The Shape of Things to Come

8 minute read. UX (user experience) design is hard - for those not in the industry, it's basically a slightly broader term for UI (user interface) or GUI (graphical user interface), which is to say how we as engineers let you the user interact with our software. I'll preface this by saying I have no formal training in UX, but then again I don't have formal training in sculpture or software engineering either, and I like to think that hasn't stopped me. 2D UX is plenty tricky, but 3D is a real bear. I've ended up designing and building a fair amount of 3D UX simply because there was no one else (a common deficiency of large software companies is a dearth of UX experts). I'm pretty proud of what I've built and I'll describe it in the hopes that it's copied, because I have spent a lot of time being frustrated by awful 3D interfaces. What makes 3D so hard? The biggest issue is that the interface (screen, mouse, touchscreen) is all 2D. Worse yet, it ...

My boss and I had a career conversation where he asked about what motivates me. I realized it’s not really money, as I’m already so far beyond the financial position I grew up in. I eventually had to admit, to myself mostly, that I’m actually motivated by fame, or more generally by being respected in my field. The funny thing is that I am almost certainly well past my high-water mark as far as fame is concerned.  I achieved my modest internet stardom through an unexpected avenue: 3D printing design. I discovered 3D printing through my first job which sent me to a UAV conference (back before everyone called them drones) and I saw a printed radio controlled samara (one wing helicopter) that some college students had designed. They crashed and broke it, then went over to the Stratasys booth with a thumb drive and had them print a replacement. They were back flying the next day. My coworker mentioned that a new company called Makerbot was selling a kit to build your own 3D printer for...

When we bought our house, I had decided already that the huge, twin-trunk pine tree overhanging our sidewalk desperately needed a treehouse. This was a little premature as my wife was only pregnant with our first at the time, but it means I did spend some years idly contemplating designs. When my daughter was two or three and showing interest in climbing, I started sourcing materials, including some driftwood my dad and I harvested from the beaches I grew up near. But still the project languished, unstarted. What broke it loose was losing my job and falling into depression, idling my days away while my dad was dying of cancer (see my previous post ). I realized that I needed a project to keep my sanity, something I could pour my heart and soul into and remind myself that I could still accomplish things.  My dad built me a treehouse many years ago; it was in a many-armed willow tree where my mom had originally built a platform for my much older brother. My dad was a carpenter, as w...