A Product Shape Design and Evaluation Model Based on Morphology Preference and Macroscopic Shape Information
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The paper proposes a product form design and evaluation model. In their method, the forms can be evaluated by three sub-evaluation models, which can help designers to grasp consumers' preferences.
The proposed method is new and the paper justifies their method well and it seems to me practical.
My questions are on quadratic curvature entropy.
- The value depends on the discretization of the curve. Is it true? In such a case how do you evaluate a specific curve?
- Cusps, or corners: At some points, the curvature is not continuous because of cusps or corners, i.e. the continuity of tangent is broken. The continuity of curvature might be broken, either. In these cases, the value of quadratic curvature continuity should be modified depending on the frequency of these discontinuity. If you have any ideas, please write them in the paper.
Author Response
The PDF file is a point-by-point response to the reviewer’s comments.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The paper is well written and has a good structure. The research goal and the method are clearly stated. However, the paper lacks originality, as proposed well known methods and techniques applied to product design, such as a two-wheel balancing vehicle and it considers only 2D curves, while most products are highly three-dimensional.
In particular, the paper shows some main limitations:
- After having obtained the merged morphological chart and after having collected the consumer’s preferences, the authors proposed four final combinations of the shape elements investigated as “the evaluated samples” (line 343-4). However, these four combinations appear arbitrarily developed by the authors: Why do not combine original and new shape elements together? How can you say that they are the most representative arrangements of the shape elements?
- The evaluation of the style of products by means of its 2D curves is still widely used (as mentioned in lines 47-8 and as highlighted by the references) but, at the same time, it does not consider the real 3D shape of products. It looks like an outdated way for evaluating the shape a product, which does not properly reflect the shapes of (current) products. Most of the product curves are not 2D but 3D, and considering only their projection on the front plane is very reductive.
- More to this last point, the evaluation of the style of a product only through its contour curves is almost trivial, as the most interesting shapes or characteristic curves are within its contour. The 2D contours curves of a product cannot fully describe the product style. Again, I wonder if the proposed method also works with “3D” objects, which do not present a “main” view: as regards the two-wheel balancing vehicle, I can agree that the front view may be considered its most representative view. But what for a car, or an household product? You cannot get a “main” view and therefore their main contour curves, so the method seems to be inconsistent in those cases.
Regarding the questionnaires and samples considered in the research: there are three samples of respondents: are they the same people? can you add information about their age, sex ratio, cultural level, etc.? Again, are they consumers/users or designers? this can completely change the perception of the product.
More specific points:
- In lines 79-81, you said that “Ujiie et al. [24] have proposed three macroscopic 79 shape information that can be used to evaluate a curved profile, namely, angle entropy, curvature entropy, and quadratic curvature entropy.” In lines 81-2, you said that “In this paper, quadratic curvature 81 entropy is used as the criterion to evaluate the product's overall shape.” Why?
- In line 158, you said that “MANY scholars have used…” but in the following line, only two references are reported.
- In lines 181-2, you said “Among them, quadratic curvature entropy is more consistent with human cognition of shape.” Who said it? How can be proved? There are some statements in the paper (this is an example) that are not supported by data and references, but appear arbitrarily stated by the authors.
Please consider the previous comments and exploit strengthens and limitations of the proposed method.
In addition, please consider the following list of typos in the text:
- The wrong use of the possessive with respect to objects, repeated several times in the text: product’s, vehicle’s, elements’, enterprises’, shape’s, automobiles’, etc.
- Line 92: the last section concludes … (there is only one section).
Lines 220-1: “this paper aims to construct anD design AN evaluation model of the product shape”
Author Response
The Word file is a point-by-point response to the reviewer’s comments.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
In this paper, the Authors are proposing a product form design and evaluation model.
Combining three sub-evaluation models the forms can be evaluated. The three models used are: the fuzzy comprehensive evaluation, preference questionnaire and quadratic curvature entropy.
For the fuzzy analysis, they have used the Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process (FAHP), a fusion of fuzzy logic and AHP. They have done a very interesting application. The case study it’s really well done and very clear.
I found that this paper is very interesting and that the obtained results are very promising, however in order to further improve I would only recommend to improve the conclusions and more references on the background (I suggest: doi: 10.3390/healthcare9050501, doi: 10.3390/math9080886, doi: 10.3390/sym13030479, doi: /10.3390/e23020135, doi: 10.3390/en14051436).
Author Response
The Word file is a point-by-point response to the reviewer's comments.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
