Rod Motta - User Experience Visual Designer » user interface

An intuitive design is…

Rod Motta — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 00:28:44 +0000

Recently, I had the opportunity to watch Jared Spool’s great talk on First Use Experience. In his talk, he argued that an intuitive design is:

When the user is focused on their objective and not on the actual interface itself
Invisible (user only pay attention to something intuitive when it’s actually not intuitive. What makes something intuitive is actually something personal. We have to know something about the people we are building for
When Current Knowledge and Target Knowledge are at the same place. There are two ways to accomplish this: Raise Current Knowledge to meet Target Knowledge (Training), or reduce Target Knowledge to meet Current Knowledge (Simplifying)
Is all about focuses on experience. Trend/ Pattern we see over and over again: Technology > Features > Experience
Is a result of constant team critique, and critiques are essential to creating intuitive designs.

Quick thought on Web vs Desktop design process

Rod Motta — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 02:39:32 +0000

There is a world of differences to consider when designing for web or designing for desktop applications:

From fundamental interactions to keyboard driven navigational paradigms to accessibility issues to screen layout to basic behavior and reaction of buttons, links, etc…we have to consider that a product with a rich client and a web client are two completely separate applications striving to assist the user in meeting the same goals. Of course, it is a little more complicated than that but perhaps it get us going in the right direction.

Is breaking the rules okay when a design calls for it?

Rod Motta — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 05:36:13 +0000

This 10 web design rules that you can break article, made me realize that “Rules you should break” or “Standards you shouldn’t follow” articles appeal to everyone rebel side. Some of you guys may wonder what Jakob Nielsen would say to “Breaking the rules is okay when a design calls for it”.

I think rules #4 “Make your site’s goal obvious”, #5 “Navigation should be easy to figure out”, #7 “Don’t put animation in the way of your content” and #9 “Don’t have a splash/landing page” can be broken for personal portfolio or some entertainment sites, where a more creative approach might be appropriate, but not so much for e-commerce, news or corporate sites.

#6 “Use different colors for the text and background” should be “Use Contrast between Text and Background”, not different colors. Most of the examples here use variations of the base color, and use contrast to make the text readable, just like it supposed to be.

#8 “Stick to web-safe fonts”: I’m getting into using Cufon and Typeface.js (I used it for 2 projects), they offer a great solution in terms of progressive enhancement (better than sIFR), and think this is one area where the old rules no longer apply.

I also liked the tables joke and the tone it sets to encourage designers not to be so serious all the time!

The concept of simplicity

Rod Motta — Thu, 28 May 2009 23:32:12 +0000

Making your interface smaller, hiding advanced functionality and taking out the obvious is the path to a simpler interface. Along this path you’ll face many obstacles. For every feature you hide or take away, there will be people who complain and demand that you bring it back. But every one of your users has different needs and uses your web app or website in a different way. If you listen to all the feature requests and needs, and go as far as addressing and implementing them all, you’re unlikely to arrive at the zenith of software design.

For those looking for some base concepts on the idea of simplicity, here are John Maeda’s Laws of Simplicity:

Reduce – The simplest way to achieve simplicity is through thoughtful reduction
Organize – Organization makes a system of many appear fewer
Time - Savings in time feel like simplicity
Learn – Knowledge makes everything simpler
Differences – Simplicity and complexity need each other
Context – What lies in the periphery of simplicity is deﬁnitely not peripheral
Emotion – More emotions are better than less
Trust – In simplicity we trust
Failure – Some things can never be made simple
The One – Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious, and adding the meaningful

The importance of User Personas

Rod Motta — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 06:10:28 +0000

According to Alan Cooper, author of About Face 3.0 with Robert Riemann and David Cronin, “The persona is a powerful, multipurpose design tool that helps overcome several problems that currently plague the development of digital products. Personas help designers:

Determine what a product should do and how it should behave.
Communicate with stakeholders, developers, and other designers.
Build consensus and commitment to the design.
Measure the design’s effectiveness.
Contribute to other product-related efforts such as marketing and sales plans.”

Impress – Flexible display

Rod Motta — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 08:26:02 +0000

INSPIRE: From the Adobe Experience Design Team

Rod Motta — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 20:42:55 +0000

I came across this new website from Adobe called INSPIRE, an online publication of the Adobe Experience Design Team, which will easily attract anyone into software, web & graphic design.

The Adobe team shares valuable, real-life experiences both written & via videos.

Here are some interesting content:

Adobe and the future of multitouch (really cool!)
Collecting User Feedback: You’re Doing It Wrong
Icons In Space

Quote: Usability isn’t enough

Rod Motta — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 20:44:48 +0000

“Usability is always secondary. It’s never the most important thing about an experience. I will accept poor usability if I get what I need, if the total experience is great. I will reject perfect usability if I am not rewarded with a useful, engaging experience.”

- Donald Norman, author of “The Design of Everyday Things”

Mega Drop Down Navigation

Rod Motta — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 17:28:18 +0000

Here’s a study on how mega drop-downs overcome the downsides of regular drop-downs: Mega Drop Down Navigation Menus Work Well By Jacob Nielsen

Here’s a screenshot of a great example not listed in the article above:

UI design patterns libraries

Rod Motta — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 20:23:18 +0000

I’ve collected a set of UI design patterns libraries. Some of them present patterns with descriptions and advices such as Yahoo, others collect screenshots of UI designs, such as PatternTap. With all the available sites, you have a lot of patterns to tap into for your sites and applications!

Let me know if you know another good UI patterns collections that are not listed above.