Reducing Distracted Driving

This photo was safely taken from the backseat of a car.

How to turn Do Not Disturb Mode into Driving Mode in iOS

Mobile phones do a lot of good but they can also be harmful, especially while driving. The solution seems easy (put your phone away while you’re behind the wheel) but it’s difficult in practice.

Luckily, there’s something already on your phone that can help. With about a minute of setup, two taps after that and a bit of habit you can be safer in the car. Do Not Disturb was introduced in iOS 6 to silence calls, alerts and notifications but using a certain combination of settings for Do Not Disturb can make for a temporary Driving Mode until a better solution arrives.

This combination of settings will allow you to use block most notifications, allow you to still receive calls in an emergency and use your navigation and music apps.

Setup

To set up Do Not Disturb for driving tap Settings > Do Not Disturb.

To start setting up Do Not Disturb as Driving Mode tap Settings > Do Not Disturb. There are five settings on this screen.

The first setting is Manual. This is one way to enable or disable Do Not Disturb. When enabled, calls and alerts received while the device is locked will be silenced.

The second setting is Scheduled. It’s not important for setting up Driving Mode.

The third setting is Allow Calls From. Set this to Favorites.
This allows calls to come through from a group of people you specify even while Do Not Disturb (Driving Mode) is turned on. This support article from Apple explains how to add contacts to Favorites. Use this for your family, your significant other or other important contacts like a doctor’s office or the vet.

The fourth setting is Repeated Calls. Set this to Enabled.
This allows a second call from the same person within three minutes to come through. It’s an extra level of assurance that in an emergency you can still be contacted. However, it’s important that you pull over to the side of the road if you need to take a call.

The last setting is Silence. Set this to Always.
This prevents notifications from showing up on the screen when your device is unlocked. It’s handy if you use your phone for music or navigation while driving.

That’s it. Do Not Disturb is now Driving Mode. You shouldn’t need to change these settings again.

Using Drive Mode

From Control Center you can turn on Do Not Disturb by tapping the moon icon.

Now that Driving Mode is set up you need to build a habit around your driving. Thankfully it’s a pretty easy one that doesn’t even involve unlocking your phone. Whenever you get in your car just wake your phone, swipe up from the bottom of the screen to access Control Center and then tap the moon icon to turn on Do Not Disturb (Driving Mode). If you forget to turn it on and you start receiving notifications while driving you can quickly pull over and enable it.

The hardest part about this will be remembering to turn Do Not Disturb mode on. If you’re having a lot of trouble you can leave yourself a note on the dash of the car.

The moon icon in the status bar shows that Do Not Disturb is enabled.

Once you arrive at your destination simply wake your phone, swipe up from the bottom of the screen to access Control Center and then tap the moon icon to turn off Do Not Disturb (Driving Mode). If you forget to turn off Do Not Disturb mode when you leave your car you may notice a moon icon in the status bar. Just swipe up from the bottom of the screen anywhere to access Control Center and turn off Do Not Disturb.

It’s not an elegant solution but it’s an attempt at one. Using our phones can be tempting while driving but the majority of the time it’s something that can wait until it’s much safer.

My thanks to the designer who inspired me to write this.

“…Cars are overcomplicated and they should be free of distractions.”

— Dieter Rams

Sources:
Add a Contact to Favorites by Apple
iOS on Wikipedia
My Lunch with Dieter Rams by Andrew Kim
Using Do Not Disturb by Apple

Playing Around with Storehouse and Exposure

I gave Storehouse a try after they won an Apple Design Award (congratulations to them!). It was a great way to put together a post about The Road to Hana in Maui. Everything in the app feels so responsive and fun and the quality of content on there is fantastic.

I didn't ignore Exposure though. They don't have the same 50 image/video limit that Storehouse does so I was able to put together a much more in-depth story about the whole trip.

NYC Transit Authority and iOS 7: A Colour Comparison

Last Year, Last Semester: Final Week

This picture is from the first classroom I stepped in at ACAD. It’s the visual communications room for my Design fundamentals class. My teacher was Karl Geist  and he introduced me to the school. I remember he asked me what I was interested in and I said Swiss design. I was completely unaware of any design history or what that actually meant; at that point I was just basing everything I knew about design off some posters I had seen on the web. I sat underneath the windows and light would pour in from outside. I started my education at ACAD in that room. And last week, four years later when I finished my final critique, I walked into that room and sat down to think. I thought about where I was in the beginning and where I am now.

The last week of the semester was spent presenting projects, working on portfolios and preparing things for the portfolio show. It was hectic and there were late nights but what encouraged me to keep going was knowing that everyone else in the program was going through the same thing.​ We all had the same late nights, the same anxieties and the same excitement.

It’s funny how I still remember some of the first interactions with then-strangers who I now call friends. Most were inevitable introductions in a program size of only 60 and most were shared smiles or laughter and then an exchange of names. But some of those first interactions persist in memory. I first talked to Laura Sand in an introductory jewelry class. When I first saw Justine Anweiler I unknowingly gave her a look that she later told me was filled with disapproval. Nikki Stephens sat behind me in that Design fundamentals class. I smiled at Kelsey Hughes when I dropped off my application portfolio for second year. One of the first conversations I had with Chris Turner was about the laser cutter at his work. I remember being intimidated by Nick Johnson’s skill in a design drawing class. Laura Russell sat across from me in communications design when we were drawing logos based on flowers. Allison Swertz came up to me in Concepts class and complimented me on a project about road signs. Ryder McLean sat beside me in almost all of my second year classes and I first talked to Jun Ren in information design when he told me all the places he had lived around the world.

These people I’ve been with for four years have shaped me and enlightened me and taught me things I never would’ve learned by myself. One of my teachers said this group of people is the strongest support network I’ll ever have. I believe him.

I've learned more than I ever expected to in these last four years. I've taken a jewelry class where I made necklaces and rings. I’ve taken a printing class where I tried linocut, screen printing and photo intaglio. There were art history classes that brought us back to the paintings in the Lascaux Caves. And then there was my design education: craft, typography, advertising, branding, illustrations and presentations.

I feel fortunate to have studied under such smart and caring teachers. They challenged me and supported me and made me a capital-D Designer. They did more than that though; they made me a better person. They taught me empathy and understanding. Teaching is a noble profession and I have a deep respect for what they do.

I can’t agree with anyone who says the four years went quickly. It was long and it’s getting harder for me to remember what it was like before my time at ACAD. I have a relationship with the building and the people there and while there is relief and excitement about being finished I’m sad that my time as a student there is done. The growth I experienced at the college was unlike any other in my life.

Here’s to the amazing time, people and memories.

Last Year, Last Semester: Week 15

It’s the last little bit of the marathon and it feels the part. It takes a lot of focus to keep going.

To prepare for the big shift from school projects to paying projects I’ve started tracking the time I spend working with Harvest. It would’ve been a good idea to start doing this while I was still in school but I’m in the habit of recording and scheduling working time in Calendar already (that's probably evident from the heat maps above). The benefit of Harvest is that it provides some really nice reporting, estimating and invoicing tools. I’m about a third through the free trial and it’s neat to see where my time is going and all the hours that were sucked out working on something else.

​Also included in the rewards for being a backer was a letterpress bookmark and your name in the back of the book. Jack added in a nice thank you card too.

A book I backed on Kickstarter arrived. It’s called These Days by Jack Cheng. He provided weekly updates about the project to his backers which was the original motivation to do these updates about my last semester. Here’s a two sentence synopsis of the book:

A guy who designs prop computer interfaces meets a girl who doesn't own a cellphone. A story about the human side of technology.

I'm looking forward to reading it full time once school is finished.​

We also had our last day of illustration and the sketchbook assignment was “change”. We took an old drawing and then redrew it again in different styles. My teacher Mike also brought in all his old work. It’s amazing to see how much he’s changed over his career. It made sense why he wanted that to be the theme of the sketchbook exercise for the last day. I took some photos of the work that I did in the morning.

​I took my pattern and drew it in line and then focused on the negative space on the page.

​I took some of the faces from the pattern and made them huge.

Drawing one of the faces with a single continuous line only.

​Painting one of the faces with a palette knife.

I was working on the presentation for the sushi project the day before it was due and green tea and my Retrospective playlist on Rdio fuelled the night. Bed was at 2:15. That's much later than normal but it was fun. Late nights are exciting every once in a while but a terrible habit to get into.

When we arrived for the critique Friday morning a few of us met and breathed a collective sigh of relief. Even though there was still hints of anxiety about how the presentation would go there was no more time to make changes and we were going up with what we had. It's nice to have that finish line. Otherwise I can see us making adjustments endlessly. The critique was long but it was good to see everyone’s work. There was laughing and applause and congratulations and some people even did a little bit of napping. But we did it together. There was such camaraderie at the end. My instructor Xerxes reminded us these people are the strongest support network we’ll ever have.

The days left can be counted on one hand. Only a few more paces to the finish line.

Last Year, Last Semester: Week 14

Finishing touch

The magazine is done. Chris and I went through the whole thing and did the final detailing. We uploaded it to the printer on Tuesday and felt no relief. I think it’s because you don’t get anything tangible. Even the receipt they send to you is just an email that gets filed away into a folder or deleted. Once the our copies of the magazine arrive I’m sure we’ll feel differently.

The “Future”

The sketchbook project in Illustration was about the theme of “future” this week. Mike took a large sheet of paper and placed it at the front of the room and he had all of us work on a communal drawing. He brought in some printmaker’s ink and rollers so we were stencilling all over it. I made some patterns and turned some triangles in a robot. There’s a photo of the sketchbook work from the day too.

​The big communal piece of paper the class drew on.

​The sketchbook page from this week.

Marimekko, with love

There was a presentation on Marimekko in the lecture theatre during the week. There were so many great people that I had met throughout my time at ACAD there; lots of people who I shared first year classes with before we split off into our departments. Not only was the presentation interesting but I also left the talk with great feelings about where the school is headed. The presenter mentioned how important it is to explain why cultural institutions matter. I’ve lived in a bubble for four years and now is a great time to show the world why they exist and why they make a difference.

​Unikko, designed by Maija Isola.

Chauffeured

I took the bus home one day and for about twenty minutes it was only the driver at the front of the bus and me at the back. It felt like I had lots of money and was being privately driven around in a large and somewhat smelly limousine.