When the apple has no edges and corners, when Ivey no longer stays, when innovation stops day and night, when minimalist aesthetics becomes empty...

When apples have no edges and corners

When Ivy stopped staying

When innovation stops day and night

When minimalist aesthetics becomes virtual

I still don't give up breaking up with you

Don't give up and break up with you

Your LOGO is the biggest waiting for me in this life.

......

Since Huawei's Mate X "left folding and right 5G" beat Qunfang on MWC in February, Apple has become one of our few fantasies.

Out of the infatuation with Jobs and the spoiling of Apple, even if Cook, who claims to be a "businessman", has repeatedly been mercenary, we are still full of patience with him.

Many people think that Cook only wants to prove himself under the shadow of Jobs too much, so that he will become a luxury product of Apple. But now he is still doing the same thing, but now Apple lacks Jobs' idealism and takes the initiative to eliminate Jonathan's minimalist aesthetics. It has been out of control in industrial design, which has been carried out by commercialization.

As a result, we saw that March's catkins didn't fly. In response to the stock price giving shareholders enough confidence, Apple's hardware strategy was lowered.

The Iraqi people in September did not return either. The iPhone 11 series stubbornly stayed in the 4G era, with only three shots to respond to the expectations of fruit powder.

I thought there would be another press conference in October to give everyone blood back, but watching the AirPods Pro, which sneaked into the night with the wind on October 28, was inevitably disappointed.

Apple's 2019 was so rubbed on the ground by Huawei that there was no room to fight back?

Perhaps, that's true.

After all, Apple's few great innovations, iMac, iPod, iPhone and iPad, all appeared in the Jobs era. However, in the Cook era, only the "small-scale" Apple Watch and the AirPods as accessories were available. They are obviously not of the same order of magnitude as iMac, iPod, iPhone and iPad.

What is more dangerous is that on Apple Watch and AirPods Pro, Apple does not have a moat like iOS and Cook does not have the deadly magic like Jobs. The great health of Apple Watch is still immature, AirPods Pro has fatal drawbacks in sound quality.

Today, is it true that Apple and Innovation can only break up with dignity?

We might as well turn our attention to 2020, which is highly expected by everyone, such as the small-screen flagship successor iPhone SE2 next spring and the new iPhone 12 next autumn.

IPhone SE2 Rendering @ Concept Creator



Apple analyst Guo Ming predicts that its overall design is very similar to most hardware specifications of iPhone 8. The main specifications include A13 chip, 3GB LPDDR4X memory, 64GB/128GB storage options, and the color matching is available in deep space gray, white and red.

In addition, the iPhone SE2 is expected to cost US $399 (about 2823 yuan).

According to the report, the iPhone 12 will adopt a sharper and more square aesthetic concept and inherit the middle frame design of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 5. Although bangs cannot be canceled, the size of bangs will be greatly reduced while maintaining all the functions of Face ID.

In addition, the iPhone 12 is likely to be Apple's first four-camera phone, including: wide-angle lens, ultra-wide-angle lens, telephoto lens, and adding a TOF lens can achieve a more accurate depth of field.

Guo Ming pointed out: 2020 iPhone will support 5G.

The iPhone SE2 has nothing to say. There are not many things that the iPhone 12 can take out its hands except the whole 5G system and the camera system. In front of Huawei's Mate X folding, Xiaomi MIX Alpha surround, OPPO and vivo's under-screen cameras, there is really a feeling of being insignificant. I can only expect it to make some achievements in experience.

We are not sure whether the iPhone's hard damage on the signal will be brought to the 5G era. We already have a solution and can boil frogs in warm water. If not, we are joking with 5G's high speed, low delay and wide connection. You can have a bad signal, but you really don't want a signal.

Moreover, at a time when mobile phone screens can do "sit-ups", it is really hard to say whether it is stubborn or paranoid that you are still obsessed with your own "ancient design.

If these are Apple's most dazzling innovations in 2020, then we can only thank you for giving the "microphone" to other competitors.

Although we don't know what big moves Huami OV will make in 2020?

But it can be predicted that they will be further explored in folding, surrounding and under-screen cameras:

The maturity of the under-screen camera technology will eliminate the "last nail house" embedded on the full screen, and it can further enlarge the imagination of the folding screen and the surrounding screen as the basis.

After the folding screen is upgraded with flexible materials, it can break away from the limitations of Samsung Fold internal folding and Huawei Mate external folding and develop different application forms in different scenarios.

As for the surround screen with the cooperation of the under-screen camera, it will have greater potential. Although the practicability is still limited, it does not prevent us from porting it to other electronic devices with larger screens.

In this way, does Huami OV wearing a red scarf have a brighter future than the iPhone?

However, in another way of thinking, Apple's "caution" is not unreasonable: when the technical level has consumed the revolutionary dividend of the supply chain, and the overall market has experienced nearly ten years of rapid growth and inevitably enters the stock era, we have ended the extensive innovation of "Jobs' first machine"; Now as the strategic points of major manufacturers-lifting screen, waterfall screen, folding screen, and the newly emerging surround screen, to a large extent, they are only innovating for the sake of "innovation". They are fighting on their own by different enterprises, and it is difficult to become a temporary choice. Even the bangs on iPhone X are just abandoned by other manufacturers.

Obviously, in the red-eyed battlefield of mobile phones, we have completely lost our direction on what "innovation" is.

This is also the reason why Apple's "form following function" fan designs such as bangs, wire planers, gas stoves and pea shooters have become popular in recent years.

Of course, the above discussion on innovation is still limited to the small framework of mobile phones, and we should look a little further: in fact, not only domestic mobile phones, but also the consumer electronics industry are facing similar problems: when the former king is no longer deterred and the emerging princes are difficult to take over the legal authority for a while, out of coveting the throne, they will be overwhelmed with a series of "small moves".

Perhaps, these "small actions" can not cause much disturbance for the time being, but for them, some words may not be subverted, but if not, they will not be able to stand out; and for users, whether they are regarded as "innovation" or not, its greatest value is to provide us with more choices.

And this kind of design, which can not be called "innovation" for the time being, we might as well call it "redesign".

When innovation enters the bottleneck, we can't find the best solution for a while. Who says that "redesign" is not the most suitable design?

Cook is well versed in this point, and we experienced it especially in the "7th Shenzhen International Industrial Design Exhibition.



(1)
Redesign · Everything
○

In the past three days, the 7th Shenzhen International Industrial Design Exhibition is in full swing.

I don't know how many people went to the scene to see the elegant demeanour of industrial design at home and abroad, and I don't know if everyone has dabbled in their favorite things in this gluttonous feast, and I don't know how many people in the industry can see through the past and future of industrial design from more than 6000 design products of these 310 global innovative design institutions?

All we know is that when Apple can't surprise the world, other industrial design companies are not satisfied with the status quo.

Perhaps, their products are not as profiteering as Apple?

Perhaps, their designs are not as popular as Apple's?

Perhaps, their users are not as loyal as Apple?

But so what.

When people's eyes are focused on a few limited brands, when the entire manufacturing industry is passively inclined to the mobile phone industry; they can hardly find a sense of existence in this field, but they have not stagnated because of this. A corner of the world uses its own creativity, its own design and its own ideas to support the day that belongs to industrial designers.

Moreover, the world is not only white or black, nor is it Apple or Huawei.

I don't need to repeat the specific situation of the exhibition. It is not my turn to take over how the major exhibitors show their muscles. As one of the "15 awesome design companies" appointed by this exhibition, we only regard it as a "wonderful misunderstanding".

Exhibitor members who started grooming at 6 o'clock last weekend, rushed the first subway on 6.4 10, set up booths at 7: 30, and didn't leave until 5: 30 p. m. All day long, I think I still have a certain say in the small steps of about 10,000 in the 20-year-old flat space.

The biggest experience is that it is hard for users to find products and for enterprises to find designs, and it is even more difficult for designs to realize their dreams.

Of course, when users look for products, they have the initiative; in addition to special needs, they have a wide range of choices and are very willful.

When companies look for designs, they also have the initiative; they need the design company to show all their strength in a few words, and they can also provide constructive supplements to their needs, and then how to cooperate has to be said separately.

Design companies are the most embarrassing in this link. They have no right to speak and purchase products. What they only have is the "temporary design right" of products from zero to one. The products before and after this have little to do with them. What is even more embarrassing is that they only need to actively expose their "design talents" if they only have the "temporary design right" of products ", only then can it become an option for the needs of enterprises, and then be chosen by consumers again; the cruel thing is that only design companies that sprint to this step, the design concepts they adhere to have value.

After all, the smell of wine is also afraid of deep alleys; moreover, working behind closed doors is not a long-term solution for a design company.

Therefore, this design event of "Redesign · Connecting Everything" is naturally a gathering of people.

At a time when 5G is about to be fully commercialized, when everything is on the Internet, and when the old design meets the new standard, we don't need to talk about the "innovation" of walking in the cloud, but we need to put down-to-earth "redesign" on the agenda.

Perhaps, we did not have the broad vision of several leaders and guests attending the launching ceremony. However, standing in the position of exhibitors, our perspective on what users like more seems to be clearer.



②
Fashion (appearance) design
○

During the ten hours at the exhibition, while making one leg no longer belong to me, I also saw clearly the preferred element that most users like: beauty.

Beauty, this kind of sensory element, is simply suitable for all ages, men and women. However, different groups of people may have different definitions of beauty, which requires designers to produce flowers.

At the exhibition, we brought a smart bracelet:

In order to distinguish it from other homogeneous products, we use a straight line to penetrate the head and tail to unify the watchband and the movement. And boldly endow the movement with its aluminum alloy shell, remove meaningless curved surface decoration, disperse the heavy feeling on the side with repeated cutting lines, and maximize the clean and elegant temperament of the whole product.

And this also gave many exhibitors the urge to try it on.

What is more embarrassing is that due to some problems with the enterprise side of this product, the exhibits at the exhibition are only concept versions rather than real machine prototypes. This leads to the product can't be turned on or bent over, which once made users who want to experience unable to enjoy it.

But this still does not hinder the audience's interest in it.

As an exhibit, it may be somewhat deficient; but as a conceptual product, its mission is considered complete.

Perhaps, this type of product is not technically far from the same type of product, but it explores more possibilities in different scenarios in design.

It is also the unique feeling of these detailed designs that make the product "beautiful".



(3)
Structural (modeling) design
○

And the second point is that the more eye-catching feature is probably "odd".

Qi, this kind of visual element, it is not as soft as beauty, but with a little distortion of reality, it can stimulate users' association and leave a deep first impression on them.

At the exhibition, we brought a game router:

Traditional routers are composed of a combination of several lines and one face, but we have broken this mindset. Through the arrangement and combination of different lines and planes, a completely different line and plane framework is used to give them a biological shape and make them "stand" up. After determining the overall appearance of the product, we put the interface, keys and heat dissipation holes in their most suitable positions, the only linear indicator on the front is like the finishing touch.

The "side effect" brought by the unique shape is that visitors are more curious about whether it has "subjective initiative" than its essential function ".

It is a pity that as a router, the four antennas outside and the two modeling columns in the middle cannot move. After all, the router is still "easy to be static but not easy to move.

However, it is not to say that this kind of new modeling design has only ornamental value. In another category, who said that smart speakers, alarm clocks, coffee machines, etc. cannot be "moved at will"?

Spend the same amount of money to find enough sense of participation in a product to make it unique; isn't that the value of styling design.

It is also the "added value" other than these basic functions that makes it "exotic goods".



④
Interactive (future) design
○

The third may have a little threshold, not everyone is willing to pay the cost of time to understand a "strange" thing.

Once this kind of strangeness is linked to science and technology, it is manifested as "new" with a sense of future ".

New, here is more advanced than Qi, and more profound than the United States. It is an unfinished or intermediate state of our exploration of future interactive experience. Therefore, it cannot show enough high-end and maturity, which is why many people reject it.

We brought an AR glasses at the exhibition:

As the industry's first augmented reality device equipped with Qualcomm Xiaolong 835 processor, it adopts user experience-centered ergonomic design, powerful computing power and holographic graphics rendering ability so that users can easily enjoy all kinds of wonderful content. While taking into account the aesthetics of science and technology and the sense of future, it further relieves the wearing pressure, and its lens can be disassembled and easy to carry.

As one of the few AR devices in 6000 products, it may really take courage to come up with its own AR products when Facebook and Microsoft can't handle it, and Apple is ready to invade.

However, whoever stipulates AR glasses can only display the glasses lenses in one way. Although the overall shape of our AR glasses may be a bit strange and the operation mode is not as friendly as imagined, the design idea of "adding an intermediate display screen to reduce lens demand" may be more economical and affordable.

Once everyone avoids Facebook and Microsoft's copy of hell's difficulty, our compromise may inspire more players to enter this field and accelerate the growth and maturity of virtual reality technology.

This requires us to "carry forward the past and open up the future" on the basis of existing materials, technology and design thinking ".


⑤
2020 Industrial Design Trend
○

Here we can also explain why Apple Mingming has nothing to do with this industrial design event, but we still use it to attract jade?

This is, of course, because the innovation that was once enriched in the mobile phone industry is actively or passively spreading to other fields due to its own bottleneck.

Of course, Apple has never been the originator of innovation. It is not even the pioneer of mobile phone innovation. In January 2000, the Nokia 7110 brought a super large screen, in March 2000, the Motolora A6188 touch screen supported Chinese handwriting input, in December 2000, the Simenzi 6688 integrated MP3 mobile storage function, in August 2001 Ericsson T68 brought a color screen, and in October 2002, the Nokia 7650 had a built-in camera five......

To put it strictly, the iPhone is just a "redesign" that brings together the essence of each family ".

However, this did not affect Jobs to raise industrial design to an unprecedented height, and Cook pushed Apple to a trillion-dollar market value on the basis of Jobs. Although Cook's era paid more attention to commercial value than industrial design, it did not deny his almost morbid pursuit of perfection in Jobs's era.

Today, when Apple's demand for innovation is no longer so urgent, it once sat back and watched the Android camp make a big difference. Its own technology is always late after a year and a half. Although their so-called "innovation" has not come out of Jobs' "shadow", they are no longer within Cook's range.

Innovation in the Cook era that was misinterpreted as "not necessarily change, but do better" showed greater inertia.

This kind of innovation in response to market changes is not so much innovation as "redesign", because they are obviously not so complete.

But just like we can't deny the significance of Apple's innovation just because the Apple innovation in Cook's era is too slow; we can't deny the value of other manufacturers because their redesign is relatively early.

This kind of relatively precocious "redesign", once we can't find the existence of the right to speak like Apple in other industries, it will surely move towards an era of "a hundred flowers blooming": everyone, Every company is participating in innovation. Although this kind of innovation is minimal, and even occasionally goes astray and goes to extremes, it is still meaningful.

After all, trial and error are always more positive than stagnation.

And we are not clueless about this era of redesign and innovation that is about to erupt in an all-round way, at least we can predict its following trends:

Trend 1: Polarization of Design

When innovation reaches the bottleneck and everyone focuses on "more beautiful, more strange and newer", in order to make our own design more distinctive, we will inevitably go to two extremes: the minimalist design with form following function and the extreme design with form following passion.

The former only takes into account the best functional performance of the product, while the latter will be more inclined to the mining of users' emotions.

It is difficult to say who is right and who is wrong, but the emphasis of design thinking is different.

Trend 2: Exploration of New Interactive Forms

The polarization of design is only the different choices made by everyone for different understandings of human-computer interaction, and we will surely usher in more convenient, more efficient and more three-dimensional interaction forms on top of browsing, clicking and touching.

The function of the design here is to process human instinct and perception data more efficiently, and win people's hearts with more mature product interaction experience.

Under the new interactive form, it will further blur the boundary between the real world and the digital world.

Trend 3: Servitization of Design Content

With the aid of a new generation of interactive logic and interactive devices, the original tools will get closer to people and even become part of us in some way, where we only need to enter the digital world directly through voice, gestures, expressions and even emotions.

At this time, some auxiliary devices need to expand more possibilities under similar templates, which requires the design to gradually move from hardware to customized services with content and private nature.

Perhaps, one day in the future, human beings will no longer need the physiological behavior of dreaming. Brain networking can help us supplement biological energy anytime and anywhere.

Trend 4: The Rise of Personal IP

Of course, the above three points may take at least 5-10 years to realize, and what we can be sure recently is that the design will inevitably move from a large-scale enterprise to a small workshop, and finally even an individual.

This is because of the further development of big data and AI, the style of some large enterprises is easier to be "cracked" by in-depth learning, but the design with strong personal style may be limited to a small group of specific fans due to limited commercial value.

And this is the final duel between machine computing power and biological intelligence.

However, in the process of big data and AI in the whole era, personal IP cannot rise against the trend, and it is likely to become a minority culture similar to fans chasing stars. To some extent, the works they designed are not designs, but works of art.

Of course, this is the worst-case scenario and a hidden worry for all creative workers.

Therefore, facing the future, we have to face only three design trends: polarization of design, exploration of new interactive forms and service-oriented design content.

Let's change the topic here. Apple's soft move may not only be Cook's compromise on business, but also Cook saw a more pessimistic future earlier: in the future era of AI rampant, this kind of "bit creature" and even "quantum creature", which can greatly omit the process only by inputting requirements and purposes, is likely to replace the existing design.

Apple is not ignorant of current affairs, it is too knowledgeable of current affairs to choose and innovate to cut.

However, this is only speculation after all. When AI really wants to replace design, it is not far from consciousness awakening.

Therefore, when AI reaches out to the field of industrial design, what we should do more is not to resist their arrival. We should rethink the positioning of future industrial designers. We should domesticate AI into a tool, not its puppet.

And this requires us to design from now on, jump out of the vicious circle of "redesign" and give AI a set of "legal" skins and logic.

By that time, we can not understand code and AI, but we must understand human-computer interaction and machine learning.

PS: Some pictures come from @ Ben Fearnley