Continuum Visit

During my trip to Boston for the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society annual meeting, I got to go on a tour of Continuum, a innovative design consultancy. It was incredibly fascinating and resulted in a semi-permanent “kid in a candy shop” feeling.

During our visit, my tour group got to participate in a design competition for a Halloween candy machine prototype. Well, it looks like Continuum just did a small writeup of the whole thing, so take a look!

My group took the approach of utilizing a more tactile sense of fright, something that might have a larger impact for children. What was surprisingly unsettling about the whole process were the flaps over the candy holes. Different materials with vastly varied textures lent a hair-raising physical sensation to reaching into the machine, not to mention the possible chance encounter with our slimy booby trap.