Qualities of a Good Design Supervisor (Part I)

[Foreign Design Issue 128]

Editor’s note: We ask design executives for advice every week. This week’s topic is “What qualities do you think make a good design executive?” So let’s givePeter MerholzandUday GajendarThe answer.

Regardless of size, every design team benefits from a single leader of authority, an individual with vision and high standards who motivates his team to the fullest. This is the most important role on a team — and the hardest one to do well.

The team leader must be able to:

• Manage down. Being in charge means taking responsibility for the performance of the entire team. They need to create an environment that fosters great design (both physically and conceptually). They educate, guide, coach and inspire teams. It is necessary to deal with challenges in collaboration, coordinate personal conflicts, clarify rights and responsibilities, and consider the emotions of team members.
• Horizontal management. The design lead needs to coordinate with the product lead, business lead, technical lead, and other positions to ensure that the team’s work is integrated into the whole. They also need to be able to reliably resist unreasonable demands and defend the design team when others complain that their work is difficult to achieve.
• Manage up. It is vital that these design directors can easily talk to the president, whether to explain the reasoning behind a design decision or the cost of applying for staff or equipment. Design leaders need to articulate requests, convey information without emotion, and demonstrate that their work is meaningful to both macro and objective goals.

“The best team leaders are a combination of mentor, diplomat and salesman.”

Pictures fromInside Design: OpenTable.

In short, the best team leaders are a combination of mentor, diplomat and salesman. They want to build a bridge through experience, will be far away from the ideal goal, pull within. They control the experience at all ends, ensuring that user needs are understood, business goals are clear, the design is appropriate, and the final output is of high quality.

To achieve consistency, they must integrate multiple efforts, including product design, communication design, user experience research, and content strategy. It is their responsibility to articulate the design vision, not only within the team they lead, but also across other functions.

There is no doubt that such people are hard to find.

Organize the creative forces of designers and bring out their strengths — don’t rely on trivial processes to manage.

Trust and respect are Paramount

These ideas are the foundation of a resilient working relationship that can withstand repeated shocks of dissent and frustration — which is inevitable when your creations are extremely novel, even scary, to others.

“Without trust and respect, your designers will walk away.”

They are also the building blocks of active collaboration on which ideas build ladders to aspirations and needs. Without trust and respect, your designers will walk away. The last hope of creating a design culture will be gone — probably beyond hope.

Transparency leads to collaboration

Glass walls and open doors make collaboration possible. Everyone should feel as a valuable contributor and member of the design process.

Everyone must feel welcome and respected, otherwise they will be afraid to cooperate.

Challenge the designer with appropriate, meaningful questions

Almost all designers enjoy solving interesting problems in which their designs make a tangible impact, from next-generation conceptual design studies to solving outdated “save” ICONS.

Designers want to be exposed to new areas, user types, tools and styles to prove themselves and take their skills and experience to the next level — they don’t want to be treated like a “support department” churning out ICONS for tomorrow’s POWERPOINT review. It’s also part of honoring the value of the designer, motivating them to solve worthwhile problems.

“Respecting the value of designers motivates them to tackle worthwhile problems.”

Generous compensation and rewards

Design is hard work. It’s hard, for a variety of reasons, strategy, team changes, technical limitations, the whims of marketing people, etc.

Here are some ways to recognize a designer’s great efforts:

For some, a simple gesture is enough, while others need more. But one thing is certain: no one likes to be taken for granted.

It’s also important to set aside “thinking time” for designers to review, absorb, and process their work.

Academic support

Create an educational budget for designers to buy books, classes and seminars.

Create a workspace that inspires

Designers need physical and cognitive space to explore creativity, both collaboratively and independently. This is a balance between the work style and the personality of the team members during the design process. Movable furniture, living images, natural light, places to write, pushpin walls, and inspiration materials (magazines, games, movies, posters, etc.) help inspire creative thinking.

Pictures fromInside Design: Capital One.

You also need specific Spaces for serious discussions with non-designers.

Finally: Don’t call a designer “creative.” Creative is an adjective, not a noun. You hire experts who will design the future of your business and deliver the products, services and experiences that will help you capture the markets of the future.

Designers help you achieve greatness. Embracing the collective wisdom of diversity, conflict, and groundbreaking ideas and thinking about what is useful, desirable, and valuable can help you make the best decisions for your team, your company, and your customers.

“Designers help you be amazing.”

Because in the end, businesses exist for one reason only: to create and deliver value to customers. Designers have an irreplaceable role to play in this effort, leading them effectively and getting the most out of them.

This part is composed of oneFirst post on Uday blogCodified.

Join the discussion

On Medium, write your response to the question, “What qualities do you think make a good design lead?” “And submit it to our journal.

The original link: blog.invisionapp.com/qualities-o…

Author Information: Uday Gajendar Uday Gajendar is a catalyst for design-driven innovation, Defining Next – Generation concepts & Coaching start-ups on UX fundamentals. Uday’s specialities include creating visionary concepts for new business/revenue models, leading “3-in-a-box” design collaborations with engineering & product, and shaping a progressive design culture. Follow me on Twitter Peter Merholz Peter Merholz co-founded Adaptive Path in In 2001, Perhaps the world’s premier firm dedicated to user experience. He was instrumental in AP’s growth from a small boutique firm to a renowned international consultancy. More recently, he led the global design team at Groupon, including product/UX, marketing, and brand design where he doubled the team from 30 to 60, and was instrumental in the first redesign of Groupon.com since the company launched. He’s also worked with OpenTable and Jawbone. He is currently co-authoring a book on building in-house design organizations. Peter is also perhaps most (in)famous for coining the word “blog” in 1999. Really. In the OED and everything. He’s been Blogging Continuously at Peterme.com. Follow me on Twitter

Some time ago, my friend bought a house and asked me to accompany him. But at that time too busy to spare time, according to my own experience and lessons, wrote a simple house to him. The findings are worth sharing, especially for the inexperienced, to provide a general context. Not comprehensive, can press this train of thought to complement by oneself.

From big to small, look at the plates first

• How is the traffic? Is there a subway now and in the future? Is the road to the nearest business district blocked?
• What are the surrounding infrastructure, hospitals, schools, large supermarkets, commercial plazas?
• Is there much room for development, a mature old town or a wasteland? If the surrounding facilities are not perfect, but there is plenty of open space to develop is good.
• Is there any potential for outward development in the administrative region where the plate is located? If the four sides are mature regions that cannot continue to annex suburbs to expand the territory in the future, the land price is likely to be inflated.
• Are there facilities nearby that affect the quality of life, e.g. viaduct, crematorium, refuse incineration plant, etc.
• The household registration problem depends on the administrative region of the plate. Some cities will have differential treatment of the phenomenon, such as Yuhang and Xiaoshan district household registration and Hangzhou city there is a difference, after their settlement, children reading will have an impact.

Zoom in, the building and its surroundings

• And adjacent to a few real estate price difference is not big, if a lot of high, usually has its positive reasons, may wish to understand in detail, there is a possible value. Go much lower and be cautious.
• What is the reputation of developers? National developers with good reputation have certain advantages in project experience, and the price is usually higher than other buildings in the same area, which can be about 20%-100%.
• Although two buildings are adjacent, but may be different because of the grade of the building, the quality of the project will differ a lot, and even the same developer will appear this difference in treatment.
• If the buildings in an area are the same developer, it may be a good phenomenon. A competent developer will take over a large area of land and make overall planning to design the whole city into a small city. A small area can meet most of the needs of life. You can focus on asking about supporting facilities.

Inside the building

• Look at the volume ratio, building spacing, these two indicators can reflect the degree of openness in the community. If the interior of the community is crowded, it is difficult to get sunlight on the lower floors and lighting will be poor.
• If the building has already delivered a batch, you can go to experience the quality of the project, visit the neighbors who have moved in.
• Look at the occupancy rate of the previous several phases of the building, how long it has been sold out, whether it is fast filling up. If it goes on sale for a long time and nobody buys it, there’s something wrong with it that you haven’t noticed. The market votes with its feet.
• There must be at least two elevators on each floor, otherwise it will be necessary to climb.
• The ground area in the community can drive, can not be the best, will not cause inconvenience for pedestrians, but also more assured of the elderly and children activities.
• Have some facilities that can enhance the life experience, such as swimming pool, court, gym, etc., these are plus points.

Choose floor

• Try to avoid elevated buildings and busy roads. Of course, houses in that location will also be cheaper.
• If the community is particularly large, or a long strip, to consider the distance to the community gate, can not ignore the possibility of taking a bus.
• Square dancing problem, if you buy 5 floors below, you should choose a building with no open space nearby, there may be square dancing.
• Individual community is built on the slope, the underground garage of different buildings is different. Some buildings are flat from underground garages to elevators, others have to walk up steps. This is a big test for moving heavy loads in the future, so trailers won’t be useful.
• It’s nice to have schools close by, but too close can be a distraction. Imagine you’re at home on vacation, trying to sleep in, and the athletes’ march is playing on the loudspeaker outside your window at 7:30 a.m. In the same way, be careful if there is a large public lawn downstairs, as you can understand with a lawn mower in the morning.

Finally, choose the apartment type

Door model the place that should consider is most, want to understand the concept of a few area respects above all:

Equally Shared area: elevator, water meter boxes and other public areas per layer number given area: sales staff will tell you which is gifts area, usually the balcony, bay window, etc Construction area: use area + equally Shared area – giving area use area: the area of it is really meaningful to you, you each room and the area of the wall of your house

The area on the developer’s publicity materials usually refers to the construction area. Note that most of the property fees are calculated according to the construction area.

• The beautiful soft outfit such as the curtain, desk and chair should be ignored when looking between example, these again beautiful also is not door model credit. To see those things that cannot be changed, such as the size of the balcony window, the position of the load-bearing wall (this will be marked on the house model), too many load-bearing walls, the room for decoration and transformation is very small.
• In the case of similar area, the side cover is always more expensive than the middle cover. Side set multi – side lighting, can be expensive to 10%-30%.
• The master bedroom must face south, and at least one of the secondary bedrooms and balconies must also face south. No darkroom, even a toilet, with natural light.
• The door type should be square, each room had better be rectangular. Missing an Angle or protruding a load-bearing wall is not good.
• Notice the balcony of the original model, the main balcony is actually inconvenient in the bedroom, because it is the common area of the family, but it has to pass through a private area. It’s best if the balcony faces west or south.
• Small and medium-sized kitchen is generally a rectangle, if the kitchen door is open on the long side, the internal space is better designed, u-type kitchen space utilization rate is also high. If the door is open on the short side, it is likely to do only L kitchen, greatly reduced storage capacity.
• When looking at the model room, pay attention to observe and ask whether the lampblack machine is placed in the same direction as the public flue. Want to assure in the future smoke lampblack effect is good, lampblack machine cannot leave public flue too far. The original door model of development business may not consider this point, for the beauty of the sample, may lead to the middle of the smoke pipe is too long.
• Want to consider the machine outside air conditioning to put a problem, do not consider this kind of problem commonly between example, decorate only good-looking, it is to design by central air conditioning. But if you have a separate air conditioner in each room, you’ll need a lot of air conditioners. Find out if there’s room for them in your apartment or they’ll end up encroaching on your floor space.
• Pay attention to the area of the gift. The complimentary square footage is usually empty at the time of handover, with the building running from the top to the bottom, or in the form of bay Windows. After making a room for a period of time, is the pouring of these places to do business, or want to spend money to do? And this kind of pouring area usually can not do floor drain, if you want to give the area as the main balcony, you have to face the balcony can not place the washing machine problem. Washing machine is put in toilet inconvenient, and affect washing machine life.
• Some houses are split-level, with a slight difference between odd and even levels. Ask if that’s the case and what the difference is.

I’ve only bought a house once, so that’s all I can think about for now. Anyway, I hope it gives you some inspiration for what you’re about to do.

[Foreign Design Issue 127]

Thanks to the growing popularity of Material Design, card-like interfaces are everywhere. This stylish and functional aesthetic uses blocky design elements to carry a variety of information. To take advantage of this versatility, your card design must be unique.

Color is one way. Beautiful color choices, exciting color combinations, and fun combinations can create focus, enhance ease of use, and draw users into your design projects.

Card design foundation

There are a number of caveat s to designing with cards that highlight different types of data (such as images, text, buttons, links, comments, or videos) that are all associated with the same piece of information.

The clickable blocks are designed to look like retro school game cards, with one area containing a visual message and a small text or button. The advantage of card-style interfaces is that they can be easily understood by users, making them ideal for large amounts of content or e-commerce. Moreover, they are easy to navigate, easy to share, and versatile.

Photo source:Urban Ministries of Durham

Photo source:The Clymb

To get started with card design, a good place to start is by learning the basics of card design, see UX Pin’s Web Design Trends Manual for 2015-2016.

You should also follow these seven best uses from the Complete Guide to Effective Card Design:

• White space. Use adequate boundaries and margins to avoid clutter.
• One card one thing. Cards can simplify the structure of your website. Don’t destroy this foundation by making each card too complicated.
• The right picture. The images in the card are always small, so make sure the images are clear, cropped and appropriate for the scene.
• Simple font. Since the text is also small, simple fonts are the easiest to read. Choose simple, elegant fonts and avoid decorative fonts.
• Get creative. Make an extra effort to make it special, using things like animations, video, rounded corners, or novel color schemes.
• Use an open grid. A standard grid helps maintain consistent spacing while accommodating a wide range of sizes and breakpoints.
• Apply Fitz’s law. As we describe in Interaction Design Best Practices, Fitz’s Law (which also applies to cards) suggests that the entire card is clickable — not just the words or pictures on it. This makes things easier for the user.

Light and dark cards

The first decision you have to make is whether to use light or dark colors. Both have advantages and disadvantages; White or light color schemes are the most common, but dark colors are becoming popular on mobile apps.

Photo source:Dribbble

Dribbble’s cards are easy to identify, line up, and click on, providing detailed information about a project. Its design uses white cards on a light background, with a content area below each image displaying the artwork. Light colors work especially well on the desktop and are eye friendly.

Photo source:SB Joinery

SB Joinery went for a dark color scheme — using anti-white text on a dark background — and overlaid colors on the image to keep the visual focus on the text and ghost buttons. The pop-up menu also uses a dark theme. Thanks to bold fonts and high contrast colors, dark cards are easy to read and extremely practical.

Bright colors

The use of card Design is mainly influenced by Material Design — good influence. The design emphasizes mobile usability, taking advantage of flat design and minimalism, and follows a set of aesthetic styles and techniques that users are increasingly accustomed to.

This style absorbs bright, highly saturated color schemes, from blue to green and red. It’s not necessary to follow these color suggestions, but it’s a good idea. Add bold, bright color schemes to create focus and a smooth experience.

Photo source:Helbak

How to make full use of saturated colors?

• Used on headers, buttons, and action command elements.
• Used as a background element with meaning — for example, different colors for different types of cards. (As in the Case of Helbak.) Note that even pastel and light colors work beautifully in this way.
• Use color for major text elements to improve readability.
• Overlay images with bright colors, or use two-color gradients to guide the user through the card.

A color used for emphasis

Finally, bold color choices are a means of emphasizing specific elements. For example, color elements can break visual uniformity and promote interactive behavior.

Photo source:Mayors Challenge 2016

The Mayors Challenge uses material design without feeling like a Google product. The colours are bright and bright, while the cards are in a way very simple and “ambiguous”. There are bright colors in ICONS, text and links, all of which are hints to guide users through the site.

There is a criticism of card interface design that it makes things look too similar — so it requires creativity and rule-breaking.

conclusion

Color is what makes card design unique. When choosing a technique to use, consider how color will best integrate with the brand and serve the user.

For the best results, use color with a specific purpose, engaging users through design and prompting them to take action. Whether you use light or dark colors, or mix bright colors with fashion, color can affect how users perceive and operate a design.

The original link: studio.uxpin.com/blog/use-co…

Author Information: Carrie Cousins Carrie Cousins has more than 10 years experience in the media industry, including design, editing, and writing for print and online publications. Carrie is also a sports fanatic and spends way too much time planning football and basketball trips and obsessing over stats.

As expected, I’m here to introduce the Markdown writing tool I use — MarkEditor. As a writing tool, the most important thing for me is blogging. Listen to me tell you a little bit about the history of the Coke Orange blog, and you’ll see where I’m going. A little disclosure, at the end of the limited discount oh!

Boredom is the first productive force

This blog was not born out of any life plan at all. It was born out of sheer boredom. As early as college, I started to keep a little diary, writing about everything from my bike ride today to my failed final grade (why did I say again?). The content began to diverge into regular columns: travel photos, anecdotes about life, film reviews, magical experiences in dreams, and a few pretentious mini-novels. Now these are retained intact, occasionally turn over, but also to witness the green years. Until I graduated from university, I wrote directly in the blog platform, using which portal has not remembered, anyway, purely as a private diary in use, few visitors.

Inevitably on the road to torment

About a year after graduation, friends said, as a designer, how can there be no personal website. At that time, it was very lazy to find a photo album website, throw the work on it, and add a main navigation link on the blog side. Friends say this is too low, since you will point front-end, build a wordpress ah. I’ve been looking around for templates, but they don’t quite meet my requirements. If the works are mainly blogs, the exhibition effect is not good; Based on works, articles are often hidden deep. The work is a reflection of me as a designer, while the article is closer to the complete me, can not dominate.

I had no choice but to roll up my sleeves and change the code. Under the guidance of my friends, I understood the relationship between domain name, space and independent blog, and the first independent blog was set up. I remember the first edition very well. On the front page there was a big close-up of a starfish with sand and ocean in the background. Sky blue, bright yellow and coffee were selected as the main colors of the blog. Unfortunately, there was no backup awareness, and the early versions of the blog template were completely overwritten, leaving nothing behind. I can only find the home page of the last wordpress blog and post it for everyone to poke fun at:

Don’t forget, writing is the original intention

Template after template, learned a lot of technical knowledge from other people’s independent blogs. One of the characteristics of these blogs is that if you read their early posts, you can see some life and reflections, and then they gradually become purely technical blogs.

I don’t want that.

I put so much thought into presentation that I never paid much attention to the writing process. What is the original purpose of blogging, both in front of and behind the scenes? Let others read happy, or write happy. If I had to pick one, I’d say the latter. Writing without interest, in any case, could not last nearly 10 years. The reason for the change of direction of technology blog is that the blogger’s interest has shifted to technology.

Respect the writing itself

While hobbies and willpower play an undeniable role, a comfortable writing environment can also have positive meanings. After all these years of dealing with words, one obvious question has been ignored: Why do you have to write this? For a long time, I coded words in only two places: Word and wordpress, and I can only say that they were well named, cut to the core, and subconsciously felt like no other choice was needed.

Of course, not really.

The ideal writing environment is a set of experiences that require support from all sides. Keep a glass of warm water handy for inspiration; The back should have a cushion of moderate thickness; Soothing music, or sounds of nature; It is better to have a cool breeze to keep people awake; Of course, professional writing tools are also necessary, so that people only care about the content and don’t have to wonder whether the headline should be 24 or 21, song style or bold.

Markdown is one such format, malleable and universally applicable. In addition, the editor is more important. Think of writing as an afternoon at the manor, drinking tea and chatting with some distant visitor, and the editor will act as a page. It has to be familiar with 18 kinds of martial arts, “mobile phone photos inserted in the text”, “generate pictures to share the full text” such things, certainly can’t bother you to start. At the same time, to remain silent, press the full screen shortcut key, the world is only thoughts, everything else into the shadow, waiting for the call.

MarkEditor

There are plenty of writing tools out there that can get you out of your way, but in terms of versatility, MarkEditor is definitely at the top of the list. The power of this feature is that you don’t have to go through the hassle of uploading images halfway through writing or scrolling through a long article to review a chapter. Because doing these things, your thoughts get interrupted in ways that a simple, edgy UI can’t compensate for. For a smooth writing experience, simplicity is the process of input, not the function of the editor.

This is MarkEditor’s first impression that the interface is extremely restrained and plain compared to its rich features. You can just ignore the bells and whistles and start writing, just as simple and clean. You can also explore it carefully to discover its infinite potential. MarkEditor is very liberalized and many of the little features are not just trophy toys but killer features. Have you thought about it? Links can directly generate two-dimensional code pictures, inserted in the text. Here are a few features that surprised me, one by one:

Working directory

Many Markdown editors can only set up one working directory. MarkEditor can set up several common working paths and invoke the working directory window with shortcut keys. Extremely useful when working with multiple documents at the same time.

It is worth mentioning that each working directory also has some options that can be set independently. My blog folder has multiple log categories, I can display the directory as a tree structure, and I can manipulate the posts and images in the entire directory.

A one-tier directory for weekly work reports is more suitable for a concise style, showing only articles and ignoring other file types.

Generate qr code

Qr code should be inserted in the article to facilitate PC readers to browse an H5 page. It used to be a headache to go out and open a browser, use a Chrome plugin or a web tool to generate it, and then download it and insert it.

MarkEditor considers this situation, shortcut keys call two-dimensional code window, paste content, can be generated directly.

Temporarily insert phone photos

A beautiful bird flies on the windowsill and wants to photograph it and post it on the blog. Try to sync the photos to your computer and drag them into the article.

Activate the illustration window, scan the code on your phone, take a picture and upload it. Of course, you can also select pictures from the album.

Change the image size

It is very easy to insert the pictures in the article and then manually reduce the size by dragging a slider. The introduction video on MarkEditor website shows this operation, which impressed me very much.

Typewriter roll

This feature, while not exclusive, is still rare. Each press enter will scroll the screen, moving the cursor to the center of the screen.

Much like a typewriter, this is the greatest kindness to the eye.

Article Content Index

Long articles will have a more complex structure, main and sub-headings can be up to 3 or even 4 levels. If you need to review a previous chapter, make an echo, and then scroll through the scroll bar for half a day.

The content index is a good solution to this problem, it is a natural outline structure, easy to find at the same time, but also help yourself to sort out the logic.

Raw growth figure

This is especially useful for long tweets. As you can see, in addition to long diagrams, there are many other forms that can be exported for different purposes.

Long micro blog pictures have been optimized for mobile terminal, clear and beautiful.

Version history

Come with your own history, which is great if you don’t use Dropbox or Nutcloud. Also, the history version is much more detailed than Dropbox. You can see how the history version differs from the current version and how the code comparison function works.

Flexible custom skins

What’s interesting about MarkEditor is that it directly displays the UI’s color table, and you can change the color of almost any element you see.

I changed the theme for night mode myself, with green links, purple images, and a slightly softer title and text. If you like, you can copy my color scheme in the link below.

pan.baidu.com/s/1kUbUYb1

Todo list

An unordered list can also be used as a Todo list, marking done/not done with a mouse click, which is what I use to record temporary requests.

Synchronize data to a third-party cloud service provider

This is a blockbuster feature, and it’s the key to solving the problem of image storage, to really centralize image storage and writing in one place.

Images can be synced to third-party cloud services such as Qiniu and Amazon, as well as Farbox’s own servers. After the article is published, the image is automatically converted to the corresponding cloud address. You don’t have to do anything but write articles.

conclusion

The writing tool also has plenty of advanced features to discover, such as the ability to customize markdown’s translation syntax, which is up to your imagination. MarkEditor and Farbox, a similar product, will make blog management very easy.

If I had to find a key word for MarkEditor, I think it would be: freedom. Having the entire blog on your own hard drive gives you maximum freedom. Both the blog and the editor itself can be flexibly adapted to suit their own habits and preferences.

Highly customized products have irreplaceable advantages over important and commonly used tools. With careful training, it will be your best helper.

Best of all, it’s also available for Windows.

Finally, attached is the official website of MarkEditor, which can be downloaded and experienced first. Some functions can only be activated by purchase:

Markeditor.com/app/markedi…

Discount purchase [Offer has ended]

Finally, it’s bonus time, and Coke Orange has asked the authors of MarkEditor for an exclusive offer. First of all, please pay attention to the wechat official account [Cola Orange] and send the word “preferential”. Use the promo code to buy, the first 3 people will get 30% off, the first 30 people get 50% off, after that, the price will be 30% off until March 28, 2016.

After clicking the buy button, you will see the actual purchase price. Be sure to fill in the coupon code!! The License cannot be refunded after it is activated. If the excitement of the original price to buy, Coke Orange can do nothing.

¯ \ _ (ツ) _ / ¯

[Foreign Design Issue 126]

In our last issue, we wrote about the design of the London Underground map, which was the first to be abstracted through design, turning a complex system into an easy-to-understand network. The story behind this subway map, and its legendary author.

© Ken Garland, courtesy of London Transport Museum

Harry Beck’s portrait does not appear on any coins or stamps, but his influence spread throughout London. Born in 1902, Beck was an English engineering surveyor whose radical plan for the new London Underground sparked a minor revolution in the early 1930s.

His color-coded straight lines were initially understood and welcomed by the Traffic Authority, and then quickly gained popularity among Londoners. Today, it has proved to be the world’s most recognisable and influential traffic map, sparking a frenzy of similar designs in major cities around the world.

The city of London posthumously awarded him a blue plaque, an honorary title, celebrating the 80th anniversary of the map’s birth. As the words on the plaque say, it honored him by changing the way people moved. This brings Beck’s legacy back into the spotlight, but the author behind it remains obscure.

London Underground, 1908-2012

“Beck’s map is a simple revolution,” unveiling ceremony on Monday, at the same time is also the 150th anniversary of the London underground running, Sam Mullins, London transport of the museum’s director, said: “it has become a symbol of London, affecting many of the world’s subway map design, at the same time also inspired many artists and designers at the time.”

Before Beck’s design, maps of the London Underground were about as legible as a bowl of spaghetti

Before Beck’s design, maps of the London Underground were about as legible as a bowl of spaghetti. In fact, it wasn’t until 1908 that all subway lines were plotted on a single map; Until then, each line had its own brochure. By combining all the lines, the aim is to demonstrate the vastness and convenience of the system, although the Rapid expansion of the London Underground could have unforeseen consequences.

“Some of the comments at the time pointed out that maps had become more complex because the number of London Underground lines was increasing,” said Anna Renton, senior curator at the London Transport Museum. “With the development and expansion of the Underground lines, maps became overcrowded, especially in pocket book versions.”

London Underground, 1908, from the London Transport Museum

In the 1908 version, each site was placed in true geographical proportions, resulting in central London being swamped by a jumble of dots, with only a few spots on the outskirts of the city. Transfers are also poorly marked, with each line drawn as a curve representing its true direction, marking out the streets and intersections above it. Like an X-ray of a bird, it’s a very faithful presentation. But for passengers, it can be utterly disorienting.

In 1931, with change on the horizon, Beck began working on his prototype design. It’s not clear what inspired him to take on this project; According to Renton, he doesn’t have an explicit commission and works on his designs during his downtime.

“It’s really emblematic of Beck’s originality in seeing a problem and finding a solution rather than just responding to a public need,” Renton said. Beck has since worked for six years as an engineering surveyor in the London Underground signage office — an experience that may have influenced the neat mechanical aesthetic of his maps.

Legibility vs. authenticity

To start, Beck changed the map’s existing winding arcs into straight lines — horizontal, vertical, and 45-degree angles. He also distorted the scale, placing the platforms equally apart and removing the network of streets above. The result is a sparse, circuit board-like design that dispense with precise geographical relationships for legibility.

Ken Garland, a British designer, is Beck’s biographer. He said the map’s most innovative feature was its “magnifying glass effect”, which zoomed in asymmetrically on areas of central London. In an email interview with The Verge, Garland said The approach “captures” The dense distribution of subway stations in The area, giving riders a more elegant way to understand The fast-growing urban jungle.

This magnification has a subliminal meaning, and it makes London’s suburbs seem closer to the city’s commercial centre. “These suburbs basically grew out of the expansion of the subway,” Renton said. “By making them look closer to the city center and showing people how easy it is to get to the city from the suburbs, the map will encourage more people to move to the suburbs.”

Underground Map design by Harry Beck, 1993, from The London Transport Museum

The metro authorities are less keen on the idea. Publicity officials initially ridiculed Beck’s proposal, fearing the maps were too deviant, but eventually agreed to print a pocket book version in 1933. It was released as a poster in March of the same year and soon became the new standard across London. It also inspired similar designs around the world, with Sydney pioneering its own Beck style traffic map in 1939.

Beck is said to have received only five guineas for his original design – about ￡5.25, or about $8. For the next 20 years he continued to draw up maps for the London Underground, modifying them for new routes, and by 1959 his flat was still shabby.

Beck’s career on the London Underground ended in turmoil

“No one at Transport for London has said why on earth they abandoned Beck’s technology.” Garland tries to remember that no one mentioned his story with Harold F. Hutchison, the propaganda officer at the time, who reportedly clashed ideally. Beck left, knowing that his maps would be replaced by Hutchison’s version — a design that sought to embrace Beck’s aesthetic while retaining more precise geographical relationships — and eventually devoted his life to teaching typography at the London University of Printing.

“I think Beck was pretty upset that his design was stolen and he left,” Renton says. “He was never hired. I think it’s a tragic end to my London Underground experience.”

Beck’s proposal for the Paris Metro, 1951, from the London Transport Museum

Until his death in 1974, Beck continued to submit bold proposals – including a prescient map of the Paris subway (above) and one that combined the above and below ground of London – although none of them were implemented in his lifetime.

Even as the Tube has expanded into the behemoth it is today, its maps adhere firmly to the design principles Beck laid out 80 years ago.

“The concept is clearly still due to him,” Renton said. “I hope that credit will be fairly attributed to him.”

The original link: www.theverge.com/2013/3/29/4…

Author Information: Amar Toor Amar joined The Verge in April 2012. He previously worked as an editor for Engadget, and before that, as a writer for Switched. He has also worked as a consultant at the OECD in Paris and at Miramax in Santa Monica. He’s currently based in Paris.

As some of you may have noticed, the Coke Orange blog went down last night. From about 5 p.m., there were only a few very old posts on the blog, and then it stopped completely until about 3 a.m. the next day. For a personal website like mine, this level of failure is not a big deal, really not a big deal.

The reason behind it, in fact, is my “cheap hand”, but the whole process is quite twists and turns, it is worth saying.

At first, MarkEditor, the markdown editor I used, released a new version. After carefully watching the introduction video on the official website of the software, I found that I had missed many new features in several version updates in the past six months. I’ll write an article about MarkEditor later (yes, that will be an AD from a real user), but I won’t go into it here. Anyway, if there is a reminder, it will be updated. After the update, it is still used in accordance with the previous habit. I don’t know what it is updated. As a designer and product man, I have to suppress this instinct for a long time, but at the same time, I can never forget its existence, how contradictory the situation.

Well, the new version started, all kinds of new features to try over. In addition to improving writing efficiency from various aspects, it can also synchronize the whole writing folder to the third-party cloud service provider, which has refreshed my understanding of this software on the whole. I was invited to try it out when it was born. As a junior student of Farbox client, MarkEditor seemed to me to separate the writing part of Farbox and become a writing tool independent of the blog system, which was a subset. Now, it is something that transcends and intends to replace.

It was fun to explore, and there were plenty of Aha moments as you learned to use these new features and thought about how your writing style would change if you wanted to enjoy them. Once you start thinking about it, you’ll start changing and optimizing your writing process. For example, you can’t imagine how primitive the illustration method of my previous articles was. I would put the pictures in categories by year, month and day, and then move this directory structure to Seven Niuyun. This is probably a legacy of wordpress, but it has its benefits. When you rent space to build a wordpress website, it will be convenient to use FTP management and greatly reduce the trouble caused by the same name of pictures.

However, to achieve the same directory structure on Qiniuyun, the prefix is manually added. It also has its own graphical upload tool, but has been lazy about researching it. So it’s a long, stupid process of manually filling in date prefixes, uploading pictures, copying urls and pasting them back into articles.

The new version of MarkEditor now supports syncing to third party cloud service providers, and like Git, the entire writing directory is synced to the same place. What I need to do is to prepare the picture structure in the writing table and organize the article illustrations. When writing, copy the cloud address of the image into the article, and sync the whole before Posting. Such a contrast, the previous illustration is unbearable ah!

I took all the illustrations from my previous posts and put them in the blog catalog, and there were over 4000 images. Dropbox has started syncing (my Farbox is synced with Dropbox), and it’s going to take a while. Then it occurred to me that the directory structure should not be arranged this way, but should have an extra layer for future use. So I created another folder and moved the whole picture directory into it. But on second thought, it’s still wrong. If it’s for other purposes, why put it in a completely irrelevant blogging system? Think of writing and blogging as two separate things, and the writing and illustration sections should go outside the blog section. So I removed more than 4,000 files.

One after another, the synchronization mechanism between Dropbox and Farbox went crazy. There was a BUG that caused the blog to point to the test site I used for debugging, so people only saw a few very old articles. The test site becomes an empty site with nothing.

This is a big problem. I need to fix it now. Try deleting the entire test site and find out that it doesn’t work. Dropbox is still in sync. I do not know what conflicts resulted from such an extreme operation. That do not do two endlessly, can only delete a bit thoroughly, my main station also deleted, and then quickly rebuild again. So you’ll see that my site is completely dead, and I also found an empty site under my Farbox account with no name, which I couldn’t delete. Apparently, this is the syncing guy, who looks like HE’s totally fucked up by me.

I had to turn to the author of Farbox, who suggested that I take the opportunity to semi-automatically sync with Farbox’s own servers, remove dropbox sync from my account and disauthorize it. Automatic synchronization is convenient, but the controllability is poor, and it is difficult to respond quickly to solve problems, just like this one.

Yes, we blindly pursue convenience and fluency, have we ever considered standing in this Angle? Back to the point, now unbind both Farbox and Dropbox, rebuild the site, and use the sync feature in the editor to synchronize. The problem is solved here, but I’ve been doing experiments most of the night. Files were added and deleted, deleted and added, synchronized over and over again, watching the synchronization record. You fully understand the synchronization process and the relationship between the blog and the editor.

Thanks to this hand outage, I had the opportunity to rethink the way I write and the tools I use day and night. It’s just like learning a computer when I was a child. I broke it countless times, asked someone to repair it, and it was broken again. Then… I became a maintenance captain at the university

Destruction and reconstruction is also a way of understanding things. A thunderbolt on the prairie set fire to everything, and then everything was born again.

[Foreign Design Issue 125]

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Good designers are never too old to learn.

At Springboard, we team up with mentors in user experience and data science, which is great for listening to the advice of seniors.

We’ve integrated the advice of many top practitioners into our ux career guide.

So we asked 11 great UX designers where they get their inspiration and what ux advice they would give to other practitioners.

We work with the UXPin team to bring you their insights.

1. Paul Boag

Paul is the co-founder of web design agency Headscape (their clients include Nestle, Macmillan and a number of UK universities) and has worked in the Internet industry for over 20 years, as well as being a prolific author and speaker.

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The design inspiration

My favourite design is the original London Underground map.

It breaks the rules and is extraordinarily original. It abandons the convention of representing distance and location in real scale. When these constraints are removed, a concise representation of a complex network can be created. To me, that’s what good design is all about — looking at complexity from another Angle and then simplifying it.

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Career advice

To be honest, I would have avoided giving my old self any advice because I knew I wouldn’t listen!

Even if I give advice, I can’t reap the value without experience and exploration. Making mistakes is the best way to learn anything, so I wouldn’t deprive my younger self of that opportunity. Winston Churchill said, “Success is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.”

Don’t listen to others, make mistakes and fall, get up and try again.

2. Eva Kaniasty

Eva runs her own company (Red Pill UX) in Boston and regularly hosts UXPA, of which she serves as president.

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The design inspiration

I recently discovered Duolingo, an online language learning platform.

I have a million reasons to love the user experience… The interface is simple, fun and engaging. A lot of apps try to mix gamification and community because it’s so cool, and the result is that it feels like icing on the cake. Duolingo gets the game elements right, and the variety of lessons keeps users hooked.

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I also like its immersive language learning section, where users collaborate on translations. Memorizing and reciting is an inherent part of language learning, and it’s clear that the Duolingo staff have made a deliberate attempt to simplify the challenge.

I often feel like we’ve reached a point where we need to focus on innovation in user applications, and it’s great to see something so new and amazing.

Career advice

In collaborative jobs like user experience, people are more important than skills. If you have a talent for research and design, you can always pick it up in time. But relationships can make or break your career.

When I first moved into tech, I knew only a handful of people were doing the same thing. Then I went to Bentley University to study ergonomics, which opened up a whole new world to me. Most of that is learning, of course, but the connections you make can be just as valuable.

Today, I continue to work in the industry through my local Association, THE UX Professionals Association. The association became more and more important, and I started independent consulting. Meet as many people as you can who are also passionate about USER experience and ask them for advice.

3. Mike Kus

Mike started out as a graphic designer, then moved into web design, working with companies like Twitter, Microsoft, and Mailchimp to create user experiences that combine form and function.

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The design inspiration

Hipopotam Studio, I like the interface of this website, full of creativity and interest.

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Career advice

Learn to distinguish UI trends from practical UI design conventions. Because just because a trend is widespread, it doesn’t mean it’s the best solution.

4. Jack Zerby

Jack is an Flavors. Me and Goodsie co-founder and previously worked as a Design director for Vimeo. He said he was heavily influenced by his father and was drawn to design when he first started Photoshop in high school. Now, he can be seen at the Workshop, a young entrepreneur development program with tangible results.

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The design inspiration

One of my favorite recent product experiences came from ParkMobile.

Don’t prepare change or wait for change, just pay according to the parking meter. All I have to do now is enter the numbers on the meter, set the length of time I want to stop, and pay. They’ll text me when the time is up, and I can charge extra for parking if necessary.

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Smooth and barrier-free.

Career advice

Always consider the end result and the situation of the user or customer. What tasks they have to accomplish, what situations they are in.

For example, I wanted to install a bike stand on my car, and I went to the manufacturer’s website. My goal is to get the braces up and on the road as soon as possible. In this scene, I’m standing outside in the hot sun, and the kids are crying because they want to go to the park right now.

Design with that in mind, and know your users. For successful marketing, it’s about understanding their pain points, their problems, their disappointments, and then talking to them in their voice.

Don’t take it for granted and fall victim to arrogance (as we often do).

5. Laura Klein

Laura has worked as an engineer and designer in Silicon Valley for over 15 years. Her goal is to help startups understand their customers and accelerate their efforts to create better products. Her book and popular design blog Users Know teach product creators what to do when it comes to research and design.

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The design inspiration

We only notice boring designs, and I think that’s the curse of the UX designer. Or maybe it’s just me. Either way, I’ve always loved simple designs so much that they fit in so well with life that I don’t even notice them.

Career advice

You need two mentors.

The first is someone who has been influential in your field. They can help you build your perception of what skills you need to be hired by someone like them.

The other mentor should be a few years older than you. They can tell you how to prepare for the job ahead. I don’t know what it’s like to be a newcomer to tech these days, but someone who’s been around for a few years will be very insightful.

So you need two people: one to help you get your next job, and one to help you get it done.

6. Joshua Garity

Joshua is a design psychologist and brand strategist who has worked with companies like Wendy’s and The New York Times to help them connect with customers and boost their revenue. He can be found on his blog, Twitter and the company he runs, Candorem.

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The design inspiration

The user experience is all about us, and it extends far beyond the digital web. From the perspective of interaction design scenarios and specific media or platforms, user experience must be seen as a marker.

For example, let’s look at cars in our general sense.

Let’s say we spend most of our time in the car driving. When we drive, our main focus is on the road ahead, at least I hope so. Stay in lane, do not speed, and watch out for other cars, pedestrians or animals. Then we added radio and air conditioning. Looking away from the road even briefly can cause serious harm to everyone on the road. Why, then, should automakers consider this when designing consoles? Many have powerful features, with options, buttons, knobs and even touch screens for controlling temperature or radio.

If the user experience is about the interaction, then we need to focus on simplifying the experience and keeping the user’s primary attention free of negative distractions.

Good design guides the user without a second thought. Confusion is your worst enemy.

Career advice

Never be satisfied, live in the present moment. Don’t be trapped by a label or ideal. Seek answers from everyone and everything, even if they seem irrelevant to the question at hand. You can achieve anything you desire.

7. Kevin M. Hoffman

At Seven Heads Design, Kevin “works on solving problems you don’t even know you have” — not just human-computer interaction, but human-human interaction. His clients include Harvard University, Nintendo and MTV. Find him on his website and Twitter.

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The design inspiration

I love the overall experience of the original Android, or “Google Play” version of Android, and more recently, Android Wear.

I’ve been trying to use Android for a while now, when the Kit Kat version of the software and the Nexus 5 came out, and I haven’t switched back since. I think a lot of the interface design is great, but what I like most is the anticipation and micro-interaction parts, such as the several ways notifications work and the seamless integration with calendar requirements.

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The first time I realized that it was two clicks to tell someone I was going to be late for a meeting, I was like, “Wow! It’s so useful.” I recently tried out Android Wear, and it just took me five days to fit into my life completely naturally. Now, I can basically take a break from social media by checking my watch, and don’t have to pull my phone out of my pocket to check and navigate notifications.

I’m also looking forward to Android Auto. We’ll see what the next version of iOS looks like, but I don’t think I’ll switch back for a while.

Career advice

“Hey, young me!

You’ll spend some time thinking about long-term goals, which is good practice. You’ll also think about your ideal job, employer, lifestyle, family, etc. But in reality, pursuing these things is not satisfying, and you can’t just wait for them to arrive.

Live your life as it is.

The greatest joy is in the real world, sometimes facing small (and sometimes small) choices, yes or no. Your goal should be to become better at making decisions that will have a big impact on your life, not a particular ideal.

Try to understand, too, that self-doubt, while humbling, has no other benefits. Don’t take yourself too seriously. Practice, boy. What have you made of me today? And don’t overuse the word ‘and.'”

8. Lis Hubert

Lis has worked with companies large and small to create technology products — like ESPNW.com and NBA.com — that have changed people’s lives forever. She is also a member of the Future Insights Conference advisory Board.

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The design inspiration

My biggest inspiration of late has been the design of public Spaces in big cities, such as New York, where I live.

It’s important to note that not only are large Spaces like Central Park beautifully designed, but small Spaces as far as the eye can see are extremely convenient. I find myself fascinated by observing the way people use parks, playgrounds and courts. I look to this ecosystem for inspiration because, for these places to be so successful, designers must aim for the experience of such a large, complex group of people and let them enjoy the place, which is a bewildering crowded place.

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This, for me, is the user experience design of architecture. Allow people to walk through the space and see how they make decisions in order to achieve desired results that satisfy users, site owners and designers alike.

Career advice

Calm down, beginners.

In our industry, we are very aware of the importance of our work and want everyone else to understand and “get it.” So we’re always trying to make sense of it.

The result, of course, can be draining and frustrating. But I realized that trying so hard to indoctrinate the layman with our knowledge wasn’t that important. As I’ve learned, it really doesn’t matter whether companies, tech teams, or anyone else can “get” the deepest meaning of our work.

Most importantly, be passionate about what is within your control. Do your part (a little more if necessary), let your passion shine, and enjoy your journey.

9. Matt Hamm

Matt, co-founder of UK-based Studio Supereight Studio, has been designing on the web since 1998. You can see his work here, or check out his Twitter feed.

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The design inspiration

Dropbox continues to lead in the user experience — it’s very smooth to use.

Good UX design should be invisible. There are a lot of things that impressed me about Dropbox: the welcoming interface experience, the attention to detail, the independent thinking rather than copying design patterns, making it completely intuitive.

Career advice

Document everything!

Crafting a user experience design reference document for browsing will help you learn and solve problems as you go. Remember to write down real-world experiences as well; these patterns can also be documented.

10. Pavel Macek

Pavel, who currently works as a product designer at Slack, says he “cares a lot about people,” and it shows in his work designing and building things that people love.

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The design inspiration

For me, a great example of user experience design is the Technics SL-1200 turntable, which has been available for 35 years with no major changes. And it remains popular with DJS, producers and musicians.

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It brings out the best in functional design, combined with thoughtful design details. I think ux designers tend to lose sight of part of their responsibility, which is to make sure the design is implemented properly, and that’s what ultimately determines the success of the product.

Career advice

Don’t lose yourself in design methodology and design patterns. While it is important to learn how to design and have a rigorous design process, the starting point is often simple: Who am I designing for? What is he trying to achieve? How to help him achieve his goals?

Then it’s just a matter of iteration, figuring out what works and what doesn’t.

11. Robert Fabricant

Robert specializes in design in healthcare and social innovation. He recently launched the Masiluleke project, which pioneered the use of mobile Internet technology to fight HIV in South Africa. He previously worked at frog Design, a prestigious design agency. He also teaches, lectures and writes.

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The design inspiration

I am constantly inspired, motivated and challenged by the New York subway system, which is an amazing multi-faceted user experience.

I’ve been riding the subway for (at least) 45 years. You can’t really know and appreciate the value of an experience without living it for a long time.

Too many of the ux designs we celebrate are fleeting — apps installed on our phones may not last more than a few months. And the subway is here, and the proximity, the flow of people, the movement of machines, all reflect its progress. The design is a slow and arduous project.

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But change is eternal. As residents of New York, there are few systems to learn from more than the subway. But where does the experience begin and when does it end? It is not confined to platforms, carriages and gates.

In recent years, the subway system has become a kind of experimental platform for both licensed projects and improvisation. Recently, giant touch-screen screens began appearing at Union Square stations. It was fascinating to see people operating them for the first time, opening up a new experience that connected the residents of this great city (yes, this is my hometown).

As user experience designers, we should think and create experiences on a large scale. What better place than a city? Here, data and mobility intersect, allowing us to constantly explore (and appreciate) the intersection of our own experiences with those around us.

Career advice

I love talking to designers about the moment they show their work for the first time, hoping people will explore it, experience it, and (hopefully) like it.

In this moment, even before someone else is attracted to the piece, you have a certain preference for it. As the old saying goes, “the light came on.” You suddenly see (and realize) that too many things are beyond your understanding, planning, and intuition.

These moments are precious — extremely precious — and shameful to designers, no matter how experienced you are.

Design shows its value in comparison, and create as many of these moments as possible in your project. Consent is not what you need!

In my 13 years at Frog, I’ve been fortunate to be able to play that scenario over and over again with different teams — getting up close and personal with the designer community.

Quality has always been measured only by feedback — how much it engages, delights and helps users.

Behavior is our medium, remember that.

More user experience suggestions

For more user experience best practices, read the free e-collection 2016 with Decisive User experience Design Trends. It has over 350 pages of advice and more than 300 mobile, web and user experience tips.

At the end of this article, Cola Orange has downloaded “2016 Defining TRENDS in User Experience Design”. If you need it, you can download it through the following link:

pan.baidu.com/s/1pKtdWb5

Original link: studio.uxpin.com/blog/11-top…

Author Information: Roger Huang Roger Huang handles Growth & Marketing for Springboard. He was previously the Editor-in-Chief at code(love) and a contributing author to The Next Web.

[Foreign Design Issue 124]

Virtual reality, the experience has been around since the mid-80s, but technology always seems to be dragging its feet. Finally, the development of smartphones and related technology has brought the amazing potential of virtual reality within reach. Today, we are in the midst of a virtual reality revolution.

From high-end platforms that cost thousands of dollars to systems that run on smartphones, vr designs are just the tip of the iceberg. Fundamentally, it is still a wilderness waiting to be explored for new concepts, and Google has opened the door.

Last year, they began offering Google Cardboard: a simple, inexpensive way for anyone with a smartphone to experience virtual reality. Just download the Cardboard app, buy (or make your own) Cardboard glasses, and you’re in the virtual crowd. Want to build your own app? It also provides an SDK. Then, in early 2015, a series of written design guides for Cardboard were released. Details set the ground rules, such as “how to avoid motion sickness” and “how to make the user feel grounded by immobilizing objects”. But what better way to educate and inspire a vr designer than to experience it for yourself?

At Google’s 2015 I/O conference, the Cardboard team launched Cardboard Design Lab: an interactive “tutorial application” based on virtual reality that interprets the standards and principles laid down earlier. Google partnered with USTwo not only to design and develop the experience, but also to test the waters and put these principles to the test with a roadshow. Our common goal is to help everyone interested in vr design and development broaden their base and reveal more to explore.

Within the Design Lab, these principles are grouped into interactive sections called “Basics” and “Immersion”. The basic part focuses on teaching designers basic principles of virtual reality, more or less universal rules. The immersion part is more exploratory, both in theory and in the experience of Cardboard Design Lab itself. First, let’s touch on some of the basic principles:

Locking the user’s field of view while looking around at the foot of the windmill demonstrates the importance of head tracking.

The head tracking

It’s a cliche that if a user moves his or her head in a virtual reality environment, it should be reflected in the app. “The most important rule in vr design is to keep head tracking at all times. Never stop tracking the user’s head movements in an app. Even a short pause can cause discomfort.” This principle, along with “use a constant low speed” and “keep the user grounded in the virtual environment”, is a fundamental principle of virtual reality experience.

We can see the positive and negative examples of the movement experience through the mining car movement.

The acceleration

Getting users to walk through virtual environments is tricky because it’s the most basic way humans perceive spatial location. If you’re standing still, there’s an acceleration due to the presence of gravity, which determines your standing direction. It would be unnatural to completely ignore acceleration or apparent constant velocity. The challenge is either finding the right number of accelerations, or replacing the sensation of acceleration with something else entirely. In this Cardboard Design Lab, our team experimented with an acceleration of 83 milliseconds, followed by a constant motion of approximately 3 meters per second, followed by a deceleration of 266 milliseconds. We think it’s a good idea, but as a principle of the Design Lab, we hope to get some feedback from the designer community.

When detonating the balloon, the effect is different with and without the cross.

Use the cross

Because most vr systems don’t track eye position (as they currently do), there’s no way to tell the app where the user is currently looking. So, the cross star helps the app mark the center of the screen. In the example above, we asked the user to try to detonate the balloon without the help of a cross star, and they seemed to miss the target several times before they got the hang of it. We’ve never seen the use of a cross before in vr, but this is a great example of how something so trivial can open the door for designers to create better experiences.

The purpose of using cross stars is to make it easy for the user to see which objects are available for selection, to quickly navigate through menus, and so on. We were careful not to let the cross interfere with the design of the app, sometimes hiding it from view while keeping it minimalist and basic in the Pilot version. Designers can use this as a basis for design and iteration, whether they want to design a cross, a camera, or anything else they think will benefit the experience.

Understanding the basics, designers move into the principle of immersion. Inspired by the Muir Forest north of San Francisco, the Immersion section of The Design Lab teaches designers certain principles that, while not absolutely necessary for vr applications, are still highly recommended to provide as good a user experience as possible. The following examples are all about these principles, which we expect to change dramatically over time:

Using the proportion

There are a number of aspects that make virtual reality a very special experience, the most striking of which is the visual impact of changing proportions between the user and the environment. When building the Design Lab, Ustwo tried many different proportions and finally chose the perspective you see above, which makes people feel small and even humble. Because the purpose of the immersion principle is to elicit an emotional response. We feel that giving designers a sense of the scale and vastness of the world around them helps kick-start their imagination.

Follow the hooting of an owl in your right ear and you will find one standing on a branch staring at you.

Spatial sound

One of the most unique concepts in 3D and virtual reality games is that sound effects in space fix the location of sound sources in your environment. So a sound coming from something to your left side, in headphones, sounds like it’s coming from the left. In the example above, the user hears an owl hoot, looks to the right, and finds the owl in place, standing on a branch and staring at him. Simple as it is, this lesson teaches designers that the possibilities of sound in virtual reality are endless.

Look at tip

The use of gaze cues may be a new concept for designers just starting to design virtual reality, and it’s a feature we look forward to evolving over time. Gaze prompts experience feedback based on the user’s gaze direction. This experience can be more subtle, a “hover state”, or it can be event-based, as in a horror game where a large number of monsters emerge from behind. In the case we created for the Cardboard Design Lab, staring at a sky full of stars activates a hovering gaze cue that displays a series of constellations.

Hike to the top of the mountain for the ultimate goal and watch the sunset over the sea.

Give it beauty

The last principle of immersion? That is to give it beauty. Pay attention to the visual beauty of the creation, which is beneficial to the user’s immersive experience. Walking through the forest and at the end of the course, users are presented with a clifftop overlooking the sea, allowing them to watch the sunset. We want users to take a breather before embarking on their vr design journey and let their inspiration sink in.

“Our goal is not to create a virtual reality bible,” says Toph Brown, project manager at USTwo and a member of the Cardboard Design Lab project. “Vr is growing fast and it’s a team sport — everyone in the industry is working together to make VR easier and more useful. For this reason, it is foolish to draw a dividing line and say ‘this is how it will be done’. And we think some ideas are mature enough for us to reach a consensus. With Cardboard Design Lab, we tried to create an experience that reflected and validated these concepts. We want designers to embrace it and use it as a basis for creating beauty in virtual reality. The best part is we’re just getting started. There’s so much more to discover.”

Cardboard Design Lab was originally conceived not just as a case study of possibilities, but as an interactive learning experience for designers and developers to take our ideas and move on to build their own products. It takes inspiration, it takes communication, it takes taking the journey of virtual reality and creating apps that people actually want to use and experience. Today is the first step, and we look forward to feedback from the designer community as Google, USTwo and all vr designers continue to explore the road ahead together.

Cardboard Design Lab is now available for download on the Google Play Store.

Original link: ustwo.com/blog/design…

Author Information: CASEY HOPKINS Casey is a curator of marketing, Community and Events at Ustwo ™. Hopeless Geekette.extreme Baker. World Traveler. Follow her on Twitter @CaseyHopkins.

[Foreign Design Issue 123]

On Dribbble, brand designers are in the minority. The Dribbble community is dominated by designers of the interface, user experience and animation. When I went to the first Dribbble Meetup in Gdańsk, Poland, last July, I expected to meet a similar audience. Indeed, most of them are freelance web designers and crossover types who have been asked to design logos at some point.

However, I decided not to talk about how to create a good logo. You can find many articles on the Internet about what an enduring logo should look like and what are the core qualities of a great logo. What I focus on is the process itself.

As logo and brand designers, our work begins long before the first concept is born and ends long after the final draft is finished.

Our job demands much more than creativity and skill — it forces us to be marketing specialist, strategist, psychologist, sales person, performer, and project manager all at once. It was very difficult, but also exciting and challenging!

The purpose of this article is to help you rethink your design process. Some of them are my own suggestions, while others are borrowed from world-renowned designers. All of these tips and tricks are tested and proven, and tailored to optimize the process of your brand building (transformation) project.

“I also need a logo, by the way.”

Duang! You landed a web design project. A new product or service is about to hit the global market, and they need your creative help. Then you ask for the branding guide and get the reply, “Oh, we don’t have a logo yet. Can you design one?”

After a moment of hesitation (because branding isn’t your main business), you say, “Yes, of course!”

This is a very common answer. Clients don’t want to split a project between multiple designers. However, the logo design process has its own characteristics. Its output depends not only on how meaningful and elegant the logo is, but also on your workflow.

1. Explain your design process

Whether it’s an individual client or an organization, when they hire you, they hire your workflow.

Review images

My workflow

Workflow is what makes good work. This is the behavioral framework you build throughout your career, and it changes with each project.

Make sure your client understands and trusts the process as much as possible. Show it to them at the first meeting (visually, of course) and explain why it’s so important to follow it. The first demo should identify the number of logo schemes you will deliver, the number of fixes and changes, and the payment and delivery time points.

Good customers will respect your process if you make it transparent.

2. Provide creative presentations to clients

My main advice in this part of the design process is to ask questions. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, even if it’s not on the subject. I usually start my first client meeting by saying, “I’m going to ask a lot of questions. Some of them seem to have nothing to do with our project, or are not what designers need to know. But all information is crucial. This helps me create character images that communicate your identity and connect with your customers.”

Questions about branding

1. Who are you?
2. What do you do and why?
3. What do you promise your customers?
4. What is your USP (” We’re the only one [offering this service] “)?
5. What’s your story?
6. What do you expect the future to be?
7. Who are your competitors?
8. Who likes or might like you and why?
9. Do you influence the lifestyle of your customers and how?
10. What emotions do you want to evoke in your customers?

Some of these questions are difficult to answer right away. Have the client prepare the answers and send them to you. Remind them that the answers will be part of the creative presentation and you can’t work on the logo without them.

I have a simple template that clients fill out after their first meeting so they can think about some of the questions in depth. (Often, this comes with a special selling point — it’s hard to explain in one sentence why people choose you.)

If you want to further engage your customers, host a small workshop!

For this purpose, I created a set of branded personality cards. It consists of 24 cards showing 24 contrasting pairs of adjectives on the front and back, such as young/mature, calm/wild, serious/naughty, etc. It helps clarify the customer’s goals and the core feelings they want customers to feel when they interact with the brand.

3. Know how to deal with creative clients

Have you ever had a client sit next to you while you were working on a project? I have. Luckily, I’ve only had two or three in my career. (In terms of 5 years of studio/organization experience, I’m a lucky guy.) These were clients of our studio, so I couldn’t resist my boss and refused to work so intimately. Yes, when the client leaves the office at the end of the day, the team applauds me. But that’s enough. I can add another rule to the creative process: Try to involve the client in the brand creation process. Make sure you understand each other, which helps if all your changes are made remotely.

An email from a customer. Believe me, the annex really is… The “top” art of painting 🙂

Sometimes creative clients will come up with ideas at the beginning of the meeting or at the end of the presentation. How do you respond? That would make a lot of designers roll their eyes, including me. But eventually I changed my mind and realized that working with clients is always good.

That doesn’t mean you should follow the client’s advice, “Do it this way.” Customer ideas are a valuable resource. It means they are really paying attention! They need your help.

In other words, respect the client’s opinion. Listen to them carefully. Even if you disagree, ask them why they think it’s a good idea. Always make sure you take their ideas into account and work on them.

Often, clients don’t come up with an ultimate branding solution, but that’s no surprise: their job is to run a company, and yours is to brand it. What do you do in this case? There are two tips:

• Redesign the customer’s idea as a set of keywords.
• Even if you know that the client’s sketches don’t match the brand’s goals or appeal to the audience, list the logos at the first presentation and explain why you’re not deepening their concept: “I really like your idea, but it’s not helping your business. Because……” Be prepared for a heated argument.

My final piece of advice: be very careful of clients who have already sketched it themselves, or who have had other designers start it, and want you to turn it into a logo. You need to know where you stand: are you an expert in providing design solutions, or an artist using Adobe Illustrator skills? “What a question! Of course I’m an expert, “you say. So be honest with the customer:

“If you only want to draw your sketches as vectors, hire a design student. They can do it well, and it won’t cost you much. But if you’re going to hire me to do this project, we have to go through the whole logo design process. Of course, I’ll take your sketches and study them. I don’t know all the details of the project right now. I can’t promise that this is the best solution, and I’ll be thinking about other concepts.”

If the client agrees, your credibility as a designer has been established. If not, it’s not the right client for you.

4. Start with research and end with research

Research is the most basic of all design processes. Before thinking about what the new logo will look like, you need to investigate solutions within the client’s business unit.

For example, say you’re creating a brand identity for a start-up and they’ve just created a new wearable device for… For example, for snowboarders. When filling out an idea brief, clients write down only a few competitors. Often these are local businesses — the same city, country or region of the world, depending on their target market and, of course, ambition.

A small number of companies is not enough to get a complete picture. That’s why you need to look beyond what the client has provided. There are two phases to the study.

First, you should look for other (worldwide) company logos in the same line of business — as many as you can. This is the first round of research. Collect these logos on a slide and show them to the client: “This is what your potential competitors’ logos look like.”

HappyTeamCheck market research

Sometimes a company’s name contains a noun that you can easily associate with a particular visual image. Or company founders may ask you to validate their ideas, such as choosing an animal as their mascot. It’s time to move on to the second (creative) stage of the research: find as many logos with this symbol as possible. However, you should avoid repeating concepts that already exist. As Austin Kleon notes, “Nothing is entirely original.” No matter how unique the idea is to you, there’s always a chance that another designer came up with the same idea before you did.

I repeat the same idea research over and over again, checking my ideas before presenting them to clients. Once I have the two best logos in place, I list all possible keywords to search in the following five places: Behance, Dribbble, Pinterest, Designspiration and Underconsideration.

Do you need to present all the research to the client? Don’t have to. I always show the market research in my first presentation to give them a snapshot of the existing logos in the industry and explain which ones are good examples and which don’t work at all. I keep my creative research to myself.

Sometimes clients will ask you to make changes and inadvertently make your solution similar to an existing design. It’s time to point out, “Actually, I advised against this. Because we’re going to end up with a logo that’s very close to that.”

In a concept presentation, once the customer comes up with an idea: “Let’s slice the logo!” Why not? It’s a great idea. It fits the name of their company, Clipatize. Before presenting my own version at the next meeting, I would show clients all the sliced logos I found: “We can’t repeat these looks.”

This kind of research protects both sides: in your case, from false accusations of infringement; For customers, from the trouble of trademark registration.

5. Create a mood board

Mood boards are a traditional design tool. Clients don’t expect to see mood boards when they hire independent designers. Surprise and impress them and get them ready to go into the logo concept presentation.

Why the mood board?

First, it shows the look and feel of the brand. This is a visual representation of the client’s answer to a question in the presentation, “What emotions do you want to evoke in the customer?” Sometimes clients ask for a specific picture to be changed or for the mood board to be combined into one.

Betoscope’s mood board, the online gambling site

Second, if done right, it will put the customer in a good mood before the logo concept is shown. Have you ever heard of the “Three Yes” communication method? That’s the first “yes”.

Ultimately, a mood board saves you time and gives you control. Once the client accepts the mood board, you can also pull it out if future design changes deviate from the original intention.

I’m on a mood board for a project

Present your design like an advertiser

Design doesn’t speak for itself. It doesn’t sell itself. Lazy project managers in many large companies have created this myth. There, designers are not allowed to communicate with clients, and there are many microphones between you and them. I used to be part of that system. Then he ran away and went to work for a small software company.

Don’t wait for the customer to understand the concept — guide them through the presentation. Present your work and explain how these solutions have helped the client achieve their business goals.

The following tips can help you deliver a more effective presentation.

Keep lively

I always do my best to host the first demo in person, either on a Skype call or a Google Hangout. Why is that? Because you’re in control of the process, you can add a few notes, and answer customers’ questions right away. Know the correct sequence. Have you read Carmine Gallo’s Steve Jobs presentation tips? If not, I highly recommend it.

The most useful philosophy is the rule of three: people can only remember three things from each list. Three is a powerful magic number. If the number is particularly large (for example, the number of concept drafts), the order is also important. People are most likely to remember things first, then last, then second, then third, and so on. So when presenting your concept, put your best idea first, your second at the end, and your third in the middle.

How many concepts to present is up to you. I’ve shown three before, but I found polishing the third option to be a waste of time. It’s even better to pick the best two out of the 30 ideas you brainstorm during the concept phase.

Show the story

Do you know why people love to see stories behind the camera? When you make videos, do you often have surprise moments? The same goes for logos. Don’t guide the user with the final product — they’ll see it on the slide. Instead, start at the root of the concept. Explain why and how the idea came about. After all, you’re not just creating a little icon or logo, you’re creating a brand story.

Don’t guide the user with the final product — start at the root of the concept

Use the tag

This is really useful. How does it work? Imagine that you have just completed a face-to-face logo concept presentation. You’ve conveyed your expertise, which concept best fits the client’s business goals, and why. The client will come back to you in a few days with feedback, because they need a few days to make a decision. When they watch your presentation the next day, they’ll notice the marks and remember your suggestion.

When they see your presentation the next day, they’ll notice the marks and remember your suggestion

Use appropriate presentation templates

A template is useful because it makes it easier to understand the final product than a single logo. Unfortunately, most designers use them the wrong way. Why is that? There are two types of templates: presentation templates and portfolio templates.

Demo templates vs Portfolio templates

All those floating business cards, iPhone photos on angled desktops… While good, it’s not a good idea to demonstrate a concept. When can you read the message on a business card, holding it flat in your hand, or spread out on a table one meter away? Do you hold the phone vertically or at a 45-degree Angle? You get the idea. That’s why it’s best to use flat templates in demos.

7. Pay attention to the app icon

I’m a big fan of text logos. But there’s one big drawback to logos — it’s incredibly difficult to create a unique app icon from them. A small icon is much better because it doesn’t have to be too special. However, the App icon must be special (and preferably not even remotely similar to the existing icon in the App Store).

The app icon must be special

If you create a brand, its company or service will have an app, I suggest you design an icon + text logo.

8. Think big. Think ahead

A Logo is not a brand. There is so much to say about this. This is a good topic for a whole series of articles.

(From Entrepreneur’s Guide to Building an impressive startup brand)

Yes, along with the name, the logo is the most valuable brand resource, but it is only one of many elements in a brand’s visual identity system. When creating a Logo concept, think about how the whole brand will look:

• Are ideas easy to evolve? Or is your Logo neutral enough (or generic enough) to leave plenty of room for innovation?
• Can you create a living brand identity system?
• What brand attributes are conveyed in the Logo and what are left for other resources to reflect?

Who knows who will take over the project after that? Today you design a logo, but tomorrow you may be asked to design the rest of the resources.

Remember: Design is a job

We are not artists. We don’t express ourselves through design. We are passionate about design, but design is not just a passion for us. And it’s definitely not just a hobby.

That’s our job. We make money by helping people achieve their business goals.

Always adjust your design to meet project goals. Take responsibility for your creation. Pitch your concept confidently and be prepared to listen to feedback.

Keep learning in the project and continuously optimize the design process. Remember, your design process is a reflection of your expertise. Part of this is about your reputation as a designer.

The original link: www.smashingmagazine.com/2016/02/des…

Author Information: Iryna Nezhynska From the very beginning of her career, Iryna has been passionate about how people and organisations expressing who they are. She began with designing brand identities for financial and industrial companies; then she switched to retail sector to help polish retail brands enter the era of iPad magazine apps. Now she is a Senior Visual Designer at Upnext, a Warsaw-based software agency where she creates visual identities for digital products. She recently has focused on lean branding for startups. Iryna tweets at @iranezhynska and has a published her work on her Dribbble blog, too.

[Foreign Design Issue 122]

Personal branding is when people promote themselves and their business as a brand. These days, it’s no longer enough to have a good craft. Unique and authentic will do, but only if people know you. As Michael Simmons writes, authenticity is key in the digital age. A strong personal brand can create a lot of opportunities and gain full recognition.

Personal branding is becoming a key factor in all industries. Skills and a boring resume will no longer guarantee you anything. You really should start to discover your brand and build a community. Or, in other words, build a fan base that can bring you jobs and support, share your work, and recognize you.

In this article, I’d like to share some personal branding guidelines that I’ve been experimenting with over the past few years. These techniques and methods have brought me speeches, interviews with Forbes and Fast Company, and business growth, not to mention connections and friends.

Why care about personal branding?

There are many reasons why you should consider strengthening your personal brand. The important thing is that the personal brand is always there. It’s what people think of you, your work, your behavior. Make sure the brand is in line with your values and how you want people to perceive you. There are also benefits to building a recognizable personal brand:

• Career opportunities
• A Better job
• Optimize company contacts and customers
• Industry recognition

vision

Create a powerful vision and be sure to spread it. Whether it’s going to the moon or going around the world, it has to be a bold plan, and people will remember that. If you haven’t seen Simon Sinek’s TED talk, “How Great Leaders Inspire People to Action,” with his “Golden Circle” and “Why to Start” theory, be sure to check it out and create your own vision.

Who is your target?

Who is your audience, and who are you talking to through your brand? The most common mistake is everyone, we want to appeal to as many people as possible. The harsh reality is that if you try to please everyone, you’ll never please anyone. There will always be people who like you for one reason and people who hate you for another. Everyone has their own ideas, so you don’t have to think about appealing to everyone. Think about your vision and long-term goals.

Use high-quality images

No matter how great your website looks or how many great stories you have to tell, people are visual creatures. Humans form ideas based on first impressions, and images convey more information than needed, leaving a strong impression and forming a certain concept of a brand.

To quote from 3M Corporation, people are extremely attracted to graphics as opposed to text messages.

“Ninety percent of the information transmitted to the brain is visual, and the brain processes images 60,000 times faster than words.”

German designer Tobias van Schneider is a good example of the use of high-quality images in personal brand communication.

Here are some great examples:

Kerem Suer

Karim Rashid

Jeff Broderick

Jim Ramsden

Viens-la

Insist on writing

To quote Austin Kleon, a New York Times bestselling author, “Show me your work!” Keep Posting details of your work, ideas, and what you’re learning online. Don’t waste time surfing the Internet. Make good use of it.

Think of all the great work you’ve done, and no one knows about it. Be sure to take advantage of today’s Internet ecosystem by Posting your drafts, ideas, updates, work processes, and finished products for feedback, approval, and potential channels.

Dribbble, Behance, DeviantArt are just a few of the great designer communities out there. Personal blogs and portfolios are another medium.

Skillful storytelling

Storytelling is a powerful skill that can set you apart from the lesser known designers in the industry and burnish your brand. People will be interested in you and even think of you when they need a designer.

In addition to showing your work, show your daily life, share your creative process, share your daily trajectory, share how you inspire, and more. A good example is Tomas Jasovsky, a Slovakian designer who tried to break into big companies like Facebook and Spotify, failed, and decided to pack his bags and travel the world with his girlfriend. He calls himself a nomadic designer, and everything he shares combines travel, design, food and adventure. Who isn’t interested in such a way of life?

More examples:

Pieter Levels

Ryan Putnam

Establish contact

It’s important to start building your professional network and include industry leaders in your circle, because people will see you as one of them.

“Your network is your network asset.” — Tim Sanders, author, public speaker, and former director of Yahoo

There are many ways to connect with people, and you can’t just focus on the designer. All connections are beneficial and can lead you to a design powerhouse that you might not have access to from other designers.

How do you get people interested in you? Can’t do. You have to start by listening to them and providing them as much value as you can, and only then will people connect with you in a real way and form lasting relationships. If you want to learn more about networking principles for designers, check out my article from last year: Key Networking Principles for Design Entrepreneurs

The following websites and social media are great for meeting new people.

Get media coverage

There is nothing more powerful than the fact that you, your story or work is widely respected. It adds a lot of credibility to the brand and sets you apart from your competitors in the industry.

But getting media coverage is not easy. Either through your own unique story, or by creating something extraordinary and controversial, such as an innovative redesign of an existing product, or a cool new concept that comes to life.

A great example was mentioned earlier by Tomas Jasovsky, a Slovak designer. He came up with a concept for a commercial version of Instagram, which was picked up by a tech publication, including The Next Web.

More examples:

Paul Jarvis

Leo Drapeau’s much-talked-about iOS7 redesign

Associate yourself with other strong brands

Work on brand credibility. Being covered, while great, may not be enough to impress potential customers. People like to deal with people they know and trust. If you’re just starting out and don’t have a huge following, it’s best to associate yourself with larger brands and companies that you’ve worked with, helped, and picked their advice with in any way. People will then associate their trust with your brand, creating a huge leap in your brand’s credibility and likeability, bringing in new business or customers.

Look at the example above, presented elegantly and convincingly. For those familiar with the Badoo, ITV or O2 brands, a first visit adds trust.

More examples:

THENERO

Tushar Merwanji

monitoring

Monitoring and tracking what people know and say about you online is extremely important in order to build real connections and attract genuine fans. There are many online tools that can track your personal brand across the web and social media and allow you to react and engage.

Do what you

It sounds like a cliche, but you really just have to be yourself. If you don’t like the way you’re doing it, find a better hobby and improve yourself. If you’re shy about portraying who you are, show people who you want to be.

“Be yourself, because everyone else is already taken.” – Oscar Wilde

From my experience, I can tell you that being humble and sincere always trumps lying and arrogance. Tell people your goals, share your vision, tell your own unique true story, and you’ll see people focus on you and connect with your story, brand, and personality.

conclusion

Personal brands are no longer enigmatic, but they take years to build and maintain. Hopefully, the experiences and experiments I share in this article will help you build your own personal brand and lead to career opportunities, meaningful connections and industry recognition.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on personal branding. What strategies do you use to reach more people, and how do you network and market your work?

Original link: designmodo.com/personal-br…

Author Information: Tomas Laurinavicius Adventurous designer and entrepreneur from Lithuania. Editor-in-chief at Despreneur and Product Manager at Refe. Connect with me on Twitter @tomaslau.

Yesterday, I watched a documentary and looked up some written materials, which gave birth to the Plantagenet Dynasty a preliminary understanding of the Magna Carta. Here’s a rough comb for a reminder.

background

Magna Carta was born in the first half of the Plantagenet dynasty, which began in the 12th century and ended in the 14th century.

King Henry I of England had previously had no male living heirs, and his plans to pass the throne to his daughter Matilda were opposed by the barons. When Henry I died, power fell away and Mathilda’s cousin Stephen succeeded him. She planned to take back the throne, and the kingdom fell into a split, with each side holding part of the territory.

Mathilda had her own way. She married herself to The Count of Anjou. The young Count of Anjou acquired matilda’s vast armies, lands, and wealth, seized The Norman and occupied the kingdom’s territories on the Continent. Unfortunately, he died too young to reach England.

The earl of Anjou’s son, Henry II, adopted the same strategy as his father, making political marriages in exchange for territories to strengthen the Earl of Anjou’s position. Then he forced Stephen to declare him his heir. Stephen died soon after, and Henry II officially started the Plantagenet Dynasty. He liked to put a plantagenet in his hat, hence the name of the dynasty.

Henry ii

Henry II was a very capable king. He was very energetic and brave. Under his rule, the kingdom expanded and became one of the most powerful dynasties in European history. However, nothing good came of him, and he gradually came to the end of betrayal.

First his relations with Beckett, the Archbishop of Canterbury, soured, and for a time he expelled the bishop. Relations were eased and the archbishop was reinstated, but the bishop could not accept the supremacy of monarchical power over divine power, so the conflict remained. After a conflict between the two sides, Henry II made an angry remark, resulting in 4 knights “ordered” to assassinate the archbishop, Henry II had to go to the church to confess and accept the whipping.

His wife also disliked him and secretly turned his four sons against him, hinting that Henry was not giving them the rights they deserved. The elder two sons died prematurely. Richard, the third son, defeated Henry II with the help of his enemy, France, and succeeded in seizing power. He became known as Richard the Lionheart.

Richard the Lionheart

Richard the Lionheart did not last long on the throne, but his heart was not in England but on the Continent. During his reign, he participated in the Third Crusade against the Muslim world ruled by Saladin, in which he played a pivotal role.

King John

After the death of The Lionheart, his brother John, the fourth son of Henry II, succeeded in usurping the throne. He was a master of politics, but not of state. Under his rule, the war with France was lost and much of continental Europe was lost. He was also on bad terms with Pope Innocent III. After several conflicts, the Pope removed him as king, and John had to relinquish all power.

To save face, he led an army to the European continent to attack France, with the intention of regaining lost territory. Philip II of France, at the height of France’s military power, thwarted John’s attack. When he returned to England, he was immediately confronted by the aristocracy. Forced by the barons, John signed a series of articles guaranteeing the interests of the barons, and this is the main character of this history, magna Carta.

The magna carta

Magna Carta is not an exact law, and there is nothing great in its content. There are rules of principle, and there are trivial matters. But what was important was that for the first time the people of Europe realized that there could be one law for all, one that could check the power of the monarch. You know, none of the previous laws apply to royals.

John returned to his estates and immediately reversed himself and abolished the Magna Carta. He also had the support of the church, which thought it was an insult to the king’s authority.

When John died, his son Henry III succeeded him on condition that the Magna Carta be recognized. He negotiated with his nobles and ministers to make some cuts, and the Magna Carta survived as a form of modern law.

The latter

The relationship may seem complicated, but that’s European history. Unlike ancient Chinese history, Europe was in a state of division for a long time, with backward economy and low civilization in the middle Ages. The Kings of Europe had no more limited influence than their eastern counterparts. He had to contend with the Pope and the nobles and lords for his rights. The royal family is not sacrosanct, they are essentially a family in power.

It is precisely in such soil that contracts and laws are more likely to be born from mutual checks and balances, and become the germination ground of legal system.

As the documentary says, “The achievement of the Plantagenet King was to create something that didn’t need him.”

[Foreign Design Issue 121]

Over the past few years, user interaction has evolved so rapidly that designers can hardly keep up — leading to the adoption of interaction design techniques from other media (and even older app designs) when creating mobile apps.

It’s important to remember that interaction patterns and design change as the medium changes.

The first stage of this thinking can be seen in the transition from desktop computers with mouse and keyboard to Touch screens (Apple’s new 3D Touch is a more elaborate example). Every new device, environment, mode, and gesture brings opportunities and pitfalls, from entirely new modes of interaction to tiny details and trends.

Photo credit:Apple

It takes a lot of work just to understand them — let alone design for them — and here are a few things to avoid when designing mobile apps.

1. Users always need to create accounts

They don’t need it, and many times they don’t want it or need it.

As a developer, it’s easy to shut users out unless you solidify them into a database. But from a user’s point of view, it’s unglamorous.

Why do I have to register to find out what’s in there? The process is laborious and has to be worth it.

Instead, user data can be stored offline and transferred to an account when the user finally decides to create one. Alternatively, consider using “visitor” or “trial” mode, exposing core functionality (such as the Wunderlist below), showing application functionality, but with limited functionality, or watermarking.

Photo credit:Wunderlist

Once your app has proven its value, users will no doubt decide to sign up. Before that, it’s a bit much to ask.

2. Users need a tutorial that tells them how great your app is

Let them use it and show them how great your app is. Explaining how good it is is very weak. Also, users often skip and forget the boot page.

The user who reads all the instructions does not understand the entire lead page design.

If you absolutely need the user to pay full attention and navigate step by step (and some apps do), keep it as short as possible and present it with a help menu. This makes a lot more sense, even after the user has used it for a while.

Photo credit:UXCam

3. Don’t assume one size fits all

Even common interaction patterns should be evaluated according to the specific context of your application.

A common example is the “province” drop – down option in the address box. Since the name of a province can be written in several different forms, the standard predefined content drop-down menu makes sense. While this may be acceptable on the desktop (though debatable), drop-down menus are the worst option for mobile usability.

App interaction is also a great opportunity to emphasize the brand. There are some memorable brand “moments” in today’s apps, such as Twitter Bird when entering a news stream from a splash image, Snapchat’s animated profile image, and Hopper’s loading image (see # 5).

The point is that we shouldn’t be superstitious about tried-and-true methods. That’s not the only way to make our apps shine.

Hopper app loading screen.

4. App design and responsive Web design are the same thing

While responsive design is similar to mobile app design, there is a world of difference between designing for any device and designing for standalone apps.

Users expect specific interaction patterns and interface elements in mobile applications.

For example, iOS apps often have a “Back” button in the upper left corner to return to the previous screen. In a Web browser, the site itself does not need a back button; It is usually omitted because it is too similar to the browser itself.

While this is a very basic and obvious example, everything from menus and forms to “pop-ups” and font sizes vary slightly. What we do on the web is often a little awkward or crude in mobile apps — not necessarily because there’s something wrong with it, but because it’s different.

Photo source:TD Bank iOS appThe login andLinkedIn iOS appThe login

Compare the login screen for TD Bank iOS to LinkedIn iOS.

In the TD Bank iOS app, you’ll find their main UI elements made to look like the app, with a back button in the upper left corner and a menu at the bottom (in line with iOS). Instead of styling the login box itself (and the rest of the page’s content), as apps do. Input boxes have default iOS rounded corners and shadows, check boxes are very small, links are underlined, and there’s even a copyright notice in the UI. Lack of an application-specific feel.

By contrast, the LinkedIn iOS app does feel like an app, though not because of any particular design or interface element. It’s because they don’t package the web as an app. They’re designed for apps, not mobile web — we can see the difference.

5. “Load the wheel” is the right way to express loading and thinking

The default loading ICONS (such as the small dials on iOS, with gray lines emanating from the center point) seem to have negative connotations.

Not only do they come at an inopportune time, they are also a feature of mobile operating systems that indicate the state of everything. From powering up your device, to having problems connecting to wifi, or apps loading slowly.

For this reason, people hate to see a single wheel, with no indication or timeline.

Instead, try to make loading feel more natural — or even hide it. One way is to hint at content through placeholders, which is how Facebook shows the loading status of the timeline. You can also take advantage of this opportunity to get creative with loading indicators and information, such as adding whimsy to the interface or emphasizing the brand.

Photo credit: Facebook iOS app

6. Users blindly allow notifications when they first use it

Never rely on the operating system’s default Allow Notifications dialog box. This mindless design will trip up countless mobile designers. First, it doesn’t make it clear enough why an app needs permission to violate users’ privacy anytime, anywhere.

Instead, design a custom “allow notification” interface in your application.

Always tell your users how important your notifications are (show them examples if you can) and assure them that they won’t be bombarded with unnecessary spam.

Once users understand the value of app notifications, be careful to provide native, system-based pop-ups — they’ll see them right away and won’t mess things up.

Photo credit:peach.cool/

Peach, a well-publicized new app, does it perfectly.

Its first “Allow notifications” dialog looks a lot like a real iOS dialog (but it isn’t), and they reassure by explaining “why” notifications are needed. After clicking “Allow,” the user is presented with the actual iOS dialog box (which is much less useful by comparison).

Photo credit:peach.cool/

7 (and more)

People expect more from the interface, and the bar is rising.

For app-based companies, inappropriately ignoring details can hurt your app’s acceptance — and even damage your relationship with your users.

These six assumptions are just the beginning. If you want to go further, learn to be mindful and avoid everyday assumptions. Be careful not to assume you know what interface works best — always try to find the best solution.

To learn more about user experience design best practices, check out the Definitive User Experience Design Ebook collection 2016. This collection contains over 350 pages and over 300 examples of mobile design, user experience design, and web design.

Original link: studio.uxpin.com/blog/6-assu…

Author Information: Drew Thomas Drew Thomas is the chief creative officer and a co-founder of Brolik, a Philadelphia digital design agency. While Brolik is his focus, He also fails to find a “maker” and tinkers with all kinds of side projects, both digital and physical.

[Foreign Design Issue 120]

Predicting the future can be challenging for any designer in today’s fast-changing world of e-commerce. Cool today, out tomorrow! As a designer, if you want to create a smooth shopping experience for your customers and stay ahead of your competitors, you need to constantly evaluate the value of current trends.

If you’re building (or renovating) an online marketplace, you need to understand the current trends in e-commerce. Here’s a closer look at the hot e-commerce design trends that will dominate 2016.

1) Material Design

Material Design continues to prevail and is now widely adopted by e-commerce enterprises. The sharp, content-focused design style has been popular since its release in 2014 and will continue to be so. It is Material Design’s unified, tangible and joyful experience across devices and platforms that makes e-commerce sites so engaging.

Despite the daunting task of applying Material Design to online stores, some e-commerce companies have taken the risk and successfully adopted this Design style. PA Design and Bewakoof are two examples.

2) Hidden menu

Hidden menus, the most common variation of which is burger menus, have become hugely popular as a way to clean up clutter on e-commerce sites. They were originally designed for mobile, but are increasingly being used in desktop design as well.

In 2015, many online vendors used hidden navigation menus on large and small screens to save a lot of screen space, a trend that will continue to grow in the future. Hidden menus are now used in many well-known online stores, such as House of Fraser and EtQ.

3) Upward response

Responsive design was a fundamental element of most websites in 2016, but in addition to optimizing for mobile and tablets, designing for larger screen devices was also critical. Browsing and shopping on high-definition devices, such as TVS, is the trend.

More than 32 percent of Internet users own devices with 1,920 pixels or higher, illustrating how important it is to take those big screens into account. Throughout 2016, more e-commerce sites such as Firebox, Smythson and Burberry will focus on big-screen devices.

4) Rich animation

Animation is a great way to engage and communicate with customers, and many e-commerce sites are starting to incorporate it into their design to make the online shopping experience more enjoyable and fun. When used in the right place and timing, animations show your customers that you truly care about their experience.

In 2016, you’ll see more creative use of animations — such as button rotation, icon rotation and loading progress bars — to impress customers. Looking for inspiration? Look at Nixon, Fleet Feet Sports, and Fallen Hero. They all do a great job with animation.

5) Storytelling

In today’s competitive e-commerce world, only storytelling can set your brand apart. Presenting content in a unique and engaging way, a good story not only builds an emotional connection between a brand and its customers, but also increases loyalty and sales. In short, storytelling can bring brands back from the dead.

While it’s not easy for e-commerce sites to tell stories, many fast-growing e-commerce companies are practicing this strategy to their advantage. Two e-commerce sites make the most of storytelling, Bonobos and Greats.

6) Card design

Card-like layouts have gained popularity among designers in recent years, and there is no doubt that this trend will continue into 2016 and beyond. Firstly, because cards are one of the most important elements in Material Design; Second, because they work so well in responsive design.

The best thing about card layouts is that they are user-friendly. This allows you to organize your products so that visitors can see all the relevant information at once, but also effectively increase sales and make browsing easier if a product doesn’t fit. Rejuvenation and Lord & Taylor have both made cards to the utmost.

7) Large moving text

Content is king, of course, but how content is presented reflects how powerful it is! Like every other year, 2016 will be known for large, responsive text for all types of devices, from small-screen phones to large-screen desktop monitors.

To build a strong brand visual identity, text is crucial to attracting potential customers to your store, and a number of stores are keen to use this technique. AYR, Nasty Gal and Brdr. Kruger all make good use of large moving text.

8) Large background

Having considered large text, let’s consider large backgrounds. It’s one of the most intriguing web design trends of all time, so it’s no surprise that large, attractive product photos are widely used on e-commerce sites to make products more compelling to buy. Full-screen background images or videos give online stores a very clean, professional, stylish look, forcing potential customers to buy as soon as they enter the store.

While large backgrounds work great on the home page, they can also be used on product pages to immerse customers. Use immersive interactive images or videos on product details pages to make visitors feel like they own it before they click the buy button.

 

9) Dynamic search

Finally, I noticed a new design trend emerging, dynamic search. In 2016, many e-commerce sites will use JavaScript and Ajax-based search to dynamically present products. This technique is very successful, especially if you have a large and diverse product line.

The most intriguing example of an e-commerce site, JadoPado, uses this amazing technology. Go to their website, search for something, and you’ll see the dynamic changes in the products displayed on the page. Another great example of dynamic search is Stuart Weitzman.

The original link: www.webdesignerdepot.com/2016/01/9-e…

Author Information: AJEET YADAV Ajeet is a senior web developer at WordPressIntegration – PSD to WordPress service provider, where he is responsible for writing custom JavaScript code during the conversion process. In his spare time, he writes on different topics related to JavaScript, WordPress, and Web Design to share his work experience with others. You can follow WordPressIntegration on Facebook More articles by Ajeet Yadav

[Foreign Design Issue 119]

Has Web design lost its soul? Is responsive design to blame? My friend and colleague Noah Stokes raises these questions, which are, I have to say, a little alarmist. After all, the responsive web not only allows us to browse the web on an ever-growing array of connected devices, it also allows us to have fun.

As designers, our priority is to solve problems, which is probably more than anything else. Responsive web design is an excellent solution for creating virtual experiences that can be adapted to any device. But there are still a lot of problems to solve, especially how to make everything interesting and engaging. A single page of pure text can make a beautiful blog post, and a bunch of unrelated JPG images can make a professional portfolio.

The question then becomes: Can we achieve both?

What we get

There is no doubt that the Internet has become an aesthetic attraction. It has become standard to build simple, engaging websites based on a reliable grid layout. The reclamation of the Internet has been completed, and law and order, in the form of frames and movable grids, have taken over the soil and begun to reign peacefully.

All of these are good things. Simple and engaging site with obvious and rich advantages:

1. Familiar, easy to navigate (if done correctly).
2. Prototyping is (relatively) simple and fast.
3. A high degree of standardization of station construction techniques (assembly lines replacing artisans).
4. Fast layout saves a lot of money (which is likely to be passed on to consumers).
5. The strict grid layout promotes responsive design (which relies heavily on minimalist layout trends).

walkAwwwardsThere are hundreds of websites on display in these web design galleries that meet the standard of simplicity and charm. (To view a larger version)

It is no exaggeration to say that standardization and its associated technologies are of great significance. Countless individuals and small businesses have benefited by sharing their brands with the world through simple, engaging (but not unique) websites. But that’s only one thing.

What we’ve lost

Take personal behavior into account, and today’s professional sites generally look great. Take an obscure designer portfolio site and compare it to the best design agency sites of ten years ago, and you’ll admit that we’ve gotten a lot better at web design. Look around, however, and it is easy to conclude that everything seems to be converging.

Have designers lost their pioneering spirit? Is convenience at the expense of creativity? Before we answer these questions, let’s look at what causes the lack of diversity in web design today.

Why do sites all look the same

If you look at the web today, what’s driving assimilation? Who is to blame? As it turns out, there is no simple tool or method to blame. Responsive design may help, but it is only one of many factors. Here are some of the suspects.

layout

Limited layout ideas are one of the main and most obvious reasons for the lack of diversity on a website. When you strip away color, animation, visual scrolling, and similar effects, you’ll notice some basic principles of web layout. How many websites are tweaked around these five layouts?

5 common site layouts. (To view a larger version)

This is what Noah was referring to when he lamented that “rules are everywhere.” We seem to have stagnated, and unique layouts have become a lost art.

Responsive Web design

In the old days, you could make sure that all visitors to your website were browsing on a low-res desktop screen. These days, websites that perform well at all sizes and resolutions are not a luxury, but a necessity. A wide, flexible, scalable basic grid system makes responsive web design more manageable than random layouts.

The framework

Web design frameworks may speed up the design and development process. For many people, they are the safest and fastest way to build cross-browser responsive web pages. As a bonus, they also take care to keep the content brief, covering all common elements, from buttons to forms. The incredible popularity of tools like Bootstrap and Foundation has led thousands of web designers to use exactly the same codebase, layout, and even aesthetic for each of their projects.

Prototyping tools and design processes

Even in the process of starting from scratch, the design process consciously stifles creativity. Most prototyping tools encourage, and perhaps even force, you to use standardized box elements, strictly following a web layout.

Many prototyping tools encourage the use of a regular grid layout structure. (To view a larger version)

Hd free photos with pics

Access to beautiful, free design resources has never been easier. Convenience and affordability reign supreme, as designers flock to free photo sites to tap into a small (but growing) pool of the same resources.

Two free photos. (To view a larger version)

How many websites have you seen in the past two years that have used one of these photos (or both)? If you check websites regularly, I bet there are dozens.

The Village StyleandJigglist;College Essay GuyandGet Busy Make Money(To view a larger version)

It’s not just photos, it’s ICONS, fonts, design patterns, etc. On the plus side, designers with no budget can create beautiful websites; Too bad all the other designers are doing the same thing with the same resources.

Design trends

For some designers, “trend” is a dirty word. But it shouldn’t be derogatory. Look for a decade in the 20th century and see the design trends of that decade. You’ll find it fascinating. It gave the era a unique style and personality, often reflecting the entire cultural environment. Even if you can’t see it, it’s happening at work. Everything you see and experience influences your behaviour, and the Internet has magnified this effect as never before. As a result, many designers draw inspiration from the same sources and follow the same trends.

We designers

Each of the tools and resources listed above is extremely valuable. They simplify work, open up web design and development to more people, and save customers money. I don’t mess with them. I pick them carefully. If I had to look for the culprit destroying the diversity of web design, I would raise my hand and it would be me. I don’t think every project deserves a unique design, and I take my hat off to all the designers who try something interesting.

It’s important to know that you can still create unique designs with all of these resources. It all depends on how you use the tools.

How to challenge the status quo

Now you know if your site has a unique design. Maybe you don’t care — that’s perfectly fine. But if you want to break the standard workflow, here are some concepts that can help you do it, and some websites that make great examples.

Bizarre layout

Turn off your prototyping tools, get out a pen and paper, and think about how you can create a layout that is fun and useful, away from what you used to do.

Phases Magazine

Phases Magazine is a great example of making bold changes in layout. There are rules — there are grids — but they somehow create a completely different experience from standard sites (screenshots don’t give you a good feel, be sure to open them for yourself). If you look at this and think, “Wow, that’s weird,” then great! That’s what they want. Some people will love it, some people will hate it, but WHAT I love is that they are trying to make a difference.

Phases MagazineAn unconventional grid was used. (To view a larger version)

Unfortunately, the overall experience of the site is terrible. There is unnecessary scrolling, ostensibly responsive layout, but badly out of order at some sizes.

The Phases Magazine layout is completely out of order on the small screen. (To view a larger version)

Curious Space

A better use of this concept is Curious Space.

Curious SpaceThe layout. (To view a larger version)

The grid also has a natural, casual feel, but the scrolling is normal and responsive breakpoints work well.

Curious SpaceAdapt to different equipment. (To view a larger version)

As you navigate the site, you’ll notice a lot of nice little design details. For example, mouse-hovering affects the order in which images are stacked.

Hovering will bring the content to the front. (To view a larger version)

Also, scrolling is a little fun, but at least it doesn’t mess things up and fits in with the site’s casual visual theme. The logo starts out as a jumble of letters that move into place as the page scrolls, forming a “Curious Space” in the navigation bar.

As you scroll, the letters of the logo fall into place. (To view a larger version)

Le Temps D’un Trajet

Le Temps d ‘un Trajet is another interesting example. Here again we see non-standard grids, but the layout is not scattered but deliberately clustered.

Le Temps d’un trajetHome page layout. (To view a larger version)

Each square in the array is a still picture, and hovering over it becomes a short video. But what’s cool is that the mesh changes smoothly with focus.

Video demonstration of change effect

Don’t be boxy

One way to create a special atmosphere for your site is to think outside the box. It sounds boring, but when you open your mind to other geometries, things get interesting.

Built By Buffalo

Built By BuffaloIt uses a hexagonal layout. (To view a larger version)

Look at the hive Built By Built By Buffalo. The gallery design is not mobile-friendly, so they simply become rectangles at a break point. This is a perfect example of making a unique design at the right time, but also knowing where the boundaries are and how they should be scaled back to provide the best user experience.

At narrower dimensions, the layout becomes rectangular. (To view a larger version)

Anakin Design Studio

The recently seen Anakin Design Studio is one of my favorites in the series. Not only is the layout beautiful and unexpected, but the shapes used on today’s websites are far beyond what you would expect.

Anakin Design StudioThe home page. (To view a larger version)

As you can see, the large, masked text is impressive. But beyond that, scroll down the page to see their most recent work. Many designers would have finished with simple rows of rectangular thumbnails, but Anakin played with the shape to make it more appealing. They are still rectangular images, but with a white background they create the illusion of many shapes.

Anakin Design Studio’s portfolio. (To view a larger version)

Avex Designs; Mathilde Jacon

Other sites use unexpected and experimental shapes.

Avex DesignsandMathilde JaconUnconventional shapes are used to create a unique experience. (To view a larger version)

That comes to life

Fixate; For Better Coffee

Sites like Fixate and For Better Coffee combine illustration with natural elements, with dense layouts to create strong, impressive experiences.

FixateandFor Better CoffeeAn illustrated layout is used to make them eye-catching. (To view a larger version)

The layout above looks complicated just because of the illustration; In fact, illustrations can be removed easily. In a world lost in cookie-cutter, boxy thumbnails, tailor-made illustrations are a great way to convey a unique brand personality.

For Better Coffee uses fun animations that scroll along the page and follow the beans through the Coffee making process. The experience is fluid, the page doesn’t stick to a specific location, and scrolling becomes a feature of storytelling.

As the page scrolls, the beans fall into the grinder. (To view a larger version)

Roll further down and the fresh coffee will pour into the cup. (To view a larger version)

HappyFunCorp

Since we’re talking about great illustration sites, HappyFunCorp is a good place to look.

At first, it looks like a normal website with animations. And when you do that, amazing things happen. The scene of the home page is the basis for all other pages, and when you click on a link, instead of loading a new page, you zoom in to see details somewhere in the scene.

Click the link to zoom in for details. (To view a larger version)

It’s kind of weird, but I like the creative thinking. And because navigation is still presented in a standard way, there is no learning burden for the user. The whole experience is a little unexpected, but it doesn’t conflict with normal interaction on the site.

Differentiated experience

We have a basic expectation for our users. We want every visitor on the same site to have the same experience. If you want to do something different, you can forget about it. Not only does the Vasilis van Gemert site use a unique stacked block layout, it also presents a different color scheme for each visitor.

Vasilis van Gemert websiteThree different color schemes. (To view a larger version)

This creative feature also extends to all sub-pages.

Child pages also change color schemes. (To view a larger version)

Create a unique visual theme

Another way to create a unique website is to take an interesting or engaging theme and use it as a baseline for all design decisions. This provides a good guide for all your actions and encourages you to explore the world outside of your traditional UI.

While not suitable for all sites (such as government sites), it can be refreshing for event announcements or small business pages. DConstruct 2015’s new website is a great example of this.

dConstruct 2015Part of the site is retro futuristic design. (To view a larger version)

As you can see, they’ve created a retro-futuristic vibe that pays homage to the Jetsons. You’ll be very happy to scroll through the entire site and want to see how they present the various parts of the site.

A design detail from dConstruct. (To view a larger version)

This site has a lot of great details to note. For one thing, the headline is extremely retro, combining Lamplighter Script and Andes.

But the best part is that these are actual web fonts, reoriented with a simple CSS slant. Diagonal lines are used throughout the site to help create unity and creativity.

Be creative with your unique web fonts and make all text selectable. (To view a larger version)

This site is a perfect example of how responsive design doesn’t have to be boring. The layout doesn’t feel boxy or typical, but it still fits well in a variety of sizes. I actually like how creative they are with the small screen. For example, as the screen size shrinks, the ticket image below is animated from horizontal to vertical bars. It’s a small detail, but very clever, and reflects how much care they put into every aspect of the layout.

On a narrow screen, the ticket is flipped from horizontal to vertical. (To view a larger version)

I take my hat off to Clearleft for creating this masterpiece.

Use copyright material as an input, not as an end result

I work for Creative Market and OF course I love working with good copyrighted images, fonts, photos, etc. High quality copyright resources can greatly help every designer’s work, but how to use them needs to be considered carefully. Whether you’re using interesting vector art, an icon set, or an entire website theme, consider going the extra mile to make sure your work doesn’t look exactly like everyone else’s. Most people download those resources and don’t bother with even a little customization, so a little goes a long way.

The problem with unique websites

It can be hard to find unique sites that are awesome. I spent many hours searching for this article and found only a handful to show for it. I have found that there is an overwhelming tendency for designers who really want to pursue unique web design to produce a site with an unreliable user experience.

Experimentation is good, but if a site’s weird, unpredictable, unpleasant experience confuses users, it often misses the point. Instead, many of these sites take a step back and give us a flash-era experience: too long loading, too flashy animations, leaping scrolling, and complex user flows. There is a trade-off that allows you to create beautiful, unique-looking sites without completely subverting the interaction.

Live web design

Standardized, predictable design will always have a place on the web. In fact, they may be best suited for displaying all kinds of content on all kinds of screens. That is, we need to pit our creative instincts against our rational instincts, over and over again.

Let’s do our part to preserve what the Internet has always been: a place where technology, art and design intersect in new and interesting ways. Become a trailblazer and try to do things you’ve never seen before — and of course, make lots of mistakes along the way. It’s great to create something exotic every now and then, even if it’s hated by everyone else. That’s how this crazy thing called the Internet was built, and that’s how we’re driving it.

Finally, despite the fact that a lot of websites look the same, I don’t believe that web design stagnates. This community continues to evolve with countless talented designers creating incredible websites. But the topic remains widely debated. I’d like to hear your thoughts on the current state of web design and who you think is doing the most interesting work.

The original link: www.smashingmagazine.com/2015/07/hun…

Author Information: Joshua Johnson Josh Johnson is the Product Manager for Creative Market. He’s also a writer, designer, and photographer, and currently lives in Phoenix.

[Foreign Design Issue 118]

Pantone’s 2016 “Color of the Year” is a stunning combination of rose pink and serenity blue.

This pastel palette is likely to be a trend for the coming year. As Pantone has done in years past, these colors often serve as benchmarks for design, fashion and other projects. For some designers, pastel colors can be tricky to work with. Today, however, we’ll look at ways to make the most of these colors in a project.

Rose pink and Serenity blue

Pantone has been choosing colors of the year since 2000, and most of them are bright — from marsala red last year, emerald green in 2013 and Iris blue in 2008. So this year’s color release was somewhat of a surprise, as it included two pastel colors that together made up this year’s color of the year.

Here’s how Pantone defined this year’s colors:

“People relentlessly seek positivity and happiness to relieve the pressures of modern society. To this end, we very need to usher in a can give people spiritual comfort and stability of color. The combination of rose pink and serenity blue creates a natural balance between warm rose tones and cool serenity blue, symbolizing connection and wellness, as well as soothing order and peace.

“The popular combination of rose pink and serenity blue challenges the traditional perception of color associations.

“In fashion, there is a de-gendered movement going on around the world, which is also affecting other areas of design one by one through trends in colour. “This uniformity of color caters to many social realities: gender equality and mobility, people are more accustomed to using color as a means of expression, and in an age where we don’t have to worry about sameness or judgment, the open exchange of digital information has opened our eyes to the rich use of color.”

Rose powder

Rose powder is a light pink, a color that is easily associated with little girls and new life.

• Pantone: 9281 C
• RGB: 242 R, 221 G, 222 B
• CMYK: 0 C, 14 M, 9 Y, 0 K
• HTML: F2DDDE

Quiet blue

Serenity blue is a light blue with a slight purple tinge.

• Pantone: 7451 C
• RGB: 137 R, 171 G, 227 B
• CMYK: 46 C, 23 M, 0 Y, 0 K
• HTML: 89ABE3

With these color samples, you can apply this color concept to various types of projects. You don’t have to stick to first impressions (both are popular hair colors, for example). Use these colors, or variations of them (as you’ll see in the examples below), and have fun!

Background background

Pantone’s colors this year serve as a good backdrop. This color combination is easy to find in nature. If you photograph a sunset glow, you’ll see it’s full of pinks and blues. Use it as a background shade and you can maximize the natural environment with this color.

Thanks to their soft nature, these two colors also work well as background colors because the colors blend into the background and don’t distract from the foreground and images.

The Camper example above demonstrates the use of rose powder and serenity blue. Notice the nice gradient between the two colors, which brings out the dog image in front. This color creates a peaceful vision that complements and does not interfere with the white dog.

Image and color overlay

The easiest way to use these colors is to use them on the main screen. From photographs to illustrations, rose pink and Serenity blue can be incorporated into the design without feeling stilted. The example above shows how gorgeous this color combination can be in photographs (Nebraska City) or in more artistic color representations (Kata Farkas).

Another option is to use this hue to create a warm or cool color overlay. Holiday Memories’ website expertly uses pink tones to cover up the entire image, with blue text to match. Thanks to the photo manipulation and cool color of the text, this combination is very attractive. The colors harmonize to create a Yin and Yang effect that feels just right.

Emphasize elements

Often, when you’re considering red as a button color, a softer color might be the right choice. Pastel colors can also be used for button designs, especially if the button element or call to action is too large. The blue button, on the other hand, is ubiquitous, making it easy to change the color to quiet blue.

Another interesting way to do this is to pick pantone’s color of the year, combine it with the gradient color it’s derived from, and use it on buttons and other elements.

These colors can be used for text elements (especially on a dark background) or for links and bold text, depending on the overall aesthetic. Note the use of several similar pink and blue elements on the site above, including small paw prints on the left side of the text.

Variation of color

While you can’t wait to use these colors in your project, they may not be suitable for every situation. All the more reason to use variants. Consider adding black for a darker look, or white for a softer tone.

That’s what’s interesting about the color of the Year, to see where this trend is taking us. The ultimate direction is entirely up to you. You don’t have to stick to the exact color scheme to jump on the bandwagon, you can experiment and create something of your own.

A group of Design inspirations from Design Shack Gallery

The Design Shack Gallery is filled with examples — and a color search — to see what other people have done with the colors. Here are some projects to help you think about how to use pink and blue.

Byanise

Appon Calendar

Mel Louie

Melodrama Boutique

FForever

NeatFolio

Dockpop

conclusion

The color of the Year gives us a window into the future and lets us witness the trends of the coming year. It’s up to you to apply them to your project, but dare to think outside the box and use them in unconventional ways. (This is the unconventional color of the Year.)

Feel free to create and then show your work at Design Shack Gallery.

The original link: designshack.net/articles/gr…

Author Information: Carrie Cousins Carrie is the chief writer at Design Shack, with years of experience in web and graphic design. Sports fanatic. Information junkie. Designer. True-believer in karma.

A few days ago, I accepted an interview with UI China. In order to make it easier for you to understand Coke Orange, I moved it to my blog intact. The following is the text of the interview:

Review images

Interview: UI Jun navel beautiful young &

One hundred thousand Why, also known as Cola Orange, UI China member, one of the core members of IFEC translation team, releases UI design translation every week. Welcome to UI China website www.ui.cn, enter the 100,000 why personal homepage (i.ui.cn/ucenter/938…) Read UI Design Translation!

The process of interviewing Coke Orange was a bit like the situation that parents would invite some college students to tutor their children one-on-one at home before the college entrance examination. Of course, he’s the teacher and I’m the student. He answers questions and he tells you why.

As a curious person, he also enjoys what curiosity brings to him, which is the motivation to continue exploring the world and dare to try new things to make himself better.

“If you stay in your own world for too long, how can you change your life?”

This is him, a person who speaks in a systematic way, gives people a sense of steadiness and steadiness. He is not impatient and focuses on his own things, and he is an active person who loves life. Such a person will succeed in everything he does.

UI China: Introduce yourself

Why: I am actually half a science youth, not that way of literature and art. There is a special cult of the natural and social sciences.

One of my hobbies is reading science fiction and movies to think about the future society and life in the future. I am also a heavy pragmatist, in fact, do not say that others can not recognize the designer. For example, I don’t dress very well, haha ~

Graduated from Hangzhou Normal University majoring in electronic information, engaged in design work for more than 5 years. At first, I did graphic design, and then I turned to web front-end for a short period of time, and then I really entered the Internet industry. For about two or three years I did web design and front-end work at the same time. During this period, I also kept learning, the only thing worth mentioning is that I started to change my personal website many times and kept writing in it.

UI China: Most of the coke orange we know is based on translation of high quality foreign languages, what is the reason for the beginning of such an interest? Under what circumstances was the first article translated and what problems were encountered on the way?

Why: Sort of serendipitous.

Peers share information and information with each other. One of my friends sent me a design article, which I liked very much. At the end of the article, I found that the article was translated.

Then curious baby burst out, found its original source, found that the design of articles there is very high quality, the same day to choose a translation.

The first translation was horrible. I had to read the original twice to understand it. The third time while looking over, stuck countless times. After reading the translation again, it was still terrible to see. It took three nights to polish and revise the wording.

But the translation is very interesting, and I like to write things, and then I didn’t think much about it, because of inertia, stick to it, anyway, the frequency of a week is not high.

UI China: What is the driving force of long-term translation? Have you ever wanted to give up after persisting for so long?

Why: After persisting for 3 or 4 weeks, I began to feel that the speed and quality of translation had been significantly improved. I thought there would be no problem if I persisted for a long time, so I began to seriously think about the significance of this matter.

Four things come to mind:

First, I like to write, which can ensure that I am in the process of writing and organizing language for a long time, which is a kind of daily training.

Second, in the process of selecting the original text every week, there can be discoveries and harvest, which is also meaningful to the design.

Third, I quite like English, although the level is average, but DO not want to waste, this is a good way to keep contact with English; Fourthly, I realized this relatively late, that after the article slowly began to have readers, I would know many peers, exchange harvest, and make like-minded friends.

Adhere to a period of time, these 4 points have been confirmed.

However, the translation project can also be stopped. If I leave the design industry one day, or feel that I am outdated, I will not be able to properly understand some concepts and ideas in the industry, and I will not be able to guarantee the quality of the translation.

Coke Orange in a year

Review images

UI China: You wrote oneHow to translate the UI design article behind the story to shareWhy do you do that?

Why: In addition to translation, I write articles and everything when I am free (although less now, but later will recover, I will be busy for a long time).

The story behind this translation is just one of a variety of self-entertaining anecdotes. Writing is a lot like designing. Ideas change and grow as you write. Originally just want to write a little bit simple, write to write more than you want to become such a detailed translation manual.

UI China: How do you view the UI design environment?

One hundred thousand why: Put it simply in four words: return to reason.

It’s December 2015, and I personally feel that this is the precipitating stage of UI design.

The last few years, the last decade or so, have been really spectacular, especially with smart mobile devices coming out of development. The picture of emerging industries is like the Big Bang: the whole industry is thriving.

But this kind of pioneer prosperity does not last long. It takes time to cool off, to settle, to reflect, and then to usher in a new, true prosperity. It can be seen that the industry is less and less discussing empty concepts, there are more and more criticism of the showy design, and more and more attention is paid to the return of design, return to the product and business itself, to serve them, rather than an independent existence.

That’s how I feel about the UI industry right now.

UI China: As a UI designer, what makes UI design different from other designs and why?

Why: I feel that as a design that exists in a virtual world, it is fundamentally different from other designs.

Prints, industrial products, architecture, clothing, etc., all have to be embodied in a product, and once the product has been produced and sold, it can no longer be controlled.

The UI is an evolving, ever-changing design. UI design can be more closely integrated into the business, can change faster, and work differently and think differently. For example, we can accept temporary imperfection, which alone is enough to distinguish the UI from other designs.

UI China: Are many people changing careers or doing UI design? What do you think? Do you have any suggestions or suggestions from someone who has been there?

100 thousand why: Good phenomenon, join more people, easier to promote the progress of UI industry. It’s a trend that can’t be stopped, and I’ve moved from other designs.

Here are some suggestions:

1. Use the Internet. Search is not just about typing a keyword and hitting enter, nor is it limited to search engines. The Internet is bigger than you think when it comes to finding the knowledge you need in the spirit of human flesh search.
2. Be curious. That is, ask why often, or even whisper it. Over the years you will develop the habit of saying to yourself, “Why? Why is that?” Then the heart will really question a lot of things, and then use the first way to find the answer.
3. Be kind to others. There will always be some unhappy things, often caused by people. Get along well with people and keep a good temper. Nothing good will come of doing things with emotion, and nothing valuable will be gained.

UI China: working in BAT or starting a business, which state do you prefer?

Why: Ali has been there for less than a year, and it certainly feels great. Seeing these very professional colleagues, I feel a lot more professional. Moreover, ali Hangzhou Xixi Park canteen is really good ah, now I often miss.

Despite the failure of the first startup project, after the experience of starting a business. I like the startup atmosphere more, maybe more life.

This has something to do with the fact that I am a pragmatist. For example, in a large company, everything that can be done according to the norms should be done as much as possible according to the norms. But in a startup, it’s a wild path, and you can do whatever works, and that’s a very interesting piece of wisdom. The state of starting a business is completely different from my previous work, and I grow much faster, which changes my view of learning itself.

Take design for example, so many kinds of advanced tools, it seems that all are very cattle ah, all can greatly improve the work efficiency. If I used to, it must be one by one to learn all over, regardless of whether to use later.

But in the startup team, I found that I didn’t have the energy to learn everything, and the strategy was forced to change. Just know where it is and what it can do. Improvise when you need to use it. And I feel like this is the right way to learn.

UI China: If you were not a UI designer, what would you like to do, or what would you most like to do in the future?

Why: Other creative jobs like carpenters, cooks, sound designers, etc.

I don’t have any big plans for the future. Just live your life now and try to maintain your health. What if you can travel around the world in the future?

UI China: Can you show us your workstation?

A hundred thousand why:

Review images

Finally ~

Talked about why he started his own website. Colachan.com came into being because of the encouragement of colleagues in order to find a better job and the utilitarian drive.

However, due to personal reasons, this garden gradually became his private garden. The contents were carefully repaired by the owner but blossomed naturally, with sunshine and rain sometimes, simple and fragrant. Those who visited in twos and threes naturally understood the master’s intention.

In his words: “That’s when the meaning of design comes out.”

[Foreign Design Issue 117]

As a UX designer, it’s important to return to your love of art and design. Especially when you’re looking for ideas.

There are many reasons. Maybe we work too fast and too hard, and we’re exhausted. Or it could be that you live in an environment that stifles creativity and have to contend with a lot of resistance every day. Or you may become a routine performer without realizing it, doing the same thing over and over again. Or maybe you’re just bored.

The design process gives you confidence to innovate, because ideas are born and evolved in a predictable way.

Your process should not be static; each project has its own constraints. Whether it’s resources or skills, your design process must change with these real constraints.

Below, I’ve compiled 10 tips for improving the design process, based on my own experience throughout my career.

1. Identify the problem before looking for a solution

Einstein said, “If I had an hour to solve a problem, I would spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and five minutes thinking about the solution.”

Many designers make the fatal mistake of thinking the problem is obvious. Most of the time, superficial problems are just a symptom of the underlying problem. When you find the real problem, you will be enlightened, because it will solve many other problems at the same time.

Free ebook web UI best practices mentioned to “How do we…” As the starting point of the design project, start thinking about the design. Remember, make sure you’re designing the right product first, then you’re designing the right product.

2. Know your users like the back of your hand

One developer once told me she was building a product for “everyone.” This may make sense for mass production, but you can’t create meaningful user scenarios without specifying a specific class of users.

Without a meaningful user story, you don’t know what your MVP(minimum form product) is or how to build a product plan and strategy. All products are designed to solve trivial problems that are easy to understand for those who need them.

Initiate user research, create personas, and start developing user stories and processes. Anything that impresses the user more will help make the design a success.

3. Think of extreme solutions

Part of the fun of design is to escape the creative dilemma for a while. Unconstrained opportunity is always worth celebrating.

Breaking the rules is in its interest. Thinking outside of a single strategy, write a user’s day on a storyboard and see what contacts are possible. Throw out the draft and play with it.

Don’t spend weeks on it (unless you have plenty of time), but a creative pause will connect your subconscious mind to the problem to be solved.

Take a look at Duolingo. The app feels more like a mobile game than a language learning platform. This is completely unconscious and might be questioned in theory, but the numbers bear out its value — the company was valued at $470 million in A June 2015 Google Capital call.

Look outside your industry for inspiration, and design solutions can be surprisingly effective (and creative).

4. Before designing, create a hypothesis to test

Hypotheses provide a way to find the truth. Every design has to be built on some solid foundation.

Think of it as the thesis argument, and that’s the core of the design. Long before development work, this was where the user story was performed.

Brainstorm as many scenarios as possible and share them with your team on the whiteboard. Conduct a design studio exercise in which participants draw their plans for completing a specific task. You need to constantly explore (and iterate) your hypothesis, which is the first step in design.

For a useful framework process, see Maximilian Wambach’s approach to Interaction Design at Ebay. The “if [action] then [result], because [user has a need/problem]” mindset is extremely useful.

5. Discuss the best solution with different people

If your design is solid, it should be able to withstand criticism and discussion. People with different backgrounds and experiences can guide you to a better solution.

Consider forming a think tank of stakeholders to share their unique perspectives and suggest improvements to your design. Work with your design lead to ensure that the product team still has the final say, or you can fall into the trap of crowd design.

Document to create a story

Produce a document that tells the story. The personas you create are microcosm of their personality. The usage scenario is the key part of the screen display, the wireframes are the stage, the operation flow and user flow are the choreography, and the UI component set is the stage design.

All the relevant elements blend together.

Documentation is often overlooked because it lacks context. Think of your design resources and output as jigsaw pieces that are worth little when they stand on their own, but together make a great picture that tells a story.

Don’t focus too narrowly on optimizing a single design document. Instead, make sure that the associations between each document are easy to understand.

Simplify documents that don’t move the design forward. If the document is useless, there is no need to create it.

7. Design and test on paper

Quick paper prototyping can be done at any stage, and it always helps with design decisions.

Give yourself or your team time to iterate on ideas quickly. Once a design is in pixel form, it’s easy to overrely on it. Drawing a prototype on paper keeps your brain exploring possibilities.

Photo credit:”App sketching”

Sketching is good for exploring ideas, and then gathering 3-5 people for a quick, informal usability test.

Once you have a design that you think is solid, test it out with a virtual workflow. Have a partner work out different scenarios with you so you can remind each other of omissions and potential errors. Once your partner understands how the design works, he can play the role of a “human computer” to manipulate the paper prototypes during usability testing.

8. Attach the product to the wall

It may be a cliche to post lots of notes on your wall, but there are very good reasons for doing so.

Photo credit:Acquity GroupThe diagram of

Think of all those detective dramas. When the detective is on the case, the walls turn into crime maps. All witnesses and suspects are displayed along with the evidence collected.

The same thing happens when you design for a specific user. Like a detective, the USER experience designer needs to locate the connection between the problem and the user, and then connect it directly to the solution. The actual output is not for display. The team has a sharing place that can be viewed at any time, helping to instill a USER experience approach into everyone’s workflow.

9. Create low-fidelity prototypes for testing

Low-fidelity prototypes can be created using basic HTML, Keynote, PPT, papercuts, storyboards, and specific prototyping tools such as UXPin (which I’m very familiar with).

Once you enter the development phase, certain limitations are inevitable (browser compatibility, site performance, and so on). Validate your design before you develop it, because it will better represent the user story and make developers feel and understand it.

Low-fidelity prototypes allow you to connect multiple wireframes to create a complete flow. That way, you can test the effectiveness of the process, not just what the user sees on the screen. You can verify that the order of interactions is valid for the user.

10. Collaborative creation

Designers are not islands. People often work too long alone.

Just as pair programming has been shown to reduce technical errors (because it’s easy to get stuck in code blind spots), try Cooper’s pair design technique for better analysis and iteration. Working with others creates motivation for self-improvement, a sense of teamwork, and a balance between productivity and sharing.

It’s a pretty old-fashioned idea that good design can only be done in isolation from other people. The idea is as anachronistic as smoking in the office. Follow the guide: Design Visuals that Aren’t Developer-hating, and your project can be fun and collaborative.

Are you ready to create your own design process?

Start with a USER experience design flow map, then practice in a tool like UXPin and design alongside your team.

Original link: designmodo.com/design-proc…

Author Information: Jerry Cao is a content Strategist at UXPin — the Wireframing and prototyping app — where he develops in-app and online content for the wireframing and prototyping platform.

[Foreign Design Issue 116]

Mobile design teaches us to design small, and now wearables are making it even smaller. Watch design may sound scary, but by going back to the basics of design theory, you can make the right choice.

When it comes to wearable design, there are a number of unique challenges.

Screens are small, even tiny, and there are many different wearable devices in fashion. (Watch-like products have been hitting the market for years.) Some offer color screens and rich features, while others have super-simple aesthetics and robust features.

All kinds of different wearable devices

From simple health-tracking devices to fully functional watches that sync with your phone’s system, there are many variations to consider when designing these small-screen interfaces.

Photo source:Apple Watch

Photo source:Tom Tom Multi-Sport

Photo source:Fitbit Surge

Currently, we can see that there are three main types of wearable devices:

Each device has a screen just a few centimeters wide, making the watch’s UI design a particular challenge. Some devices have color screens and animation support. Many have the capabilities of a phone, while others are still limited to white-lettered displays on a black background (there are also white-lettered ones).

Apply UI design theory

So how do you design all these devices? And how to be consistent?

It all comes back to your first design project and the design theories and concepts involved. These concepts include color, contrast, white space, and fonts.

color

Most watch screens these days are black, and many watch apps use bright colors on dark backgrounds. This makes it especially important to choose colors that blend in with the environment and are clear and striking.

Dealing with a dark background means that Design elements are based on a light or light color scheme, which brings to mind Flat color scheme and Material Design.

Photo source:Runtastic

In the image above, Runtastic does a great job, with bright hues that are easy to see against a dark background. Blue helps show the brand, while a more vibrant green is used for buttons and user actions. All colors are easy to identify, which plays a positive role in design and function.

contrast

Contrast is also important on the small screen.

The design should clearly divide elements and establish a lot of division between them. This is especially important when there are multiple click areas on the screen. Another important reason is that it makes elements easy to see at a glance, which is how many watch users use them.

Photo source:Streaks

In the image above, Streaks uses light and shade to create significant contrast and improve readability and operability. Each ring is designed to be clickable and the function is clearly visible, thanks to the color and size used to make each element stand out.

White space

On the small screen, white space is the difference between success and failure. Too much white space means there’s no place to show content. White space is too few elements to distinguish and read. There is only a narrow area between the two extremes that is good for functionality and usability.

Photo source:The Guardian

In the picture above, the Guardian is doing a good job. The placement of images and text leaves plenty of space, and only one message is displayed on each screen. The message contains both text and pictures. Note the number of words per line and the increased line spacing.

The font

On these tiny screens, only one font is useful: the simple font.

Almost all applications on the market use simple sans serif fonts with medium weight (some thinner or thicker fonts are used as an aid). The size is usually bigger than you think. Each line contains about 20 letters and no more than 6 lines per “screen”. A little more text and it would be hard to read.

Image credit: Citymapper*

In the image above, Citymapper uses several different levels of text to establish a reliable hierarchy of actions. The font is simple and the text is clear. The watch app combines all the elements — colors, contrasts, white space, and good fonts — to help users sort out the most important information.

Simplicity, simplicity and micro-interaction are equally important when it comes to wearable devices. Mix them together and you have a product that looks (and works) great on a small screen.

Photo source:Pittsburgh Steelers App

The Pittsburgh Steelers app above combines all of these elements, using lots of color and images to make the app attractive and easy to use. Content and information are functional because of the amount of white space and contrast between elements, as well as the legible action items.

What’s next?

When we talk about wearables, we’re really learning best practices for wearables and working with all the specific ideas for UI design.

While many wearable interfaces are native, can we incorporate more web and other apps into them? Most designers follow existing tools. Can the two be combined?

Isn’t it time to think about different ways we can use wearable devices?

Ask everyone, and it seems they have their own reasons and purposes for using wearables. But for now, wearable devices linked to phones seem to be just an extension of the phone itself. We hope that will change one day, but it’s unclear whether users will be able to browse the Web on their phones.

Photo source:7-Minute Workout

When will wearable apps move beyond native apps?

We started talking about mobile-first design not too long ago. It is now the first principle.

Could this happen with wearables, too? It’s hard to say. The market may become saturated before the industry moves in that direction. (Fitbit and Apple Watch are expected to dominate wearables, generating 2.5 million to 6 million watches sold. That compares with an estimated 9.4 million iPhone users.)

conclusion

Basic design principles exist for a reason. Using these concepts can create effective designs regardless of device size. This is not to say that every “rule” of UI design theory should be adhered to.

Experiment, experiment, but listen to the little voices in your head. When you start to question usage and design — no matter how small — it’s time to go back to your roots. And test it with users.

Focus diagram source:Forbes

The original link: studio.uxpin.com/blog/think-…

Author Information: Carrie Cousins Carrie Cousins has more than 10 years experience in the media industry, including design, editing, and writing for print and online publications. Carrie is also a sports fanatic and spends way too much time planning football and basketball trips and obsessing over stats.

[Foreign Design Issue 115]

Since iOS7 was released in 2013, the flat design has taken the Internet by storm. Since then, it has continued to flourish and developed an astonishing number of variations.

With the introduction of the Google Material Design specification with flat colors, the widespread adoption of card designs, and the overwhelming trend toward extreme simplicity, it seems that flat design will be the dominant style for the foreseeable future.

As the 2015 and 2016 Web Design Trends book describes, flat design is evolving:

“The original flat design was strictly flat, with little emphasis and a focus on minimalism. Recently we’ve seen more eye-catching elements, such as hints of shadows and colouring. Despite the objections of flatteners, the design community embraces it and it works well with other popular design patterns.”

The sudden change in a previously uninspiring style raises a host of interesting questions.

If it’s so popular, how can you use it differently in your work? You want a flat design, not a plain one. What’s the difference between clever use and poor reproduction?

That’s what this article is about. We’ll look at how flattening has evolved to make your designs trendy.

Long projection

The design we’re talking about should be flat, but shadows can create depth, even if it seems counterintuitive.

But these subtle elements can add a touch of mood to a design without being too dramatic. In fact, they still count as part of the white space, although they are technically a visual element.

After all, where is shadow without light?

More importantly, the long projection adds an element of contrast to the picture, making the overall visual experience attractive. Even the projection doesn’t have to be that long to achieve the desired effect.

Please look at:

Image credit: Kikk.be

Pastel colors and short projections provide a nice visual element that doesn’t overshadow the navigation and main information on the page. Notice how these shadows brighten up the picture. It also makes the image seem to be off the page. The combination of projection, flat content areas, and muted colors blends well with the animation elements of the site.

Speaking of color, it should be easy to bring up our next flatness property.

Color application: bright colors and auxiliary colors

Color is one of the most important capabilities of flat design.

Bright, positive tone, the achievement of many flat design, to compensate for the lack of visual expression. The projection decoration in the flat design looks vividly on the paper and adds freshness and movement to the design. This works well with other dynamic visual elements, such as visual differential scrolling and CSS animations.

Image credit: Spotify

Also, these bright colors can be used as an auxiliary color on a soft background. This seems to be the standard of the future. Something like this:

Photo credit: Takeit

A bright picture on a dark background is definitely enough to impress. The strong contrast of visual elements is a perfect match with today’s flat trend. Use simple or exaggerated techniques to make things stand out, including fonts.

Simple/exaggerated fonts

Today’s “flat” fonts usually consist of a single font, or two very close to each other. This resulted in legible, recognizable and obscure fonts. This is exactly the point.

You don’t want the font to be distracting. If the alphabet has too much style and personality, it will hinder the user’s reading flow.

Image credit: Cienne

The best course of action is “stealth design,” in other words, design so that users won’t notice. Because every time they pay attention to design, they lose the immersive experience.

Of course, you can go to the other extreme. When dealing with a minimalist interface, you have to adjust what you add. Using large bold type on a blank background creates a unique context for the text on the interface. If the interface doesn’t have any other visual elements, you have to have some kind of aesthetic, and all you can do is use fonts and colors.

Photo credit: Truthlabs

Ghost button

To be careless — even transparent as air — we need to spend some time talking about the ghost button.

Can you spot the ghost button in the picture below at a glance? They don’t stand out, and that’s the point. Transparent buttons give the user an indication that navigation items are not necessarily stealing attention from the underlying visual focus.

conclusion

In short, the elements of flat design, and the results of its evolution, are all about attracting attention.

Whether it’s using visual elements such as flashy backgrounds or focus images, or trying to refrain from using text or navigation cues — the idea behind it is the same. Use a small number of elements, arranged in a minimalist way, to create contrast on the page and direct the user’s attention correctly.

Flattening is a trendsetter. The reason is that designers are able to embody multiple layers of complexity within a simple interface in a variety of ways.

I expect flat design will continue to evolve as a trend. While keeping it simple at its core, making it a trend-setter.

To learn more about flat design and other great web design trends, see this 180-page web Design Trends for 2015 and 2016.

The original link: studio.uxpin.com/blog/how-to…

Author Information: Zack Rutherford Zack Rutherford is a UX Design Writer at UXPin. His work has been published in UX Mag, awwwards, and Speckyboy.

[Foreign Design Issue 114]

One of the most popular techniques in web design is high-definition background images, thanks to the proliferation of high-definition displays. But when it comes to complicated logos, it’s hard to deal with.

In this article, we look into the future of web design. It is no longer a question of whether hd web design will dominate the web, but when high-resolution displays will become ubiquitous, which is a prerequisite for improving visual design.

Starting next, we’ll explore how to create hd backgrounds using images, video, or animation, and combine everything in a hierarchical way.

The picture

Large size, focus, full screen.

The above words are best used to describe the background image of modern web design. Designers didn’t just think about hd design, they took it to the extreme, dominating the scene with background images.

This design technique works because users are visual creatures by nature.

After all, as web Design Trends 2015 and 2016 describes, vision dominates the subconscious mind as we make sense of the world around us. Also, pleasing images create a better user experience to a certain extent, because we take it for granted that attractive things are better. This may seem extremely superficial, but perception is truth in design.

The high screen resolution creates the perfect opportunity for users to see previously unobserved details. Small details in the image — such as Junction Moama’s multi-toned texture of Macquarie Park (both above) — enhance the level of refinement of the interface and go a long way towards making that all-important first impression.

5 tips for using hd Images:

1. Make the main frame the focal point — just because the picture is in the background doesn’t mean it takes center stage. Great photos create an emotional connection with the user, learn the subtleties of the image, and see how it affects the visual level of the design.
2. Consider using multiple images — use the slideshow or card-style structure we mentioned in the Web UI mode to handle content-rich or photo set-type designs.
3. Adding effects to an image – blur or color overlay – can add or change the tonality of an image (for example, using all red tones is more positive). This works well on high definition images, where the underlying image is high enough that details are still visible.
4. Consider how the image will look at different screen sizes – arrange the background image at various sizes so that it fits into any breakpoint and doesn’t show any solid color blocks (which is the real background).
5. Break the limits – Photo backgrounds don’t have to follow the standard 1:1.5 camera scale, but images cropped from their respective backgrounds can be used.

Background photos create simple visual appeal. Good photos work best when they reinforce a brand, product or message. Remember that sometimes multiple background photos will be used and make sure that the design structure and surrounding elements match well with each image.

video

High-definition video backgrounds are likely to be one of the most popular techniques this year — especially with lots of fast action that feels crazy. From giants like AirBnB to almost every type of small site, video has quickly become an important part of web design.

One of the first sites to use background video was movie sites. The website for Life of PI, for example, uses a movie trailer as a backdrop (in downloadable format).

The emergence of video as a design technique has nothing to do with its own novelty. Before HTML5 (and smartphones capable of playing hd video), many browsers and web-connected environments simply couldn’t handle a full-screen video background.

Any discussion about hd video should be about the final product. Whether it’s a surrealist black-and-white approach like Dunckelfeld’s or a more realistic montage like AirBnB, you’ll need to adjust its saturation and frame rate back and forth to make the video more engaging and less distracting.

A video is not enough. All the tricks of making a good movie — framing, zooming, panning — are equally important in web video, even as a backdrop.

“The Kitchens of Brindisa Tapas Kitchens have done a great job of editing a large number of short films to show its food and environment. The videos are shot from multiple angles, with some clips accelerated in time-lapse style and others deliberately slowed down to create the right ambience.

Also, here are five tips for using HD video in your design:

1. Be aware of the length of the video — the background video should present a visual story in just a few seconds, giving the user a sense of atmosphere. The optimal cycle interval is 10 to 30 seconds.
2. Turn off sound — Sound is still an extreme autoplay element for most users. If you want to use sound, you also want to mute it by default.
3. Focus on load times — while hd video is fun, it shouldn’t slow down your site. It doesn’t matter how awesome the video is if the user quits during loading.
4. Consider alternatives — some devices can’t render hd video. You can view the most frequently used devices in Google statistics and design them based on the actual situation. Usually, you’ll choose a still image as an alternative.
5. Stick to high quality video – whether you shoot it yourself or not, it’s best to hire someone to do it, or use copyrighted video, for clarity and quality. Not only does it have to be used in hd environments, but it also has to be pretty good picture quality. Just like a photo, if you use it at a higher resolution than the original, the video is ruined.

Web design, especially with background video, is all about creating a cinematic experience. The high-definition video on the site creates a complete multimedia experience, layered on top of a moving background.

animation

High definition background animations exist in the design of fixed images because they often contain both fixed and moving elements.

It’s as popular as loading animation, and design principles have changed little over the decades. The only thing that has changed is the quality of the hd display.

The key to successful HD animation is time control. Animations should have smooth, traceless effects. All looping animations should be end to end.

As described in Web Design Trends 2015 and 2016, we recommend keeping these five principles in mind:

1. Stick to simple animations — too complicated stories and actions can be cognitively burdensome, so don’t make complicated effects if you can achieve perfect basic animations.
2. Use bright colors to associate interfaces — for example, you can start with a simple mouse-hover effect and change link colors. Consider using the lightest hover color to draw attention to the animation. Zooming in on text while hovering is also a visual cue that adds extra emphasis. These simple tricks help highlight specific user actions.
3. Take advantage of hd screens – for best visual effects, use scalable image formats, such as vector images.
4. Animate with video — the same subtlety applies to animation. Dissonant movements and objects, such as sound, should be avoided, which can annoy the user.
5. Animate for the right audience – While many designers often combine animation and illustration, this may not work for every site.

Again, pay attention to detail. Depending on the site and the user, the animation can be cartoonish, video style, or just a series of motions in the illustration environment. Animations can be triggered by user action — clicking, scrolling, or mouse-clicking — or simply played automatically.

Layering: Blend everything together

An hd background only works as a layer of information. A great picture, video or animation is hard to do alone — you have to think about how it relates to everything else on the screen.

Here are three simple case studies that all of these sites have combined well.

Adidas Design Studio

Adidas design studio uses a variety of tricks to create large, vivid images that invite people to join.

The full-screen background actually links to a video, scrolling and visual effects that guide the user through the entire product line and related information. Clear pictures with equally clear text. In a gentle way, the visual hierarchy is constructed with color.

Flipboard

Flipboard has mastered the art of fixing backgrounds, which relies heavily on traditional photography.

High definition images contain a lot of detail without being aggressive. The image also extends beyond the screen, making you imagine the dining table extending in all directions, as it does at different screen resolutions. The entire hue shapes the image as a background element, keeping attention on the brighter call-to-action message above it.

5 Eme Gauche

5 Eme Gauche features a large background image with multiple elements, including navigation at the bottom, social media ICONS, and a brand logo and homepage link in the center of the screen.

Each layer of content interacts with the background and is differentiated so that you can see the hierarchical relationship on the screen at a glance. The internal hierarchy of the site is clear because all pages use the same hierarchical format and scrolling animation.

conclusion

Although hd backgrounds have been gaining in popularity in recent years, it’s not just a trend. They are the result of usability finally catching up with technology.

That means there won’t be a day when people get tired of HD design and look for the next trend. As a growing visual industry, this creative skill is definitely worth learning.

For more timeless web design tips, check out UXPin’s free ebook web Design Trends 2015 and 2016. This guide breaks down 165 of today’s best designs to reveal 10 of the most useful trends from companies like Intercom, Spotify, Apple, and Google.

Original link: designmodo.com/high-defini…

Author Information: Jerry Cao is a content Strategist at UXPin — the Wireframing and prototyping app — where he develops in-app and online content for the wireframing and prototyping platform.

[Foreign Design Issue 113]

Client project deadlines are looming. The moment of presentation to the customer is approaching. Are you ready?

Throwing the design to the client is not the right way to present the client. To make your design or proposal easier to draft, there are a few other things to prepare. Presentations are critical, and you need to be prepared to feel comfortable and confident and make your project (or proposal) easier to impress.

Here’s how to do it.

Start with the basics

Before you even start your presentation, know who you are presenting to. When you give a customer presentation, who is involved? What is the goal of this presentation? Knowing your audience is key to developing the right strategy.

Your presentation also needs to be tailored to different audiences. Speaking to company bosses and design team members may have a different style.

Get to know your audience in 3 ways:

• Confirm the details of the presentation a few days in advance, and determine the identity and size of the audience.
• Check out the company and its employees to see how they appear online. This will make your contact with them smoother and give you visual cues that will help you connect with them properly.
• Ask for assistance if necessary. If you’re presenting to a large audience, it’s time to consider whether you need assistance.

Design a presentation

You are a designer, the presentation will reflect the quality of your design, and it needs to be designed.

Consider these points:

• Light and sight. Are these data legible?
• Are the slides customized or with brand logos?
• One slide on one thing. Make sure the presentation is simple and easy to understand.
• Double-check all elements to make sure they look and write flawlessly. Avoid illegible text, images, or half-finished products.
• Have a backup in case of a technical failure or a variety of factors deviate from expectations.

If you want to understand the design of your presentation, consider using Slides. This Designmodo tool has a professional look and feel that can be customized to help you create a great presentation.

Be ready to explain the design

You also need to think about the questions you might be asked during the presentation. Be sure to have your answers ready. (Remember, sometimes the best answer is “I’ll take another look.” Don’t overpromise yourself.

When thinking about your presentation, focus on two things:

1. Explain the basic design and what it means
2. Highlight the uniqueness of the design

With these elements in place, you’re ready to face the customer.

The ultimate goal of these reviews is to sell your design services to clients. Think of yourself as a salesman for a product. Think of your design as a product so you can sell it to customers. Be prepared to explain any aspect of your design and answer questions — even ones that are outside your area of competence.

Practice speaking

As the salesperson of your design, speaking is crucial. Customer feedback on this project has a lot to do with the quality of your presentation. So practice and improve your presentation.

• Remember, when it comes to design, “Don’t talk when you can demonstrate.” Even if you only have renderings or sketches, you still need to visually present what you can do for the customer. (If your presentation is to illustrate the services you offer, be sure to pick the best examples from your portfolio.)
• Make your speech brief and comprehensive. Don’t over explain what you did or can do. (This is where many people get into trouble.) Just say what you need to say and leave it at that.
• Inject some excitement into your speech. While the atmosphere at these events is usually a little tense, try not to read from a script or keep your speech rhythmless throughout. Your pitch and body language should match the visual “tone” of your presentation. If it’s informal, keep the conversation casual. If it’s fast-paced and exciting, incorporate those emotions into the presentation to keep the audience engaged.
• Watch the time. Rehearse your presentation in advance and know how long it will take. Run the presentation with the slides at the same time so that everything works together.

Presentation outline

It can help you sort out a presentation outline that you can use later. This makes the process much smoother.

• Start with a thank you and a brief description of the project.
• Tell the client where you are on the project and what the next steps are.
• Remind them to provide feedback and suggestions.
• Visual presentation throughout your specific design work.
• Invite customers to ask questions or discuss.
• Summarize, for example, what the client needs to do before the next presentation, and what you need to do next.

conclusion

Preparing for client presentations can be very stressful. These factors will help you better prepare and cope with the task.

If you don’t know where to start, look at Slides. It was created specifically for presentations, and you can use it on a personal website or in person.

Original link: designmodo.com/designers-c…

Author Information: Carrie Cousins Carrie Cousins has more than 10 years experience in the communications industry, including writing for print and online publications, and design and editing. You can connect with her on Twitter @carriecousins and Google+.

Busy taking care of his home, imperceptibly a few months passed, a lot of columns are shelved indefinitely. But rest assured, the last place coke Orange will stop is the humor section, because that’s life itself.

The winner in the statue

Coke Orange has thought about a problem, the influence of historical figures on the later generations, to some extent, also reflected in the statue. Guan Gong statue all over the world, you can see how bright he left the historical image; MAO’s statue can be seen in any red spot; Confucius traveled everywhere, and statues followed people wherever they went. So from this perspective, who was the most influential historical figure in all fields?

The answer came one day on the bus. The most sculpted figure is not a founding father, a hero, a cultural leader whose name is familiar — climbing is forbidden.

Make netease

Small steel about NetEase to work in Japan free travel, a month before the departure of a wen changed his mind.

“This cheap silver, last time I stood up must find him account.”

“Directly to make NetEase, and then maybe be employed”, we have to support small steel.

“Carry the axe to the gate shouted: SAO text you give me rough!”

“Lift two axes, and when Shouting, they should touch each other, so as to have momentum,” I added.

“And then you build up momentum behind it.”

“I carry a tape recorder in the back, receive a stereo, put the golden snake dance.”

(In case you are not impressed by this song, post a link here. You can hear the effect of the scene.)

Music.163.com/#/m/song?id…

KT doesn’t have one of his girlfriends

I: recently work more leisure, can do their interest in the matter.

KT: Too bad I can’t play the guitar.

Me: If be a community security guard, maybe can go to work to play guitar…

KT: A thousand young women.

I: why does everybody mention guitar to feel be fan pour thousands of young woman, why mention suona to have no this kind of feeling, this is why?

KT: I played the suona when I got married in the countryside.

I: that why blow flute also can’t fan thousands of young woman? Harmonica can’t charm thousands of young women, accordion can’t charm thousands of young women?

KT: That’s why I don’t have a girlfriend. I always…

Ever heard of CCO?

Programmer small steel plan to lift the table again, ah…… Why do I say again?

Anyway, he told the group to give us a good place to go. When someone tries to flip the table, everyone gets excited. Why don’t we start a web tech company?

“Agree, go registering first!”

“CTO Little Steel.”

“I quit CTO. I interviewed ctos of two startups. I want to be CEO!”

“That BB to do CCO!”

“What for?”

“A Cheaf cooking Officer is a chef.”

Throw snowballs

It was KT’s turn to have a free day.

KT: It’s so boring. The one next to me has nothing to do, and then he seems to want to leave all his stuff to me.

Me: so you can throw to throw to play, he passed the document to you, you pick up. You send him the file again, he takes it. Come and go, an afternoon is over, everybody’s happy. Like snowballs in Wow, [Use: Throw at teammates!]

KT: No wonder you don’t have time for Wow.

Me: What does this have to do with?

KT: Because you usually spend the afternoon throwing snowballs with your teammates.

Aye… Why can’t I argue with that?

Contact Us

Forgetting what I was asking for, I opened mapbox’s website one day. This tool is very good, the most basic use, can generate awesome maps.

Review images

But I noticed something was wrong.

As long as the original contact us there are so many things ah ha ha ha, that also pay what money!

The design of the point

KT asked me to recommend two or three graphic design material websites to him. I asked him what kind of material he wanted, ICONS? A picture? Or something else.

He said, for example, I want a dot design now!

The dot is a ball!

View pictures View pictures

It’s a dot.

Here you go. Dot design.

Review images

The red panda

National Day back home, a group of people to the hot pot restaurant corruption.

All the dishes are served, one by one. KT carries a dish of shrimp slippery, say I come to give you next.

Renjie said you merit ah, put let the waiter come down. Look what you got there. You cut the shrimp into a crab stick.

That’s how shrimp skate eats, and you want me to cut out a baby panda! ?

(Total silence)

From then on, I found the word “red panda” very useful. For example, Bamboo complained to me that the product manager of his company made her change the color of a button more than 20 times. At this point, I can blurt out:

“Why not just a color, adjust to adjust, but also a little panda to ah?”

KT daily

KT at work often tells me live stories about their office, usually featuring a cat. He said many times that the eldest sister downstairs would talk to the cat for most of the day. But I didn’t really understand the layout of their office until…

“Downstairs in the cat, and then in the ah-ah-ah-ah, I have no language.”

“You’re working from your hammock. You can hear everything downstairs.”

Review images

KT doesn’t have a girlfriend

This issue of KT story seems to be a lot of ah, the main is recently and he talk too much. He has a big imagination and is a good companion for inspiration. The side effect is that when you get to the bottom of it, you don’t have to worry about it.

Me: why can thunder rain, oh! Why winter and summer? That’s a puzzle!

KT: Oh, it’s raining. Wait, I know why I don’t have a girlfriend.

[Foreign Design Issue 112]

Although good color schemes are readily available today, finding the right color scheme for data visualization is still a huge challenge.

At Graphiq, things were even trickier because we were communicating information through thousands of different data sets with very different visual representations.

Current problems

Rather than start building our own color scheme right away, we launched some research into existing color schemes on the web. Surprisingly, we found that only a few of them were designed for complex charts and data visualizations. We found some reasons not to use existing color schemes.

Problem 1: Low recognition

Many of the color schemes we’ve looked at don’t work well for data visualization. Not only do the colors vary a lot in brightness, but they were created without any thought of discernment. Flat UI color schemes are one of the most widely used for obvious reasons: They are excellent. But, as the name suggests, it was designed for the interface. With Flat UI color matching, it is difficult for color blind people to make out data images.

Flat UI color matching complete color, red color blind mode, gray mode.

Problem 2: Not enough color

Another problem is that many existing color schemes don’t have enough colors. When creating data visualizations for Graphiq, we needed a color scheme of at least six colors, and sometimes eight to 12 colors, to fit all application scenarios. Many of the color schemes we looked at didn’t have enough colors to choose from.

Here are some examples from Color Hunt:

While these are all great color schemes, none of them are flexible enough to offer a rich palette.

Problem 3: Hard to distinguish

But wait, there are some color schemes that look like gradients — you can theoretically create any number of colors, right?

Unfortunately, they don’t usually vary much in brightness, and many of them can easily become indistinguishable, like this group, also from Color Hunt:

Let’s try taking the first group and expanding it to level 10 colors:

If the average user can correctly distinguish these colors and match them to the corresponding data item, I’m satisfied, especially if I can distinguish the four greens on the left.

Our way

At Graphiq, we live by data and spend a lot of time looking for not one, but many, color schemes that can be used for data visualization. We’ve learned a lot from this process, and we’d like to share some guidelines for creating flexible color schemes:

Article 1: the span of tonal and lightness should be large

To ensure that color schemes are easy to identify and distinguish, they must vary in brightness. Lightness differences need to be considered globally. Select a monochromatic color scheme and test its performance in red-blind, green-blind, and grayscale modes. You can quickly get a sense of the level of recognition of the color scheme.

Complete color of light blue, red color blind mode and gray mode in Google Material color matching.

But, have a group of brightness span big match color is not enough. The more varied the color scheme, the easier it is for users to relate data to images. If you can make good use of the color change, it can make the non-color blind users more relaxed.

For lightness and tone, the larger the span, the more data can be carried.

The 2nd: imitate natural match color

Designers know a little secret that may seem counterintuitive to rationalists: not all colors are created equal.

From a purely mathematical point of view, the transition from light purple to dark yellow feels roughly the same as the transition from light yellow to dark purple. But as we can see below, the former feels natural, while the latter doesn’t.

This is because we are accustomed to gradual changes that exist in nature for a long time. The transition from bright yellow to deep purple can be seen in a gorgeous sunset, but the transition from mauve to deep yellow is nowhere to be seen.

Photo by Kyle Pearce, Wesley Fryer, and Jon Sullivan.

Similarly, there are light green to navy blue, light yellow to dark green, brownish red to blue-gray, and so on.

Photo by Kbh3rd, Ian Britton, and Jon Sullivan.

Because I see these natural gradients all the time, it feels familiar and pleasant when we see the corresponding color match in the visual diagram.

Rule 3: Use gradients, not a set of fixed colors

Gradient color schemes that combine different tones work best for both. Whether you need 2 colors or 10, these colors can be extracted in gradients to make the visualizations feel natural while maintaining enough hue and lightness differences.

It’s not easy to switch to thinking about gradients, but a good way to do this is to pull a guide line in Photoshop to the break point, match the amount of data, and keep testing and adjusting gradients. Below is a screenshot of the gradient we created when we corrected it.

As you can see, we place the color palette next to the grayscale gradient at the top of the table, adjust the gradient overlay (which then gives us the exact gradient value), and then pick the colors from those breakpoints to test how the color palette works in practice.

Our color scheme

We’re excited about the end result. Here are some of the color schemes we used, all with gradients from pure white to pure black to maximize the lightness difference.

Cool, warm and neon.

Practical use of color matching

Review images

Review images

Review images

To make a long story short

While there are more and more excellent color schemes, not all of them are suitable for charting and data visualization. Our approach to color matching is to create natural gradients with large enough changes in hue and brightness. Doing so makes our color palette easy to see for color blindness, more obvious to others, and satisfies 1 to 12 data sets.

Reading, Tools and Resources [Update]

Along the way, we found some great resources and articles that came to similar conclusions, but took a more precise approach and even delved into color theory. We thought we’d share it for you to read in depth:

reading

tool

Other resources

We also found some other favorite color matching resources. They’re not specifically designed for data visualization, but we think they might help you.

Hope this article is helpful to you! What’s your process for setting up color schemes? Do you use any other tools? We’d like to hear about your experience with color matching and visual diagrams.

To learn more about how we work, please subscribe to our publication Graphiq Engineering.

Original link: medium.com/graphiq-eng…

Author Information: Samantha Zhang Senior UI/UX @GraphiqHQ. Tutorial writer @TutsPlusCode. Product maker. Data nerd. Side project ninja. More at samanthaz.me/ and @moyicat

[Foreign Design Issue 111]

Bindo POS 3.0 design process

These are just a few of the app’s hundreds of interfaces

Back in May 2013, the first version of Bindo POS, an iPad check-in app, came out with many advanced business features. It then went through several iterations in the hands of several designers, including the brilliant Sean Farrell. Shortly after iOS7 was released, I was in charge of redesigning it to fit the new style. In January 2014, version 2.0 was released, and as you might expect, the rushed product was bland.

1.0 and 2.0, just visual tinkering.

We pack a lot of functionality into our product. We continue to receive customer feedback and requests for new features. Because of the diversity of our users, these needs are often specific to their industry. These are usually features that can’t be ignored. If they are not added, the product cannot be used at all. The complexity is compounded by the variety of hardware devices we support. For example, each invoice printer template is paired slightly differently. Sometimes it feels as if we are designing a separate operating system.

We can’t focus on most users, or pick the best solution for all. This is the opposite extreme of single-function, minimalist products. As more and more features were added, the number of buttons exploded and the app became bloated. We need a concise solution that fits as many usage scenarios as possible.

A clean – up is urgent.

Some of the first sketches. We drew almost 400 of these pictures.

wireframes

We started by questioning the decisions of the previous release and gathering as much customer feedback and functional requirements as possible. List all possible usage scenarios by priority classification. This is often the point of simplifying things, and only a few usage scenarios are considered necessary. However, since we have a variety of business needs to meet, we put our heads together to improve flexibility. At this stage, user research plays a crucial role.

All right. I was a clickbait for a while.

Simplicity is still what we strive for. We just can’t get rid of many of them right away. But that doesn’t mean we can’t make interfaces smarter and easier to use. With this next update, we’re looking for a blend of environments, sometimes even predictable. If it’s near noon, you may need the lunch menu. If you place an order with a supplier, chances are you’ll want to see an inventory list that needs replenishing. We strictly control the number of buttons to reduce clutter and avoid too many options on the screen. Unfortunately, users don’t seem to notice all this simplification unless it is compared to them. ¯ \ [ツ) / ¯

What is too complicated? What degree of customization do we allow, and what usage scenarios do we consider? These are the questions that need to be identified at the outset. Wireframes are a great way to find the best solution without committing too much time.

Everything has to be designed — whether it’s a conscious decision or an unintentional mistake.

When I think about all these design intentions, I really start to believe that my design is growing. Everything has to be designed — whether it’s a conscious decision or an unintentional mistake. Take the scan interface as an example. It may seem generic, but as soon as you ask the question, it’s clear that it can’t be arbitrary. There is a box for the bar code, but this box is not actually the boundary of the scanning area; It’s a guide to how far away the camera should be from the bar code to focus. The shape of the square is no coincidence. Rectangles suggest that people rotate the bar code at a certain Angle, but we want to show that we support scanning at any Angle.

Details as trivial as the scan interface have been carefully constructed.

The prototype

The sketchpad of the prototype has gone crazy. There are so many options to choose from, each with its pros and cons. We started with wireframes and continued to prototype as the work progressed. But why do we bother?

1. It allows you to identify ideas or find problems early, rather than waiting until the code is written to discover the harsh reality — it doesn’t work.
2. It’s important to preview your design on a real device. A gesture may be harder to use than you think, or a button may look smaller than it does on your laptop.
3. You don’t become a thorn in the side of the development team, picking on them all the time, and they getloveYou are.
4. No back and forth with engineers. You can tweak everything you want until it’s perfect.
5. Instead of writing requirements documents that no one can understand, you can share interactive prototypes directly and demonstrate exactly what you have in mind.
6. Prototyping is so easy these days, there are so many great tools out there. Why not?

It is always confusing to explain complex interactions in words.

But not everything needs a hi-fi prototype. To quickly test the user flow, Marvel was our choice. With their new user testing feature, you can record what the screen looks like and what the user is doing, which is extremely valuable for usability testing.

We require that all custom animations be shown in prototypes and fully tested. Their purpose should be to inform the user of changes to the interface and guide them to the desired results. In the case of our checkout process animation, the checkout button originally triggered a completely different interface, although the two interfaces were partially shared. In this update, the two interfaces are combined into one continuous interface, with their association represented by animation. This animation can also be triggered with a swipe gesture to quickly start the checkout process.

The order and checkout screens have been merged.

Animations can also please users. How much animation to add, this will test the designer’s self-control. Prototyping is also very helpful here. We would animate it in the prototype and trigger it over and over again until it was puking. (Masochist, I get it.) It’s easier for users to understand and ask the necessary questions. Many end up being scrapped or speeded up. We used Origami and Principle to simulate animation. Principle is a breeze to create interactive prototypes that are close to native applications. Recording and sharing are also easy.

This is a deprecated lock screen concept animation because the animation takes too long and it blocks the flow of interaction.

As an added bonus to prototyping, our team can start preparing marketing materials and videos before we even get into development.

A preview bootstrap video is prepared prior to development.

Early schemes tended towards bright, warm colours.

visual

For some reason, people believe that products for merchants are ugly, and we want to change that. We are committed to making it as aesthetically pleasing as possible, both for merchants and customers. After all, any user needs to look at the interface all the time. We don’t want a great product to look bad. It feels sloppy. It doesn’t matter who the user is.

After the UI flow was finalized, we explored a number of visual scenarios. Most of the early schemes were bold and bold; some were relatively soft. We choose the best ideas and pick a compromise. We want to feel confident and friendly, but not too playful. Bright colors are retained, but not too laissez-faire.

unity

Let’s first select a few interfaces to design for the rest of the interface as a reference. We created a rough style guide that describes the composition and placement of various elements, fonts, shadows, main action items, and so on. It also includes a standard color scheme and a common icon set.

One of the goals is to develop a range of products that are immediately recognizable as coming from us. Finding a balance between unity and freedom to create is especially difficult. Constraints vary from platform to platform, and deciding how to present a brand can be a challenge. It was a learning experience of trial and error.

All of our products share the same design philosophy.

We talked about adding more later. By the time we finished the redesign, the style guide had gotten a lot richer. The guide will continue to evolve and shape the overall image of our other products across a variety of platforms.

Design review

We have an informal daily design “criticism meeting”. We don’t usually go to conference rooms to write on the walls and have discussions. But the team understood that we were criticizing the product, not its designer. But when your work is criticized, it’s hard not to feel completely detached and discouraged. That’s why we try to make it as comfortable as possible. We share uncertainty at any time. We never send invitations, or find a time or venue for them. Our involuntary nature encourages us to talk freely and openly. There was only one rule in these conversations — “Don’t give offence”.

Collaboration is spontaneous and informal.

Usability testing

It’s easy to blame users for the problem and feel angry at them for rejecting new things; It’s much harder to listen and see things from their point of view.

We do usability testing at the beginning and before every beta update. The most common feedback is truly shocking. People are naturally afraid of change, and sometimes this prevents us from making any significant improvements. The onus is on us to tell them what’s changed, why, and how to switch to the new version as seamlessly as possible. It’s easy to blame users for the problem and feel angry at them for rejecting new things; It’s much harder to listen and see things from their point of view. We have to make sure that this radical change is meaningful.

The most valuable feedback came from the beta. Fortunately, a few merchants were patient enough to be guinea pigs and allow us to observe how they operated. The real test is the cruellest, but also the deepest. Needless to say, some seemingly brilliant ideas have been knocked straight back.

In each task, we typically provide the developer with a user flow chart and a guide to standard UI components.

perform

The implementation phase is not as simple as some people think. It’s not just about exporting resource images and getting the documentation ready. Throughout the process, the design team worked with the development team and was deeply involved in internal testing and quality assurance. The engineers were very helpful in figuring out the little details that we wanted. They need to think about real execution scenarios and ask technical questions, such as “What if privacy permissions are not obtained?” And “What if the Internet connection is intermittent?” Documentation is always one-sided. Communication is crucial to producing everything we want.

Even so, no one likes frequent questions/answers every 5 minutes. Everyone involved with the interface has a Sketch source file. Developers like to see CSS properties, coordinates, dimensions, distances, and 16-bit color values that you missed.

A lot of effort goes into making operations “fast.” One feature allows employees to take photos and clock in with front-facing cameras while commuting. In earlier versions, users waited for photos to be uploaded to the server before locking the screen. Now, we upload photos in the background, so users don’t have to stare at a rotating animation for 10 seconds.

The iteration

Design is an iterative process. It pains me every time I hear someone jump to conclusions about a product and disrespect the effort behind it. In my view, the true value of a design is not determined by the final product, but by all the work we put into it — including those of incompetent designers. Quick response requires a legendary design team.

The 3.0 update is now in the final stages of development. Naturally, we’re already working on the next version. Design work is not complete until the product is released. We continue to receive feedback and make adjustments and improvements accordingly. Complex or not, solving problems requires patience.

Products are not designed in a uniform way. A firm, focused strategy is great, but it won’t work for everyone. We are ecstatic about the changes to the project and can’t wait for our customers to use it.

Follow me on Twitter and Dribbble for more of my design ideas! 🙂

Thanks to my dear colleagues Nicole and Jillian for proofreading this article.

Original link: medium.com/user-experi…

Author: Raven Yu Product Designer

[Foreign Design Issue 110]

If you’re an experienced designer, you’ll agree that being inspired is not copying UI design. This is best research practice. It also applies various design patterns, follows design specifications, and makes sure to choose familiar patterns to build a usable interface.

Some might argue that adhering to norms and copying others stifles creativity, and that one day all apps will look the same. But I noticed another problem from a user experience perspective. Accustomed to best instance might make you blindly follow Google/Facebook/sets/and your favorite applications, mistakenly assume that their design goals are the same with you, you are not in question. Here are some patterns that are (or were) considered to be the best examples, but not necessarily as good as you might think at first sight.

1. Hidden navigation

At least half a million articles, mostly by designers, have been written about the burger menu, sparking heated debate. If you don’t know anything about it, read this or this. But in short, the point of discussion isn’t the icon itself, it’s hiding navigation in an icon.

The sideslip menu is flexible and easy to use.

This solution is tempting for designers and is quick and easy: you don’t have to worry about limited screen real estate and just cram the entire navigation into a scroll layer hidden by default.

However, experiments have shown that displaying menu items in a more visible way can increase activity, user satisfaction, and even revenue. That’s why all the big companies are ditching burger menus to keep the most important navigation items visible.

The revolution of YouTube navigation, Luke Wroblewski notes

If your navigation is complex, hiding it is not mobile-friendly. Prioritize it.

2. ICONS, ICONS everywhere

With limited screen space, another seemingly no-brainer to save space is to replace as much text as possible with ICONS. Pictographs take up less space, they don’t need to be translated, because people are familiar with them, right? And other apps are doing it.

With this assumption in mind, app designers sometimes hide features in ICONS that are hard to read. For example, in Instagram you can send messages directly from this icon. Can you guess?

Or assuming you’ve never used Google Translate before, click on the icon below. What do you think it does?

A common mistake is to assume that users are familiar with these pictograms or will take the time to explore and learn their meaning.

Blum.fm’s obscure TAB bar.

If you think adding a floating bubble to the icon will make it easier to use, think again. Even if you’re Foursquare, users need to learn to use it anyway.

Swarm icon prompt.

This is not to say that ICONS should not be used at all. There are a number of fairly familiar ICONS, most of which represent common functions such as search, playing video, email, Settings, and so on. (But users still feel uncertain about what exactly happens when they click on the heart icon, for example.)

Some ICONS are familiar to most users and can be used as generic ICONS.

However, complex and abstract features should always be labeled with appropriate text. ICONS are still useful in this case, because they make menu items stand out and add a touch of warmth and personality to the app.

Pixelmator navigation

Basic features are well represented by ICONS, but for more complex features, text labels should be used. (If you use ICONS, be sure to do usability testing.)

Gesture-based navigation

When Apple introduced the iPhone in 2007, multi-touch technology became a mainstream focus, and users learned that they could not only click on an interface, but also zoom in, pinch and swipe.

Gestures are very popular among designers, and there are many applications with experimental gesture controls.

Gesture navigation in the Clear app.

Like hiding navigation in ICONS instead of text labels, gestures can sometimes be tempting for designers who need to save screen space. (” There shouldn’t be a delete button, people just swipe left. Or swipe right. We’ll decide.” )

The first thing to know about gestures is that they are always hidden. People need to remember them. It’s like the burger menu: if you hide an option, fewer people will use it.

Also, gestures have the same problem as ICONS: some universal gestures are already mastered, like tapping, zooming, and scrolling. There are also gestures that are different for every application and need to be explored and learned.

Unfortunately, most gestures are non-standard and inconsistent across applications — this is still a fairly new area of touchscreen interface design. Even something as simple as swiping gestures can vary from email app to email app.

Swipe right in Apple’s mail app and you’ll see an option marked unread.

The same gesture in the Mailbox is for archiving mail.

Also, think about it: shaking your phone can be both undo (iOS) and send feedback (Google Maps).

Don’t forget that gestures are hidden controls that require a lot of effort for your users to remember. Unless you’re Tinder, you might define right swiping for the world — but only so farA concept that is critical to your application.

4. First use of instructional guidance

First-time use, one of the hottest user experience topics these days, refers to the first contact a user has with an app. In many cases, this means displaying some instructional guidance layer to show the user the application interface:

Teaching guidance in DCOVERY.

Why is this a bad idea? Because most users will skip your introduction; They just want to get started. Even if they notice your tutorial, they usually forget it. (Especially if the interface has too much information.) Last but not least, adding instructional guidance does not make the interface more intuitive. Remember this one:

A user interface is like a joke, and if you have to explain it, it’s not funny. Source: Startup Nutrition

First-time processes can be designed in many other ways that might be more useful to users. Slack, for example, uses the home interface to create the environment. They introduced themselves, focusing on the benefits rather than the interface and features.

There’s a more interactive way to welcome new users, incremental. Duolingo doesn’t explain what the app does: It encourages users to open it up and do a quick set of tests in their chosen language (without even signing up), because people learn fastest on the fly. It’s also a more engaging way to show the value of an app.

Remember how swipe gestures are different in Mailbox than in Apple Mail? That’s how it works incrementally: Users are presented with a series of guide pages in which they try out each gesture before actually using the app.

Before designing instructional guides on translucent layers, pause for a moment and think about what the user’s first open experience will be like. Pay attention to the environment. In most cases, there is a better way to welcome users.

5. Creative but not intuitive empty states

Empty state is easily overlooked by inexperienced designers, but it is an important element of the overall user experience of an application.

Sometimes designers use misinformation and empty space as a canvas for creativity.

For example, this empty state interface for Google Photos:

Empty state in Google Photos.

It looks great at first, right? It’s regular, it’s hierarchical, and it’s beautifully illustrated.

But a second look reveals something strange:

• If there is no photo gallery, why have such a prominent search button? Why do you want toemptyIn the search?
• The second most obvious element, illustration, is apparently unclickable (though many people try).
• It says I should look for the “+” button at the top, which is embarrassing. Why doesn’t the hint itself come with itaddButton? It’s like saying “Click the continue button to continue.”

The empty state above does not help the user understand the environment:

• What is a photo album? What are they for?
• Why don’t I have a photo album?
• What should I do (should I do something)?

When it comes to creativity, sometimes less is more. The empty state below is very useful. (Let’s ignore the “now click the button below.”)

The empty state of Lootsy.

Don’t forget that empty states (the 404 page of a web page) are not just about visual aesthetics and brand personality. They also play a more important role in usability. Make them intuitive and easy to understand.

Question everything

Don’t get me wrong: Design patterns and best practices are still your best teachers. But keep in mind that apps and users are different, and a solution that works great in one app may fail in yours. This is not a universal rule. And you never know why an app is designed the way it is.

Think for yourself. Independent design. Independent research.

Weigh, test, verify — don’t be afraid to break the rules, as long as it makes sense.