Amber Bellerjeau
This is an exclusive portfolio for Amazon. Thanks for stopping by. I’ve collected here the projects most applicable to the position, but feel free to browse the rest of my website if you’d like to see more.
Please note that this page is only accessible via the link provided in my application or cover letter.
Love bug Speaker
Groovy on the outside, sustainable on the inside.
I started designing this speaker in my first year back at school, in 2019. It’s a design I periodically picked up, made progress on and put down again, each time bringing a new idea. The first concepts were a simple ball with racing stripes.
A couple moths later, I took that ball concept and began thinking about creating a family of products using the same ball at the core to hold the speaker and it’s components.
Early CMF test
That summer, out of school, I began looking into alternative materials to plastic. Cork, had the right combination of technical, acoustic and sustainability properties, and I applied the idea to this project.
In December 2020, I began to refine the form, thinking of different ways to showcase wiring rather than hide it.
As I refined the design farther and built the model in Rhino, I thought about it’s usability. It was important to me to blur the line between a portable speaker and a home speaker.
Project Redbug:
Inspired by the procrastination of others.
Fall Quarter 2019: The Week of Midterms
After impulse buying a pair of Hexbug Spider toys during midterms, I brought the set to school to show off the fun yet dysfunctional robots to my classmates. For about an hour, we played with them and brainstormed on how to make them better, thus, my project for the following quarter was decided.
Winter Quarter 2020
I pitched the idea for the toy and working off a ramen noodle budget, scratched together the cash needed for such a project.
The first step was to disassemble the toy and measure the contents. Because of the cheapness of the materials, I found myself having to disassemble the toys because they’d frequently break during testing.
Some fixes were easy.
Others came down to the product’s cheap production.
Palaeoboy was right, and having to buy twice the number of toys I needed just to test them ate into the budget I’d put aside for 3D prints.
After conducting play tests and interviews, dissecting and repairing multiple units, watching hours of YouTube reviews, opening half a dozen boxes only to return them broken and reading blogs, Reddit threads and Amazon reviews on the subject, I felt I had enough information to start sketching.
Ideation:
In over 100 sketches, I explored what direction I wanted to take for it’s form.
Narrative Exploration
Since I was exploring an older audience, I also explored the function of the toy including developing a game, creating light and acting as a companion to help with stress.
Digital Development:
Finally, it was time to build the model in Solidworks, using the measurements I’d taken from the dissections.
Because of the level of detail needed to make a fully printable object, I was able to use Keyshot to create some impressive hero shots while exploring CMF.
After working tirelessly over two weeks with the print techs, I was presented with a box of Legos that made up my successful print. The smaller parts really needed the stability and accuracy found in machined metal parts. Having just learned to use the metal shop, I originally planned to recreate them during Spring quarter of 2020. The project is currently on hold.
Other Sketchbook Pages:
