An Investigation into the Use of Digital Sketching during the Early-Middle Design Phases in Industrial Design Practice

An increasing number of new and emerging digital design tools are available for designers to employ in industrial design. Digital Sketching, as one of these tools, shows great potential to improve the way designers practice. Through an investigation with practising designers, the thesis shows Digital Sketching can be used in a more diverse applications, facilitating industrial designers to achieve effective design outcomes in a timely manner and at the same time freeing up design resources in the community. In addition the thesis also proposes a more comprehensive Design Tool Characteristics framework to analyse and understand other design visualisation tools in the industrial design field.