Picasso meets Photography

Some friends on Facebook sent this to me. It's one of the best examples I've ever seen. As one wrote "It makes my head hurt." I can only imagine how a young Picasso would have loved this photo.

Closure versus Closure

I'm working to improve my javascript skills and am struggling to absorb, to grok, closures. I find that in addition to the issues in getting past the basic definition of a closure: that it is "code that remembers the outer environment from where it came while still being usable to where it has been brought." that I have overloaded the term.. Closure is also a graphic design term and I realize that somewhere, whenever I hear the word closure I keep thinking about "completing" code; or completing a partially worked out idea.

Wow. Talk about overloading and conflating terms. For the programmers out their who are not familiar with it closure is one of the components of Gestalt Theory which describes how the mind organizes visual data. Apparently while psychologists have rejected Gestalt Theory as it does not accurately reflect human cognition - graphic designers and HCI folks have adopted it as useful in understanding how it is that humans interact with their products / applications. For instance: "why is it that human beings don't always see something right in front of their face?" Or "why are somethings found and other things ignored?"

We, as UX professionals, have to understand this when thinking about how the user is going through the application. In addition to all the other burdens faced by the user we have to take into account the fact that the user's cognitive ability will be altered/enhanced/impaired by what it is he is focused on at the time he is using the app.

A closure, in design terms, is the ability, the tendency of the mind to fill in the gaps with expected information.
The importance of this is that we must take into consideration what it is that the user is expecting which in turn comes from what it is that the user is looking to do.

Hero Shot and other interesting trends in Web Design*

There are several interesting design ideas that have taken hold.

 The Hero Shot / One-Page Design / Flat-UI Design

The Hero Shot
A hero shot is a large image that dominates the viewing area. The image, for all practical purposes, is the design. It's a very clean, very engaging look. The image brings out the emotional response of the viewer and the simple navigation and call-to-action elements do not overwhelm the viewer. Present different images on reload and the site remains fresh for return users - and it also allows one to more easily integrate multi-variate testing into site design.

One Page Design
The hero shot works very well with one page design. There were many reason we, as designers, went away from one page design in the late 1990s. Multi-page designs were "kooler"; it allowed for more images and text to be quickly shown to the user (connection speeds were MUCH slower then); it allowed for knowing when and where the user dropped out; it was useful for breaking up server-side interaction; it was useful for showing more advertising; it allowed more methodical presentation of data; and it was kooler. Designers and marketers want something new, attractive.

As with all things fashion the one-page design is fresh once again. Of course there's some interesting twists: namely the transitions between "pages." For all practical purposes the one-page design is presenting differing "screens" with transitions between them, but the fact that they're all on one page makes it new. I would say that there is also a utility in the design as all the information is loaded and remains even if the server connection is lost. Ultimately its appeal is not its utility - it's its freshness. Regarding the reasons why designers went away from one-page design and their return. All the practical reasons that existed before no longer remain.

Flat-UI Design
The use of flat, as opposed to textured, or beveled elements. It's advantage is that it has a clean, fresh look. It allows more elements to be presented to the user but at the same time maintain a more minimalist feel. All three elements are part of the current design zeitgeist where mobile design is influencing design presented on larger screens.

* For my distinction between Web Design, UX Design and UI Design please see "What's in a Name? Web, UX, UI Design"

Fonts Can Save Lives

OK, that's a little dramatic but research shows that humans can absorb information faster in some type-fonts than in others.

(Really? /sarc)

And that if these type-fonts are used in automobile display monitors perhaps there would be fewer accidents.

(Who would have thought of that? /sarc)



Hat Tip: Slashdot.

Maybe I'm just a little bit snarky tonight but ... duh!!!

The Importance of Design

How important is design? My designer friends say it’s the most important thing. When I see how they translate my wireframes and HTML mock-ups and turn them into pixel-perfect design I see the difference immediately. It changes what was a good idea into something "PROFESSIONAL."

But look at some of the most important, most influential, most profitable sites and you see terrible design and an irreverent approach to pixel-perfect design: IMDB is an industry standard but it's ugly as hell. Craigslist is ugly; and how about Google, eBay and Amazon? The beauty of those sites is in their functionality.

The Importance of Sketching

I'm a big fan of sketching ideas and consider it to be a key design skill. One of its many benefits is that stakeholders and project managers and salespeople are comfortable recommending changes. The know that it is "nothing but a sketch." However many people I speak to say "never show a sketch to a client" and, I have to admidt, that many times I think they are correct; especially when the stakeholder says "why are you showing me sketches?"

Stakeholders often times feel that they are wasting their time looking at sketches and don't particular warm up to the idea that making more "presentable" representations take time (hence money). They like the idea of not wasting money but they feel that it is the designer who should "waste his time" making things presentable as opposed to them "wasting their time" reviewing sketches. Too many stakeholders do not understand the value of a sketch. The question, I suppose, is "how do we change this perception?"

Another benefit of a sketch is that it helps to put a form, a face if you will, to the idea that's floating around the room. We all may be talking about the same thing but the image we each have is different (sometimes very, very different). Sketching out the concept allows us to be focusing upon the same idea AND often times generate multiple leads from what was originally thought to be one idea.

And yet another value of sketching its that it functions as a recording of design ideas. It's a story board of when the idea(s) were formed and often are themselves the springboard to new ideas.