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/u/LeadGenDairy:
> GO TO SCHOOL

This is good advice. Before I did some career counseling to figure out what to do with my life, I didn't know industrial design was even a thing. (I figured you needed a degree in engineering to do that sort of thing, but learned that it's common for a company to employ engineers who figure out how to make the thing work as well as designers to determine how it should work and, moreover, how it should look.) Once I realized that ID was definitely what I wanted to do, I looked up programs in my city, and found a good one. It was at an art school. I decided to apply.

"Apply with a short statement and a portfolio of 10-15 images of your recent work."

Welp.

I had never even taken an art class. I had no recent work. I had no "work" at all. So I made some. It took a few months, and I had some late nights, but by the application deadline, I had 12 pieces, including a few pretty solid drawings and some screenprints that started out in Illustrator. Got in, and got my degree.

If you're looking to learn drawing skills good enough to get into school, get a good book - I recommend Sketching: drawing techniques for product designers and Rapid Viz - and practice the techniques therein. You can also find a lot of tutorials online for programs like Illustrator, Photoshop, SketchUp, and Rhino if you're interested in building those skills too (and can get your hands on the software).

If your background is in CS, you probably have a good bit of experience coming up with weird creative workarounds for tough problems. This kind of problem-solving comes in very handy in ID. I wish you the best of luck!

This is an excellent response above, and I'd like to add to this. I'm a senior at Auburn University for ID and I second that you should become familiar with sketching and, if given the opportunity, CAD software.

I've read through Scott Robertsons How to Draw book and it's a good resource for learning how to sketch.

Autodesk will often have free downloads for AutoCAD, Fusion 360, and Inventor for students. I'd recommend getting AutoCAD of the three, but I feel like Fusion is a bit more beginner friendly.

Even if you choose to go into engineering for school, sketching and CAD will help out a lot when you start your classes.

Also, if your high school has any public speaking classes, it wouldn't hurt to look into taking one. At least in my program we have pretty regular presentations, and it really helps to be able to communicate your ideas fluently when presenting a final product/end of the semester project.

Feel free to DM me as well!

Start by doing lots of sketches in black and white with a pencil or bic biro. Don't be afraid to make mistakes, overlap sketches, make notes and show your construction lines. Sketch in 2D and 3D, sketch details and forms.

Sketch faster. Sketching is exploration and your hand should be working fast to keep up with your brain! Here's a good example of black and white sketches with a little colour, note how they're not clean and perfect and you can see how they've been built

Only use colour where necessary - you're sketching not rendering. Use it to make the best ideas stand out, or to add detail such as material selection and exploration of colour choices.

Save up and get some decent marker pens. Magic markers or Letraset pro markers are good. 3 shades of neutral grey should do to start say N1, N3, N5. These are buildable and can be layered to create darker shades and the shades (C2, C4) in between. Use these to add simple shading and a group shadow, shading should be used to help communicate form. Sharpies are ok for outlining or adding a line of colour, not for colouring in areas.

Get an A3 marker or layout pad, the paper is semi transparent so you can trace over other sketches or use an underlay to speed up the sketching process. They also don't soak up the ink or bleed so your images will look crisper and marker pens will last longer. I say A3, because generally this is the paper size ID's use, so get used to filling that page! The brand doesn't matter but I usually use Goldline layout pads as the paper is whiter.

Practice, practice, practice. Copy other peoples sketches, a good book I always advocate when people are looking for sketching feedback is one called Sketching for Designers by Koos Eissen. If you can get a copy then try to recreate the sketches and emulate some of the techniques, your own style will come after. Otherwise look on Behance and try to recreate any ID sketches you like for practice.

Good luck :)

Source: I'm an ID. Edit: Spelling/grammar

This book is great at developing your basic sketching skills. Mastering the basics is the secret to becoming a master designer. like /u/Methylene_Chloride said, some of you perspective is off, which throws some of the pictures.

There are plenty of books and resources out there to help! So sketch until your fingers bleed. Learn some drawing techniques like 3 point perspective drawing.

http://www.portfoliohandbook.com/

This website will help with structuring and presenting your work in a professional manner. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT. You could be the greatest car designer ever, but if your portfolio is shit you wont get the job. Learn how to present your work, employers won't read any text you put with sketches or work, you need to present it in a logical order so it tells a story they can follow as they flick through your portfolio.

You could also take a year out, try and get an internship somewhere to see how the actual industry works. I wish i did this before i went to uni, as it would have given me more drive to succeed. If you do, do this you will definitely see a difference in how people work ina professional setting and at uni. Uni will be a lot more laid back than a job.

Good luck

There are a lot of people recommending certain books and videos, but personally those suggestions never worked out for me and arent the best start since they concentrate on being too flashy or don't teach the basics. The 2 books you want to buy are

Sketching: The Basics - Koos Eissen, Roselien Steur

Sketching: Drawing Techniques for Product Designers

Both are hard cover at a price of $29 and are by far the best sketching tutorial and reference books I ever purchased.

And as a starting point to sketching, buy a batch of fine point ball point pens (I recommend the Bic Ultra Round Stic Grip Black Ink Fine purchased at Staples), a ream of paper, and just start drawing straight lines across the pages.
Draw with the pen to build confidence, draw straight lines because it's the basis of product design sketching.

Then take those 2 books I recommend, and start copying page by page while practicing straight lines every day (2-3 pages a day)

There are a lot of books out there that will help you. At OSU we're using this book for reference (required) in our sketching class: http://www.amazon.com/Sketching-The-Basics-2nd-printing/dp/9063692536/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1343289990&sr=8-1&keywords=sketching

There are a ton of other books specifically for ID type sketching if you want that I can recommend. There are also a lot of online resources and videos both that can be bought or are free. Here is one very good resource/reference.

http://www.sketch-a-day.com/

ID sketching is different from fine arts sketching. If you are not comfortable drawing/practicing using your own imagination, try imitating/copying ID sketches from professionals. You need to build a visual vocabulary before you can draw/make your own products/designs. Copying helps a lot to give you that foundation.

Edit: Learning how to draw in perspective is a key foundational skill in ID sketching. Also, rendering using things like marker, etc ... they come later and can take awhile to learn. Prioritize basic sketching using a medium you are comfortable with (honestly though, I think the majority of professionals use a simple/cheap pen [not pencil although you're welcome to use it if you're better at it]).

3rd year product design student here, so I'm offering what knowledge I have.

>What sketching exercises are helpful?

I'd say getting into the habit of drawing on a daily basis is probably the best. There is no way you won't get better. Watch some youtube videos or get a good textbook (I use this one)

>What things should I start noticing around me every day to build a designer's mentality?

Literally everything.

>What habits should I work on cementing into my daily routine?

1. Be open to criticism. Not everyone will like what you made, or agree with what you have to say.
   
   
2. Take pride in what you made, but don't become too attached to your prototypes. They will probably fail/break during testing, so take that as an opportunity to iterate and improve the design.
   
   
3. Don't be afraid to ask "why?" Ethnographic research is good design practice.
   
   
4. Document everything because you want to tell a story. See something cool? Snap a pic. Try playing around with different materials, methods, sequence of production. Organise everything into a binder so you can refer to it in the future, bring it to interviews, etc. The process is an important part of the portfolio

Why on earth are you learning Rhino? You'll get a lot farther in the industry learning pro-E or Solidworks. I don't know anyone who still uses that program, and your professor is very behind in the times if he's telling you to learn it, especially at junior level.

We had to "become familiar" with Rhino our first year of ID undergrad, and it was a nightmare. It does not function with dimensions, and you'll end up making something that is "three inches-ish." If you'll be using 3D prints with it, joining pieces will never align properly. It loves exploding, especially when trying to apply a radius or round on anything. Our class ended up creating a folder on our shared drive of screen captures of the crazy things rhino would do when it blew up. And be prepared for crashing.. lots of crashing.. Our university has since dropped it.

If you are hellbent on learning it though, try looking for downloadable ebooks/text books like Rhino for Jewelry by Dana Buscaglia or Inside Rhinoceros 4 (try to find them for free; not worth buying ..) Even though the first one is jewelry, it's for beginners of the program, so it'll help you get used to the commands, etc.

I sincerely wish you the best of luck..

You need to draw through. That means drawing every side of the cube, even if you don't see that corner.

None of your lines are straight. Practice one movement of your arm that results in a perfectly straight line. it's hard to make yourself learn this but practice is important. once you have that one perfectly straight stroke just rotate your paper around and do the same motion every time.

You also need to work on your perspective.

these are some great books to start with: 1-2-3.

I was in the same boat as you, I got my degree in Mechanical Engineering and now that I've been working in industry for a few years now I've found that my passions have led me to the Industrial Design side of the business and has caused me to reconsider my career path. Since I don't have the money to go back to school I've decided to educate myself, I do a lot of reading and just exploring design related topics that interest me.
Like Direlion said, learn to draw and do it every day, this has been one of my biggest hurdles, while I'm very good with CAD and 3D systems, they are frustratingly slow ways to explore an idea.
I think that any good Industrial Designer has an Mechancial Engineer hiding inside them and vice versa.
Your idea to take a semester or a year of ID classes is a good one, i would explore different ideas and topics that interest you and than go from there.

Some movies that helped me realize I wanted to become and Industrial Designer:

Objectified

Eames: The Architect and the Painter
Both are on Netflix

And read this:
The Design of Everyday Things

Mostly just surround yourself with designers whether it's ID's or graphic designers or interactive designers, for me design seems to be more of a way to look at a world than a specific job.

Good luck

I enjoyed The Design of Everyday Things by Donald Norman which everyone seems to recommend for designers of all types from UI to ID.

I haven't looked at any of the others suggested for materials but I was very surprised at how good Manufacturing Processes for Design Professionals was when I was looking through it last week, it's full of images and diagrams and does a great job of going over things. Much more interesting than this book which I used in Man. Tech.

In terms of hand sketching? If so, I've found this book to be super helpful:

https://www.amazon.com/Sketching-12th-printing-Techniques-Designers/dp/9063691718/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1498808723&sr=8-1&keywords=product+sketch+for+product+designers

Whenever I'm stuck on a sketch or idea, and either need inspiration or need help visualizing a form, I'll flip through the pages of a book like this and find one of the sketching styles or one of the many products listed in books like this to keep things moving.

A few things off the top of my head:

Creative Confidence By Tom and David Kelly (IDEO) - In fact, anything by these guys as IDEO are a great resource for design thinking.

Wacom Pen and Touch S Perfectly adequate starter tablet for sketching on a laptop.

Sketchbook Pro to go with it

Product Sketches - Great book with sketches of everyday things from Ideation to presentation quality.

Making It: Manufacturing Techniques for Product Design - Really good book covering the basics of industrial processes to manufacture objects.

Copic Multiliner set - maybe with some stationary. I fucking love stationary. Could combine this with a Moleskin or Field Notes notebook

Steal Like an Artist - cute, short book with a great message about how its not what you steal but how you steal it.

Kor 'Hydration Vessel' - I've had one for like 3 years.

How to design cars like a pro:

https://www.amazon.com/How-Design-Cars-Like-Pro/dp/0760336954

Is essentially the bible for car design students, it has lots of info about design, famous/ important designers and cars and a good section on the day in the life of a designer. Highly recommended.

How to draw cars the hot wheels way


https://www.amazon.com/How-Draw-Cars-Hot-Wheels/dp/0760314802/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1542868955&sr=1-1&keywords=How+to+draw+cars+the+hot+wheels+way

Zounds a bit weird but hear me out, this is by Scott Robertson, one of the gurus of car sketching and contains great tips on aesthetics and techniques for car design, plus there is an absolute ton of awesome renders from the Hotwheels design team.

A good book to look into would be Rapid Viz. While having pretty sketches can be advantageous, the real point of sketches is to convey information and you don't need to be an artist to communicate effectively.

Here are a few terms, as well as some convenient flash cards someone assembled.

As a previous poster mentioned those are engineering/machining terms.

I also recommend blogs such as Core77 or the Fictiv Blog which talk about a broad range of manufacturing and design topics.

If you’re just dying for more product terms, there are plenty of terms that fall under plastic injection molding

For a good overview of materials and processes, the book Making It: Manufacturing Techniques for Product Designersis a good balance of interesting content, pictures, and examples, and isn’t too boring for the layman.

Essentially this is what a degree covers. I assume you are not studying ID yet?.
Pulling apart things is a fantastic way to learn, and every ID professional will do it. We have boxes and boxes of disassembled products at my work, and that’s pretty standard.
https://www.amazon.com/Making-Manufacturing-Techniques-Product-Design/dp/1856697495/ref=nodl_
Making it is a good book that shows basic manufacturing processes, and from there you can learn how to design for them.

I recommend Objects of Desire. It talks about the development of Design over time, and doesn't just focus on pure aesthetics but also the manufacturing / marketing process behind it as well. It's a really good read.

I like Chris Lefteri's books when it comes to manufacturing materials & processes.

I'm also reading The Evolution of Useful Things which is an interesting read about how common products have evolved very organically.

Rapid Viz is an extremely basic ID visualization book. Lots of great exercises for beginning drawers who want to express ideas. Once you get through that try PFD link here.
https://brownstudio12.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/rapid-viz_15-53.pdf

Once you get through that you could try something like this (https://www.amazon.ca/Drawing-Product-Designers-Portfolio-Skills/dp/1856697436) or some of Spencer Nugents ID sketching tutorials (https://vimeo.com/idsketching).

No problem You are already showing great potential.

Learn Scotts method and you will blow people away!
Its easier than it looks at first.

There is also this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Draw-Cars-Like-Motorbooks-Studio-dp-0760323917/dp/0760323917

and this

https://www.amazon.com/How-Illustrate-Design-Concept-Cars/dp/178711015X/


Good luck!

For perspective, a really valuable, but quite an easy book is Perspective Made Easy by Ernest R. Norling.

This
is my textbook for Manufacturing Materials and Processes class. Seems pretty good.

This is a pretty good one, as is this

mcmaster.com is a good place to look. Plus they have downloadable cad files for most of their hardware.

If you find a good book, let me know. This One and This one are OK, but they don't really work as a quick reference.

This is a personal favourite of mine on sketching, and the two you mentioned on thinking about design by Don Norman are also great.

Here are just a few recently recommended to me. Thought I'd share and bring some pulse to this subreddit.

Cosmic Motors: Spaceships, Cars and Pilots of Another Galaxy

Lift Off: Air Vehicle Sketches & Renderings from the Drawthrough Collection

Syd Mead's Sentury II

DRIVE: vehicle sketches and renderings by Scott Robertson

Sketching (5th printing): Drawing Techniques for Product Designers

The Art of District 9

Start with the book Rapid Viz. It's a workbook for sketching and rapid communication of ideas. Look for books on car sketching, toy sketching, product sketching, whatever... just practice practice practice. Get a note book and fill it from cover to cover, then start on a new one. Trust me on this; good sketching skills will get you hired one day.

Yes

and this

and this

Manufacturing Processes for Design Professionals is another great reference, but somewhat less specific than what you asked for. It lists a lot of forming-, cutting-, joining- ánd finishing technologies, each of them explained (and compared) in quite some detail and accompanied by a real-world example. Those examples are presented as series of step-by-step photos, taken at quality production locations. This is one of my favourite references as an Industrial Design student!

Heres one id recommend!

https://www.amazon.ca/Industrial-Design-Materials-Manufacturing-Guide/dp/0470055383

This is a classic around designing for usability. Worth taking a look if you haven't already read it.

https://www.amazon.com/Design-Everyday-Things-Donald-Norman/dp/1452654123

From my understanding Formula Student is a competition where Universities compete against each other. The teams have to get their own sponsorship (business aspect I mentioned) to fund parts and development and do the full engineering too which had lots of CAD work (perfect for us ID guys). It goes on every year and follows similar aspects of the development path Formula 3 takes. Technical knowledge you could pick up from it would be invaluable for automotive design.

I bought my ref guide directly from them when they first got funding. They ship globally and I've never seen them in shops so I can't think of anywhere else to buy it. Two other books that I have are How to design cars like a pro and How to illustrate and design concept cars.. Quite dated now but I still use them for visual references.

Get this book right here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1933492732?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_search_detailpage

Check out Making It by Chris Lefteri

I haven’t actually read this book but this sounds close to what your looking for.

Manufacturing Processes for Design Professionals

Books I own and still use as reference:

https://www.amazon.com/Industrial-Design-Materials-Manufacturing-Guide/dp/0470055383/ref=sr_1_35?ie=UTF8&qid=1497367939&sr=8-35&keywords=industrial+design

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https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1856697436/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o04_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

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https://www.amazon.com/Sketching-Basics-printing-Roselien-Steur/dp/9063692536/ref=sr_1_32?ie=UTF8&qid=1497367910&sr=8-32&keywords=industrial+design

https://www.amazon.com/Manufacturing-Processes-Design-Professionals-Thompson/dp/0500513759

Scott Robertson - How to draw is starting from the scratch. How to render is about putting color on.

http://www.thedesignsketchbook.com/


https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sketching-Drawing-Techniques-Product-Designers/dp/9063691718/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1462128277&sr=8-1&keywords=sketching+product+designer

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Drawing-Product-Designers-Portfolio-Skills/dp/1856697436/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1462128277&sr=8-2&keywords=sketching+product+designer

Anyhow. You also need to learn somethings about aesthetics, form and function.

> ppl will have hard time telling the back from front and top from bottom.

Which is, ostensibly, a bad thing