Aykys Salchak
A graphic designer with 4+ years of experience working as a creative, guided by market trends and design expertise. Currently designing at Whalar and pursuing an IDM, M.S. degree at NYU Tandon.
A graphic designer with 4+ years of experience working as a creative, guided by market trends and design expertise. Currently designing at Whalar and pursuing an IDM, M.S. degree at NYU Tandon.
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Week 3 Assigment, Process and Reflection
October 2, 2026
Endangered Animal
Sierra Nevada Red Fox
Species Name - Sierra Nevada Red Fox
Scientific Name - Vulpes vulpes necator
Geographic Locations- Limited to federal lands and counties in California
Threats - Forest fires, droughts, global warming, lack of genetic diversity, coyotes
Materials Used - Plastic bottle, cardboard, paper, hot glue, acrylic paint
My endangered animal that I have decided to model is the Sierra Nevada Red Fox, a subspecies of the Red Fox. I think this is important to bring awareness to this animal because it was once believed to be completely extinct in California, until it was finally found in 2010. In 2021, it was officially listed under the Endangered Species Act in 2021 with only 39 foxes remaining. Climate change is one of the biggest risks to their population because they thrive in snowy environments, and with rapidly changing weather they are unable to hide from their predators. The low population also causes inbreeding and less genetic diversity, which negatively impacts their overall health.
Although these foxes are currently located in California, it is imperative to understand how the fox population can be protected. In the NYC area, foxes are part of the biodiversity and live amongst us. If we are not careful we may endanger their population and potentially lose red foxes entirely.
For this modeling project, I used cardboard from a package and a plastic Gatorade bottle. I found these materials to represent how much materials we use for personal use that then impact the environment. When it comes to plastic, the way we discard this materials is often an after thought. They end up in landfills or the plastic is burned which produces toxic gas and pollutants into the environment. This in turn harms the Sierra Nevada Red Foxes because they need cold and snowy environments to survive. With the warming temperatures, the foxes have to run higher up the mountains to prevent coyotes or other predators from finding them.
Cardboard is also not always the most environmentally friendly material. Although it is praised as an alternative to plastic, it also has a dark side. Decomposing cardboard releases methane (potent greenhouse gas) into the environment which leads to habitat loss through deforestation. However, cardboard can be a sustainable material if managed properly through how it is made and if recycled properly.
Despite such sad facts about the Sierra Nevada Red Fox, I thoroughly enjoyed this project and prototyping this beautiful animal. As stated before, I used cardboard to model the head and the tail. The cardboard I used was a very thick material so it was a bit hard to score and manipulate, using the butt joint and glue helped me to maneuver it into shape. For the body I used a small gatorade bottle and inside I added in paper material (which was found inside the cardboard box I used to make the head and tail), to make the bottle less hollow and sturdier. I then painted the body to make it looks neater and cleaner, and to further commemorate the Sierra Nevada Fox.
The two things I learned from this project is how to manipulate cardboard and to think outside the box when prototyping. In the beginning I was very stumped and unsure how to create a full fox prototype. I was worried about how it would turn out and if I would like the end result. However, because of the readings and further research I found ways to work with cardboard that favored the fox’s shape. I also had a hot glue gun which worked perfectly with such a heavy material. I also had to think outside the box and not create the most perfect rendering of a fox. I think my mind is very literal, but I was able to think of other ways to show the body of the fox, hence the gatorade bottle. Despite my urge to design an exact replica of the fox, I was able to somehow think of a gatorade bottle as the body. In the end, I think my model ended up capturing the right essence of a fox. As stated from our readings, models and prototypes do not have to be perfect and mulling over their creation can be a waste of time. The most important is to gain a deeper understanding of your subject matter and design process, which I think I gained from this project.
Sources
BiologyDiversity.org
DefenderofWildLife.org
WildLife.ca.org
FederalRegister.gov
EarthDay.org
GreenMatch.co.uk
FishandWildlifeService.gov
Process Documentation
Reading Notes
Cardboard Modeling: Exploring, Experiencing and Communicating
- Althought computers have opened up the doors for us, material design shapes our domain
- important to have a broad repertoire of skills and designing with our hands
- “thinking with hands”
- Cardboard modeling
- Basic technique- basic constructions of a cube or a cylinder
- Milter joint, butt joint, or rabbit joint
- “Cardboard modeling is a tool for designing for (physical) interaction. To design for interaction is to explore rich physical action possibilities and this cannot be done without having skill in creating moving parts.”
- “After a basic level of skill and speed in Cardboard modeling is established it can be used as a tool for exploration rather than as a tool for the creation of models alone.”
- Overall a design model does not have to be perfect, but good enough to answer the question you are exploring, polishing it is a waste of time
- “a hi-fi cardboard model, that is the endpoint of a
certain exploration is, in the grander scheme of things, a mid-fi prototype at most as it leaves unanswered important questions such as which material to use, or how to exactly fit components”
An Unexpected Rapport: Mushrooms,a Designer + Everyone Else
- Design is not just creating the design, it is the whole process and how you interact with your work that actually can help you grow
- this is why it can be important to create things by hand because you experience an interaction that you otherwise may miss while working on computer or 2D design
- “When the notion of care becomes involved, we shift our approach. When that notion of care is tied to our environment, we adapt our approach (and ultimately our perspective).”
- We can physcically see and live with our designs which can change the way we approach it
- “That also came with a sense of sorrow, denial. I closely witnessed the mushrooms, that I had lovingly cared for and developed a relationship with, mould, rot and decay. Out of my control, as they started to crumble and deteriorate. The mushrooms smelled, they gave off mushroom juice, brown sticky liquid. That I soon became numb to, adapting to. No longer hesitating to touch.
- “My approach as a designer completely shifted when I began to phys-
ically encompass elements from the natural environment into my work
and research. When I began working with and caring with the natural
environment, I began to consider our environments and the emphasis between our spaces became evident: the separation of our built and natural environment, and the mixture that does, in fact, exist.”
- “Was I able to get mushrooms to attach to the mundane object? No,
not in a consistent manner. I had to adapt as a designer. Developing my practice, shifting my process, growing as a designer — working with the dirty, the nitty-gritty.”
- Overall this experience allowed for the author to learn how to adapt to environments, adapting as a designer, and simply just growing, like those mushrooms
Living Landfill
- Approximately 11% of the waste generated is plastic, with
4.8 to 12.7 million metric tonnes entering the ocean (Jambeck et al.,
2015: 768–771). Plastics production has surged over the past 50 years, from 15 million tonnes in 1964 to 311 million tonnes in 2014, and is expected to double again over the next 20 years (MacArthur Foundation, 2017: 11). - ‘Plastisphere’ (Zettler et al., 2013: 7137–7146) is a scientific term
for a new bio-layer in the oceans, created by human discard of plastics. - Currently, the oceans have been estimated to contain 269,000 tonnes
of plastic (Eriksen et al., 2014: Results). The term Plastisphere describes the variety of microbes living and thriving on this new oceanic habitat consisting of 5.25 trillion plastic particles.
- Plastic Soup
- The colour and the rotational movement of the plastic was beautiful and lethal at the same time. The hand-in- duced current stimulated the rapid drop of the plastic to the bottom of the tank. Sedimentation is the ultimate fate for plastic lost at sea (Eriksen et al., 2016: 3.2). The rotation created a cloud of buoyant plastics gathered under the top of the water surface.”
- The workshop conversations ended on an anxious note, as
we reflected upon the plastic pollution facts and the decline of the marine habitat. To borrow the words from a participating stakeholder, who regularly follows environmental news, this topic makes her so anxious that “it feels like the end of the world”.
- “Trying to visualise the gyre from the perspective of a lanternfish helps me, as a human (designer), to make a leap, emotionally and cognitively from my usual position on land, into a much more fragile and unfamiliar space.”
- “Thus, the workshop advocated a call to raise a new plastic materiality paradigm and change plastic governance: in why and for whom we relate to, design, manufacture, distribute, consume, dispose and discard plastics.”