From the beginning, I wanted the feedback to the rider to be visual rather than sound or anything else. This doesn't mean that I was utterly ruling about sound, but I wanted to make sure sight wasn't the answer first. There are a few reasons for prioritising sight over sound; 1. There's already a lot to do with sight on a bike, from being aware of your surroundings to reading your speedo, so my thinking was adding another visual feedback wouldn't be crazy 2. Some bikes are loud, and the ones that aren't are LOUD. They're fitted with custom exhausts which burst your eardrums and cause the bike to shake like mad. Heres a video I took at Harley Davidson Edinburgh as an example:
Because of this loudness, I don't think that any sounds in the helmet would be all that noticeable, and even if they were the rider would probably start to tune them out along with the noise of their bike.
3. A lot of bikers already have helmet to helmet heads sets fitted to their helmets, so the 'ear-piece' section of the helmet will already have a little speaker installed, and I'm not quite sure how I'd be able to make it work for both (as in 2-in-1).
However, there is the counter-argument that lights/visuals might be distracting, but no more so than a random sound every time you're in a blind spot. Bikers already lookout for brake lights, indicators, road signs, warning lights on their bike not to name any other optional features such as cruise control, ABS, the list goes on, so fitting just one more light or visual notification isn't going to be the make or break on what distracts a bike rider.
I wanted to play around and get people's opinion on what symbol(s) they thought might be the best as a notification. To do this, I replicated the prototype I made last week (available to see here) and laser-etched 15 different symbols into them to light up and test. Here are photos of each different symbol
My plan is to test out what symbol is the most effective moving forward and then utilise that as the key notification for the rider. I want a symbol which is effective in portraying warning but not distracting for the rider, so I'll need to do some user testing to find the one with the perfect balance.
That's all for today's blog, not much in it but just a quick update.
Thanks!
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