Image generated by Dall-E | prompt: a cover for a title "AI for inventory and storage". Keywords: storage, workshop, AI, smart camera
AI storage | smart inventory
passion project at Fotolight
Client: myself
Timeline: 1 month
Tags: Interactive experience | AI | UX
project brief: Create a smart system that assists in store / search / find / buy materials in the workshop
project roles:
Ideation
UX
AI training
Digital and physical prototyping and testing
pitching and presentation
The big problem
The image speaks for itself! the problems with storage system in this workshop are countless, but to put it in a nutshell, there is no specific guideline for what to store, how to store and where to store it.
The status quo is that everyone selects a spot to put back rest material by “convenience”.
My main idea
I want to create a system that is self correcting over time and DOES NOT require going through the current storage system and fix it. Although It takes time but I have concluded this is the best approach because:
the current situation is the product of the past 25 years of lack of a system so it takes a lot of time to re-arrange it
The staff is reluctant to co-operate in fixing the current situation because it takes time and it’s a tough task
Study of the layout
Interviews + pain&gain points
Key takeaways are:
There are 2 docks that the new material is charged from
there is 1 path that takes the “whole sheets” to the CNC machines
After CNC operation, the rest material is temporarily stored in a spot.
The rest material goes to the wall saw for being cut in square / rectangular shapes to be storable.
Based on this observation, I want to implement a system between the wall saw and the storage. this is the path where almost all the rest material should take before being stored and the optimum “Design opportunity”.
My goals and WHYs
I’ve defined these goals for the project and the reason why. I’ve extracted these goals from studying the current layout and situation.
I interviewed the main stakeholders because I have access to all of them. These are the people directly in charge of placing the material. the key takeaway is, there are 3 reasons to keep the rest material:
The user is told to keep the rest material by another user or a higher ranking member
the user doesn’t know if the rest material is going to be used again or not (might be blamed later so they store everything)
The user know the material is going to be used later based on their experience or the information they have about the upcoming projects
Different materials have different threshold for being usable. e.g. small piece of PVC could be used later but small pieces of Acrylic not.
