Milestones
Human Centred Design methods will be similarly employed in the development of assisstive controllers, allowing for appropriate consideration of the experience of individual product users. The implementation of software and hardware demonstrators will also allow for the validation of the overarching delivery platform and illustrate the route to mass customisation using advanced and integrated digital manufacturing techniques. To provide an appropriate path to integration across these elements, and to allow for appropriate points of reflection, the project methodology comprises three critical milestones at 12 month intervals:
Milestone 1
Technological review, review of
state-of-the-art and key stakeholders, and initial experimentation
Milestone 2
Development of the proposed VR environment and refinement of assistive controller designs based on biomechanical injury profiles
Milestone 3
At this stage, the critical theoretical work will be undertaken as well as the foundational experimentation that will guide the latter two milestones. It is envisioned that following a critical review of technology and contemporary research, the biomechanical profile can be built using a variety of methods. Additionally, it is proposed that the initial materials and mechanical testing is carried out over this time period.
This stage will be iterative in nature and will most likely require a lot of resources and cooperation from all involved parties. Additionally, the assistive switch design refinement will be resource intensive but will provide some of the most valuable scientific output of the work – testing various structures and materials could lead to a number of publications and tangible practical output. The development of these two elements is critical for the next phase of the work.
The VRR platform will be tested with 3 people, each having unique injury profile from which a unique assistive controller has been developed. This stage will involve a set of structured experimentation and analysis of the platform and a detailed review of the human-centred design requirements of the assistive switches.