Project Brief
For this project, my teammate and I were tasked with creating a product that is an exchange of some kind. In return for the user giving something, they were guaranteed something in return. For this project, we chose to do a restaurant recommendation device.

IdeationDuring the ideation phase, we were brainstorming what symbols best signal to the user that our product is associated with restaurants. We decided to use a chef hat model. We also chose to use a question mark because of product was based on a mystery box.

Low-Fidelity Model
The initial prototype helped us get a good idea of the size, layout, and design of our product. We decided to use a chef hat as the restaurant signifier since it represented the theme well. An 11 x 11-inch box gave us plenty of room to play around with the layout and sizing of the different elements. At this point, we were still deciding upon the exact name and slogan.

High-Fidelity Model
We made the body out of MDF and spray painted it white. The pieces were cut at a 45-degree angle and glued together. Small hinges were used to open the back panel. The question marks were laser cut from plywood and covered in gold-colored vinyl. We made a bobblehead-inspired design for the chef hat. We also used a vinyl cutter to create the lettering. Future improvements would be to change the color scheme to stand out more, embed the button better, and improve the directions.

Process Map
The original plan for the device was to have the user complete a Google Form, which would then send an alert to the Arduino to start printing. This required the Arduino to be connected to the internet. After initial testing and coding, I found this method to be outside the scope of the project. I decided to use a button instead, which eliminated a potential pain point. By using a button to start the process, the reliability is greatly improved.

Printing Process
The printer works by taking a single restaurant from a predetermined list and randomizing it. The printer then flashes a lightbulb and begins to print out the result. The user then tears off the paper and can take it with them to explore and try out the restaurant.