Why the pencil is still the most important tool for digital designers
Looking for digital inspiration, or staring at an empty computer screen? Even at the tech nerd mecca that is SXSW in Austin, designer Von Glitschka has some radical advice for you: Close your laptop, shut off your iPad, and pick up a pencil. Open a paper notebook. And give doodling a shot. (more…)
Lean Sketching Tips: Flexible Fidelity & Cutting Corners
Here is some lean UI sketching advice – let the level of detail be a variable in your design process that which you control. Staying conscious of and knowing when to cut a corner or when to spend additional time detailing an interaction, screen or flow is a healthy thing. All sorts of design tools impose certain fidelities on to us the second we pick them up. (more…)
Creating Wireframes And Prototypes With InDesign
Hundreds of tools may be available for interaction designers, but there is still no industry standard for interaction design (more…)
How to Go About Prototyping and User Testing
It takes a stretch of days at a time to get the coding and programming in place for your web app and if something goes wrong in the process, it hurts to start it all over again. At times when you haven’t checked and rechecked your app beforehand, you may come to find out that in the middle of the creation process that the idea you had isn’t going to work or the budget for your project is not big enough. (more…)
Fitting Big-Picture UX Into Agile Development
The rapid pace of UX design in the agile world can lead to shortsighted design decisions. Focusing on addressing the immediate needs of particular user stories within the limits of a sprint can lead to neglect of larger design questions, which can come back to haunt UX designers later. (more…)
Wireframing and Sketching for Web Designers: Tools, Utilities and Reasons
A website wireframe is a visual guide, or a skeletal framework that will help you define your future website’s characteristics. By wireframing you are basically defining the primary steps and the shape your website or product is going to have. One of the main purposes of wireframing is to set the main priorities and describe the functionality of your future creation. (more…)
The Importance Of Wireframes In Web Design And 9 Tools To Create Wireframes
Designing wireframes the right way the first time costs no more than doing it the wrong way. Creating a paper prototype adds no cost either; simply print out the wireframe diagrams for the pages a visitor will use to complete the tasks most closely related to achieving his goals and meeting the site's business objectives. (more…)
iOS Prototyping With Adobe Fireworks And TAP (Part 3)
In the previous parts of this tutorial (part 1 and part 2), we looked in detail at the building blocks of our design in Fireworks (pages, shared layers, symbols, styles), and we started to make a demo prototype in Fireworks. (more…)
Sketching And Prototyping
Sketching enables you to brainstorm, explore multiple ideas, define flows, communicate with team members all why being quick and cheap. Prototyping enables you to get out of the building quicker, talk to users, validate assumptions, ensure expectations are meeting stakeholder needs, while spending as little time as possible worrying about polish. (more…)
iOS Prototype With TAP And Adobe Fireworks (Part 2)
In the previous article in this series, “iOS Prototyping With Adobe Fireworks and TAP, Part 1: Laying the Foundation,” I looked in detail at the four major stages that all of our projects at Cooper go through, as well as our approach to Fireworks PNG organization, and the main components of Fireworks (pages, shared layers, symbols and styles). (more…)
iOS Prototype With TAP And Adobe Fireworks (Part 1)
One of the strengths of Adobe Fireworks lies in its ability to produce basic-level prototypes in HTML format for the purpose of sharing concepts, evaluating them and conducting usability tests. But did you know that you can use Fireworks in combination with other tools to create complex iOS prototype (for both the iPhone and iPad) with similar ease? (more…)
My Workflow for Developing PhoneGap Applications
I am asked all the time “How do I get started developing PhoneGap applications?”. My normal answer is to advise people to check out the PhoneGap (more…)
The product design sprint: understand (day 1)
At the Google Ventures Design Studio, we have a five-day process for taking a product or feature from design through prototyping and testing. We call it a product design sprint. This is the third in a series of seven posts on running your own design sprint. (more…)
Tips on Prototyping for Usability Testing
Don’t let prototyping drive your design. The best prototyping tools are not necessarily the best design tools. It certainly saves time if you can design and prototype at the same time, but the last thing you should have to focus on when designing are the limitations of a prototyping tool. (more…)