Visualization

Challenge & Selection    As a 5th year Electronics Engineering student in the Technological Institute of the Philippines – Quezon City,  the tool that I’ve been using is the Visualization, since it enables me to properly elaborate what I’m thinking  and planning to my groupmates in our Design Project, or Thesis. Through this, they were immediately able  to understand what I’m trying to say to them and we were able to quickly identify the possible solutions that  we need from our stated problems. As students, we’ve been mostly using the block diagram visualization in  order for us to easily define the step – by – step procedures that will immediately result to our desired project  output. By doing this, we can also brainstorm and identify the different parts of our project that can be  replaced, or that needs further improvement.    Application    We start out our project by creating a block diagram. The block diagram shows the components of a system,  which, in our case, is our Design Project. The topic of our Design Project is the “Design and development of  a Portable Electric Circuit Fault Locator”. To learn more about the problem that was given to us, we would  need to look for materials that are related to our subject of interest. It would also help us if we would be able  to interview experts from electric distribution companies.    By using the block diagram, we were able to identify the main problems that we have, which is: 1) What  scientific method should we use for our project? 2) What platform should we use if we would make our fault  locator portable? and 3) How will we make it low – cost and user friendly, such that our project will be  affordable and easy to use for everyone? By identifying these problems, we would then try to write or draw  our ideas in a single sheet of paper. After a few minutes, we would then brainstorm, explain, and defend our  ideas to further identify whose ideas can be applied to our project. By seeing each idea’s pros and cons and  through the usage of visualization from each member’s writings and drawings, we would be able to get the  desired output for our thesis’ prototype.    Another visualization application for our project is the designing of the circuit’s body. Since the prototype  should be portable, it should be lightweight and small in size. It should also be made with a non – conducting  material, since it will be connected to the outlets that emits electricity. From this, I would try to sketch its  features in a piece of paper. After this, I would then finalize my output through the use of the SolidWorks  software.    Insight & Approach    From this exercise, I learned that visualization is an extremely essential tool for us students, especially when  we are having difficulties in explaining and elaborating our ideas to our fellow groupmates. This tool enables  us to share our insights regarding our stated problem. Through the use of visualization, we will also be able  to identify to where we are in our project, and to what parts we can further improve in. It also helps us to  identify the parts in our diagram that we haven’t known yet and still deserves further gathering of information.    Since the sharing of ideas, or group communication, is the most focal point that makes or breaks the group,  next time, I would like to further use the visualization tool to extract information from my groupmates and to  gather their insights to be used for the further development of our future projects.

