

"Everytime there is a gun shooting, there is a sudden massive affluence in donors... Sad but true."

"In the US, the donation buses are the most popular way to give blood."

The client company, Delcon, provided initial research about blood donation and an overview of the competitors' products.

As a group, we collected complementary information through several qualitative interviews, and we made additional research on the existing products and the technologies associated.

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"I participated in a blood donation event around the theme of Game Of Thrones! They coordinated the donation with the finale of the season, a lot of students came for the event.

They even gave us a T-shirt."

"I got rejected after having waited because I did not weight enough. I thought I was limit but in the end they preferred not to take my blood."

Counterbrief We want to design a portable diagnostic instrument for blood donation, operated by experienced nurses and one-time volunteers to eliminate as much ineligible donors and reduce the queue in front of a donation bus.

Ergonomy: less than 2kg, hand grasp of 5cm Ø Features: Integrated battery, 3h of autonomy

Technology: Infrared thermometer Automatic blood pressure cuff Non-invasive hemoglobin measure (co-oximetry)

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I D E AT I O N As our main goal was to manage the queue, we began by studying various way to integrate the diagnostic step in the queueing process.

MULTIPLE SCREENING STATION

BUS REGISTRATION + SCREENING

WAITING AREA

Potential donor Elligible donor Inelligible donor Operator (nurse or volunteer)

INDIVIDUAL SCREENING STATIONS

BUS REGISTRATION + SCREENING

WAITING AREA

We finally opted for the "Operator's weareable" solution, having an operator going through the queue while screening.

Indeed, with such a solution, the operator works part-time, screening the queue only when it attains a certain length; the device's battery can be charged when the queue is not long enough; and the process is adaptable to any sort of queue in any sort of space.

Moreover, the axis "the diagnostic comes to the donor" had not been taken into account at all by other groups who converged towards "the donor comes to the diagnostic": willing to give diversity to the client, the professors were excited about this angle of approach.

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OPERATOR'S WEARABLE

BUS REGISTRATION TABLE

In the preliminary concepts, we chose to focus on the Keychain, as the semiotic is really relevant to the situation: the device holds the three keys to open the door for the donor, its operator guards the safety of the collected blood.

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CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT

The Keychain

The Stethoscope

The Keychain with retractable cords Our main challenge was to create a concept with which the operator could juggle between the three modules (body temperature, blood pressure, hemoglobin concentration) without struggling. All throughout the design process, low-fidelity prototypes helped us put the finger on usage problems or opportunities and had a decisive role in the configuration chosen.

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The Keychain with inflatable cuff

The Carabineer

Cue

Later, prototyping helped us keeping track of the proportions of our device while it evolved with the technical development.

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FINAL CONCEPT

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MODE OF USE

5 sec

4 min 3 sec

1. The operator reads the donor’s ID from their phone or from a form with the barcode reader

2. The temperature is measured with the IR sensor

5 min

3. Sliding the top module, the operator measures the hemoglobin concentration from the donor’s finger

2 min

4. Switching to the portable position, the operator adjusts the cuff to the donor, comfortably using both hands

5. The operator can sanitize the device between patients

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TECHNICAL DEVELOPMENT

Oximetry thermodiode window Quartz glass Machining

IR thermometer window PET + 15% glass fiber (brand 4PLAS) Machining

Body ABS + PC (4LOY®) Injection molding

Outer Body TPE (Versaflex OM 1040X-1) Overmolding

From the start of the technical development of the project, since we already worked together on Mike the rice cooker, we already had in mind a functionning organization.

I focused on all the internal components: understanding how the elements worked together in existing devices, finding specific component references, modeling them and integrating them in our encasing through ribs and bosses.

Paul Cozma-Ivan worked on the exterior of the case and on the integration of sterilizing in the product; Mihriban Koç was in charge of the material selection; Clara Esteva focused mostly on form refinements, taking into account the new constraints arising with our inputs.

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Oximetry sensors Dual LED Emitter & Photodiode OSI Optoelectronics Thermometer Aiming LED Kingpin Far infrared photodiode Melexis technologies Far infrared transparent lens Haiwang LCD Display EC-Buying Battery 12V, 150g Kunsen Blood pressure cuff inflation system Solenoïd valve Melexis technologies Motor and pump Koge Quick turn socket Mc Master Carr

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TECHNICAL DEVELOPMENT

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In the group, Paul and me modeled on SolidWorks. We took charge of Design for Manufacturing and Design for Assembly: noticing all the potential problems linked to injection molding such as undercuts, draft angles and bosses; simplifying the agencement of internal component to reduce the steps of the assembly process.

The final version of Cue weighs about 1kg, internal components and encasing included.

For a batch size of 500 devices, we estimated the cost of production to 320€.

Von Mises constraint (MPa) 25.14 (max) 22.36 19.58 16.80 14.02 11.24 8.46 5.67 2.89 0.11

25.9 cm

Stress (MPa)

Stress-Strain curve for 4LOY®

Yield strength 56 MPa Max. Von Mises Stress 25 MPa

16.3 cm

6.2 cm

Strain (%)

Cue is carried by the nurse all throughout its use: moments of lower attention need to be thought of, and a critical point to assert that it would not break at the first fall. To ensure this, I made several impact modelisations with Ansys and we iterated on the case thickness.

Buy components (websites)

66,64 €

Make components (Granta Design / quotes)

252,16 €

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Cue is a rapid diagnostic instrument for blood donation. It separates the donation process in two, reducing the waiting time outside the donation bus and avoiding frustration for non-elligible donors.

ABOUT ME Hi! I am Alice Dubourg, a 25 years old Design and Engineering student, currently living in Sèvres, France.

I am looking for an internship of 4 to 6 months.

EDUCATION 2019-2021, Design & Engineering master degree student at Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy

Design Sudio projects

Usages and forms of industrial products

Technical drawing and 3D modelling

Materials, manufacturing processes and prototypes 2016-2018, Engineering student at CentraleSupélec, faculty Centrale Paris, Paris, France

Fundamental mechanic of objects and fluids

Materials’ mechanical behaviour

Numerical and collaborative engineering

Project managment 2014-2016, Lycée Sainte-Geneviève, Versailles, France

Preparatory school, Physics and Chemistry pathway

alicedubourg@orange.fr +33 6 62 21 76 66 https://www.linkedin.com/in/alice-dubourg/

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE 2019 - 6 months, Intern in Product Development and Strategy for La Fabrique de la Danse, Paris, France

Renewal of an SaaS interface : gathering of users’ feedback

and redesign

Optimisation of intern processes (communication, commercial,

human ressources) 2018 – 6 months, Intern in R&D for Michelin Group, Clermont-Ferrand, France

Development and validation of a physical model for the

mecanical effects of rough grounds on the tire performances

Setting of an experimental protocol

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ASSOCIATIVE WORK AND PERSONAL PROJECTS 2018, Contestant at CiamLabs#3, workshop between technology and circus

Design of a communication product within a multidisciplinary

team, Grand Prix of the Jury 2016-2018, Vice-president & responsible of Communications for the art association of CentraleSupélec

Organisation of a one-week cultural festival, with a 13 000€ budget

Conducting meetings and managment of group creativity

LANGUAGES

SOFTWARE SKILLS

French: native speaker

CAD SolidWorks

English: fluent German: fluent Italian: basic

INTERESTS Painting, sketching, graphism Swimming, hiking, rugby Acting Travelling

Virtual Environments Unity Physics-driven simulations ComSol MatLab Microsoft Office Suite Adobe Suite Photoshop InDesign Illustrator