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Hal Mills

Industrial Design and Technology (BA Hons)

I believe that good design is crucial for improving peoples experiences with products and services. Through my designs I strive to solve problems for real people in effective yet beautiful solutions.

GROOVE 1 – Linear Tracking Wireless Turntable

The Groove 1 is designed to be a statement piece in the home and is completely wireless, running off its integrated battery. It allows playback of all sizes of Vinyl LP from its built in 6″ speaker driver.
Working closely with an electrical engineer I modelled a working circuit for the electronics within TinkerCAD. This allowed me to accurately determine the internal components needed for the Groove 1 to function.
I use sketching as a key medium for ideation throughout my design projects and for the Groove 1 many iterations where drawn up, tested and discussed with my target user before I arrived at the final proposal.
Prototyping is another medium I use to evolve the form of my products. When designing the Groove 1 many prototypes given to the target user group to evaluate which allowed me to make informed design decisions as I moved forward.
The story and overall ethos of Groove as a brand is to get the younger generation into listening to Vinyl. The size, shape and palette of the product and brand where heavily investigated to insure they would appeal to the younger generation in order to standout from the crowd of existing turntable brands. Inspired by underground music culture the product is designed to be portable yet dependable, with bluetooth connectivity also available if the user wants to listen to digital forms of media as well as their collection of LPs.

Graphic Design and Illustration

Graphic design wasn’t a skill I had when I started my degree but as I worked on projects I became very knowledgeable in various Adobe products and other Graphic design softwares. Over the years I have also taken on various freelance graphic design projects including designing and illustrating music event posters and logos for brands such as Psyked Records, The Drum Engine and Urban Heightz.

Poster Designs for The Drum Engine events
Illustrated poster and album cover art I was commissioned to do.

UX Design

I am also proficient in UX and App design and put these skills to good use in an optional user experience design module undertaken in my final year.
High fidelity concept screens from Dine Round Mine, an eco friendly dinner party planning service I developed the concept for during the user Experience module.

More of my work

Complete Care was a brand and product designed as a personal assistant for workers in care homes. This group project was submitted to the RSA design awards.
The graffix auto stencil was a second year project. The concept was for a device that automatically stencilled a wall so that Graffiti artists could easily create 3D art.
The Oakley aware was a concept for snowboard goggles that made the wearer aware of other skiers in their blind spot.
The Groove DJ system was an early iteration of The Groove 1 turntable. It was designed to be a modular DJ media player that allowed both Vinyl and Digital play within one product.
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