Product Designing about Fishing Frog Lures
Designing about products:
1. 3D Design
3D Design: Cooperate with professional designers to design three-dimensional renderings. It is possible to borrow or splice parts from other products if the whole or partial design needs it. This process takes about 12-120 days. It will take a short time to make partial modifications on the basis of a certain version of the product. Creating a brand new design will take a long time. 3D design software has a variety of options, which software should be used depends on whatever the designer is good at. The original designed 3D file format is ".stl" or ".stp". Files in ".stl" format can generally be used for 3D printing, and files in ".stp" format can generally be used for machine engraving to open molds.
Typically, large brands may have their own designers. Small and medium creative brands will often find a small workshop to cooperate with. These two types of brands may take the initiative to provide us with the original 3D design when developing products. Other even smaller brands need supplier’s help to provide designing service.
Here are some common ways that customers may use to describe the shape of a frog lure to supplier:
a. Hand-drawing on white paper. Customers will usually draw the four sides of the frog lure, mark the position of the logo, the modeling details that need to be paid attention to and so on.
b. Search and collect photos of real frogs or other products from the internet and write marks on the photos or describe the required changes in the text of the email.
c. Ask the designer to design a 3D diagram on the computer and add description. This is the most direct and effective method. However, this requires the suppliers to have the ability to draw and read drawings.
2. Mold design
Mold design: The production process of the frog lure skin is Rotocast. The difference between Rotocast and the injection molding process of conventional plastic products is that the molds required for the Rotocast process is not engraved by machine, instead it uses replicated and manually processed molds based on 3D printed samples.
First, wax sample has to be prepared which is a hand-wrapped 3D printed sample with wax material for production. The size of the wax sample is 7% larger than the actual product size. Wax samples can be used to make the mother mold, or they can be used to make the final mold.
The mother mold is the mother of the final mold and can make final molds in batches. The mother mold’s size is 3.5% bigger than the final mold. The mother mold can also be directly used to produce samples, but hooks and other parts cannot be used since the size is 3.5% larger.
Usually making the OEM products way is to first make a wax sample 3.5% larger than the actual product size and skip the making of mother mold, then make the final mold directly, after it produce the sample and send it to the customer to confirm. After the customer confirms, re-make a wax sample that is 7% larger than the actual product to make a mother mold, and then make a batch of final molds.
Furthermore, there are also 2 other processes that can replace the use of mother molds to make samples: The first process is to use a replicated molding process to make a plaster mold, and then use a plaster mold to make a soft plastic product, but this mold is disposable and not precise enough. The second process is to use a computer to engrave an aluminum mold, and then use the aluminum mold to make a sample of the same material as the final product, but this mold is made by combining upper and lower molds, resulting in a sample with a joint line. The advantage of these two processes is that the price is slightly lower than that of making molds, so normal-sized samples can be made, hooks and other accessories can be matched in advance.
3. Accessories Matching
The most commonly used configuration of the Rotocast frog is:
Split ring + double hook + hook tip transparent tube + lead weight + skirt.
Another common configuration is:
Split ring + single hook + lead weight + swivel + blade.
In addition, there are some special designed frog lures that may also use the following: buzz blade, soft lures’ frog leg, nylon rope loop, hard plastic parts, etc.
The weight of the lead will affect the swimming style and water entry angle of the frog lure. Therefore, the weight design of the lead should be just right.
The wiggling of the skirt can attract the attention of fish, but it’s more suitable for fish with big mouth, such as bass. If a fish with a small mouth bites the skirt of the lure, it might not bite the hook. Therefore, when fishing a fish with a small mouth, it is recommended to choose frog lures without skirt, but with blade, because the blade is much shorter than the skirt. Similarly for the popping frog, if the water splash caused by the angler when fishing is too big, it will also cause the small-mouthed fish to miss the bite.
4. Packaging Design
Commonly used packaging:
a. PP plastic bag + Stickers (attached to the outside of the plastic bag)
b. Big PP plasitc bag + hangtag (put the double hook through the two holes which are on the hang-tag)
c. PP plastic bag + Paper Cardboard (inserted in the plastic bag)
d. PET transparent box + Paper Cardboard (inserted in the box)
e. PET transparent box + PET blister + Paper Cardboard (inserted in the box)
f. PET blister + Paper Cardboard (inserted into the blister hem)
g. PET blister + Paper Cardboard (Heat pressed together with blister)
h. PET blister + Double-layer paper cardboard (Heat pressed after folding the cardboard, clamp the blister edge)
PET transparent box and blister are recyclable and environmentally friendly. In the past, when people did not have a strong awareness of environmental protection, most of them used PVC transparent boxes and blister, but PVC materials are not environmentally friendly.
When designing the shape and size of the packaging, it is important to consider factors such as beauty, sturdiness, sufficient information display, saving transformation volume, etc. Since human creativity is endless, there will be more creative packaging methods in the future.
5. Pattern Design
There are two types of coloring process for frog lure: spray painting and UV printing. Spay painting needs color molds. UV printing needs particular color design artwork and fixture.
Here are some common ways that customers use to describe the pattern of a frog lure to supplier:
a. Hand-drawing on white paper. Customers will usually draw the four sides of the frog lure and fill the four sides with hand-drawn patterns, mark logo color and other pattern shapes, colors, etc.
b. Search and collect photos of real frogs or other products from the internet and write marks on the photos or describe the required changes in the text of the email.
c. Ask the designer to make a design draft of the 4 sides using a computer and write marks on the photos or describe the required changes in the text of the email. As a supplier, we can read the color parameters from the design daft.
d. Ask the designer to design a 3D diagram on the computer and add description. This is the most direct and effective method. However, this requires the suppliers to have the ability to draw and read drawings.
After receiving the customer's design proposal, the factory will start to manufacture the first round of samples. First is the making of the color mold, which is a hollow mold. The shape of the color mold has to be the fitting to the frog skin shape. Usually the product is clamped between the upper and lower molds. There are two types of color molds: Disposable mold for samples and formal mold for mass production.
The disposable mold for samples is a transparent thin slice which can be hand-made by frog lure factory when being used.
The formal mold for color spraying in mass production is customized. Since it does not bear pressure, it is durable, easy to clean and does not rust as long as it does not deform.
If the color required by the customer is intricate and complicated and it cannot be painted by hand, then UV printer will come into use. UV printing needs customized fixtures, which is used to fix product posture and position on UV printers. At the same time, a professional designer is needed to split the customer's original artwork into four different design artworks (up, down, left and right). When the product is placed on the fixture, the printing can be started.
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What is Designing:
Designing is basically the ability of human beings to create and shape the surrounding environment. We transform the environment using our own creation. While satisfying our needs, this can also give a meaning for life.
Designing is for solving problems, however, it creatively solves problems by means of shape, material, process, aesthetics, etc., and use various methods to deeply dig and meet people’s subdivide, deep, and potential demands.
Designing is actually a translation job. The first round of translation is to translate people’s potential needs into designing key points. The second round of translation is to transform the design key points into a product by means of materials, technology, process, etc.
A product is the carrier of the connection between the designer and the consumer. We aim to provide value to consumers by precisely designing products.
