An intelligent computer-aided design system incorporating considerations for aesthetics and the environment

Amidst intense competition, manufacturers are constantly striving to improve their competence with others. In this respect, aesthetics of the product has become one of the prime factors in capturing market share. On the other hand, ever increasing pressure from the public, customers and governments has forced manufacturers to take environmental considerations very seriously. This study focuses on the development of an intelligent computer-aided design system in order to assist designers to design specifically on the basis of aesthetic and environmental considerations. The study began with an extensive literature survey. It was found that small volume of research work had been done in the topic of design for aesthetics whereas a substantial volume of research had been ongoing in the field of design for environmental considerations. Although the aspect of combination of these two factors of design was not fully investigated. So the project was understood to be a novel one. To achieve the objectives of the research, two research surveys were conducted to gauge public viewpoint about the aesthetical attributes of the bottles of several consunler products. The first survey was conducted among Dublin City University (DCU)'s students and staff, and the second one among the residents of Dublin city and its suburb. The information obtained from these two surveys was used in the development of the design system. The design system consists of overall score & aesthetics advisor, simple material selection for bottles index, simple life cycle analysis and golden section ruler modules. The author created threshold values for the first three modules that work as benchmarks to judge the design in terms of aesthetics and environmental considerations. This novel approach of design and the software tool developed will be helpful aids to the designers to consider aesthetics and environmental aspects of design at the primary stage leading to faster product development and savings of money