Design Team of the Year: Intelligent teamwork wins international acclaim.

Design Team of the Year: Intelligent teamwork wins international
acclaim. Essentials of BMW Group design development: The right tool at
the right time, the right people in the right place. Munich. The
exhibition dedicated to this year's winners of the red dot award hosted
by the red dot design museum, which is situated on the grounds of
Essen's World Cultural Heritage, the coal mine "Zeche
Zollverein", was extended until 5 August, 2007. At the centre of
this presentation of outstanding product design are highly acclaimed
design projects accomplished by the this year's winner of the title
"Design Team of the Year".: BMW Group The show in Essen,
which has already been extended once before, demonstrates how BMW Group
always succeeds in fascinating customers of the BMW, MINI, Rolls-Royce
and BMW Motorcycle brand with the design of their vehicles while also
convincing the automotive experts. At the internationally acclaimed
design competition, current BMW Group products were also highly
successful. Both the new BMW 3 Series Coupe and the new MINI were
presented with a Red Dot Award 2007. The jury also considered three BMW
Motorcycle models: BMW F 800 S, BMW G 650 Xcountry and BMW HP2 Megamoto.
Winning the title of "Design Team of the Year 2007" however,
was the highlight of the award winning ceremony as it expresses the
jury's respect for sustained and trend-setting innovative design work.
The award pays tribute to the design team for successfully highlighting
the premium character of the car, while maintaining the tradition of
the brands and expressing the innovative force of BMW Group. This
year's red dot awards presentation ceremony pays tribute to the design
achievement of a whole team, the "Design Team of the Year"
rather than honoring the work of individual designers. During the award
ceremony at the Aalto-Theater in Essen, Christopher E. Bangle, BMW
Group's chief designer, emphasized his appreciation of this shift in
focus. "Successful, sustained design never the work of an
individual ," Bangle explained. He highlighted the importance of
bringing a range of different characters and personalities with diverse
skills and qualifications using a high variety of different tools to
work on one project. An essential element of BMW Group's design
philosophy is the principle of integrating a group of people with a
variety of different skills in one successful unit. This is not just
about teamwork but about the selection of the most efficient and
effective method for every single stage of the project. "We need
to put the right people in the right place," Bangle sums up,
"and we need the right tool at the right time." This method
is an integral part of the process of designing vehicles of the BMW,
MINI, Rolls-Royce and BMW Motorcycle brand. At the beginning of the
design process, the designers are faced with an empty, white sheet of
paper and their heads are full of information and ideas. The visual
expression of design concepts is delivered in many sketches. At the
same time, two- and three-dimensional drafts are created by means of
digital tools. These versatile tools allow the development of rough
surface geometries and animations within a relatively short period of
time. More importantly, however, they allow a highly efficient exchange
of data with all other partners in the product development process.
During all stages, the design process is characterized by an ongoing
assessment to ensure that the right tools are used for the process in
hand. A life-size "tape plan" with the finalized proportions
for example, is used to hone the most important contour lines. This
method allows the rapid implementation of changed within the design
concept without excessive material consumption. This is followed by the
next stage: from two-dimensional to three-dimensional representation.
At this time, the first clay models and the first virtual
three-dimensional models are developed. Both tools are important in
their own specific way: the clay model widens the sensory perception,
while the computer allows a fast and precise transfer of data to the
numerous development partners. The designers are set on dealing with
the problem of when best let machines take over manual processes and
vice versa in an ongoing and deliberate process. The quest for the
right tool is guided by clear principles, which determine the
composition and interaction of a design team. Best example: CAS
(Computer Aided Styling) methods for design processes are only deployed
by clay modelers with a high degree of professionalism and many years
of experience with the clay modeling process. Only then can these
skilled team members exploit the strengths of this tool without losing
the design to its preference. Does work on a virtual object open up new
design potential or does it even restrict creativity? In order to find
answers o these questions, one must look to the work on a real,
three-dimensional object. This way the personal touch of skilled human
beings with their optical and tactile sensory abilities remains at the
center of this process. "Whenever we need to see the overall
effect of a vehicle, the eyes and hands of the human designer are
vastly superior to any computer tool," Ralf Kostenzer, Head of
Clay and CAS Modelling at BMW Group's design department, emphasizes.
Yet, computers are indispensable when it comes to making the production
process more efficient and gaining more time for the creative process.
When it comes to making design processes more efficient, the deployment
of a five-axis CNC milling machine is doubtlessly the tool of choice.
This machine is used to introduce rough contours and proportions to a
new clay model. The milling machine is programmed to CAS data. The
rough models are then manually honed with fine tools to their final
design. Over a period of several months, the clay modelers will refine,
diversify and add the finishing touches to the clay model. "For
us, the finer modeling work that come with the design of surfaces truly
proves that car design is a form of art," Kostenzer explains. This
is achieved by a close cooperation between designers and clay modelers.
At the same time, they will use their CAS skills to quickly change
individual details such as headlight assemblies or wheel via rapid
prototyping whenever this is deemed efficient. Different methods are
seamlessly integrated into the entire design process. The processes a
selected model has to undergo prior to its series production are
characterized by interaction between human creativity and computer-aided
efficiency. Computer Aided Design (CAD) is used to reconvert the data
acquired by scanning the clay model into three-dimensional computer
models. This way, data is transferred efficiently to all departments
involved in the product development process right through to preparing
the model for the tooling department, which marks the start of all
series production processes. Up until this moment, the hand-made clay
model remains the final reference for the safe implementation of all
technical requirements.