Abstract

As most people have experienced, the pace of development of digital technology has been phenomenal in today’s world. As digitization has transformed people’s lifestyle, it also has transformed design radically in the past few decades. It is clear that the digital revolution is producing a similar revolution in design by providing new intellectual tools (Mitchell, 1999). It is also evident that digitization has enhanced the designers’ ability to express and realize their ideas. Nevertheless, it is unclear how does digitization affect one’s creativity in the process of formulating the creative ideas. In the past, digital tools were used mostly as the tools for production, then the tools for exploration. However, with the development in digital sketching tools, such as SketchUp and Sketchbook Pro, and digital prototyping tools, the design methodology needs to re-evaluate the capability and fluidity of the digital tools in searching for creative ideas. Although much has been written about both creativity and digitization, to date, no study is available that examines the correlation between creativity and digitization. This study helps to fill this gap. The result of this study may help educators to gain a better understanding on how and when to employ digital technologies in teaching design and creativity.