An ever-increasing array of design visualisation tools are available to designers. As such, design education is constantly challenged to keep up with these trends so that students are best equipped for entering industrial practice. This paper reports a study into the use of digital sketching, a relatively new digital visualisation tool. The study…

Few digital product development tools are used in industry and academia compared to their historic paper-based counterparts. This is surprising as many parts of the product development process have digitised such as communication and Computer-Aided Design. Therefore, a gap in knowledge was identified which informed the development of a novel…

Problem-based learning (PBL) approaches are well-accepted and disseminated and have been intensively employed in several engineering programs. This article aims to present a teaching experience in which PBL was applied in one course of a mechanical engineering graduation program. The PBL approach applied is described step-by-step as well as the…

This paper presents two studies in which an empirical approach was taken to understand and explain form generation and decisions taken in the design process. In particular, the activities addressing aesthetic aspects when exteriorising form ideas in the design process have been the focus of the present study. Diary methods were the starting point…