Voodoo192

Lovely UI - See What You Print

2011-09-28T09:34:00.000+01:00

SWYP: See What You Print from Artefact on Vimeo.
Artefact created a radically simple printer concept called SWYP. See What You Print. To learn more: http://www.artefactgroup.com/#/content/swyp

Widows on another world

2011-09-26T09:20:00.000+01:00

Imagine that digital information exist in another world that lies just beneath our feet. A world jam-pack with data and activity, a world of ever increasing importance.

But as the creators of this world it is strange that we are forever looking down, peering through tiny windows to gain access and view a snapshot of what is going on.

Surely this is not right, we should be bringing this world out into our own. Making these windows as large and expansive as possible, through which we can survey and interact with this information. Here is a good example:

and also this:

Typical Price – Google Hotel Finder

2011-08-10T09:55:00.000+01:00

Lots of people are talking about Google's new hotel finder. One thing I thought was really clever was this.

Because hotel prices are not the same from one city to the next, it is difficult to know if you are getting a good deal or not.

Most of us begin the hotel bookings process with a bit of research. We compare a number of hotels to establish the typical price, which we use as a bench mark to compare others to.

This handy little tool does the research for us, it even gives the relative cost in the hotel details (top right)

Hopefully we will see this used a lot more across the internet, real-estate might be a good place to start.

Manhattan in motion

2011-08-06T17:21:00.001+01:00

love this sort of thing

Google adds politically bias search (maybe)

2011-08-04T09:37:00.000+01:00

It is widely excepted that most publications and often news programmes have a political bias. We often choose to read a particular news paper because it reflects our own bias or view of the world, whether left or right wing.

So why not add this feature to search, at least you will know the bias of the results you are looking at

Conventional

Controversial

How not to draw a map

2011-07-11T10:00:00.001+01:00

A great example of how breaking a trusted convention can make things a tad confusing. Maybe it is just me, but I spend at least 20 seconds staring at this wondering what country I was looking at.

Data Mines

2011-07-08T13:45:00.002+01:00

By the end of the decade data mines will be common place and like the great gold rush of the 1850's people will flock to this industry. A combination of luck and hard work will allow some to earn a living and a few to make a fortune.

We're rapidly digitising and moving every aspect of our work and personal lives into the cloud.
Over time our ability to organise and control this information will become increasingly challenged.

Over the years you can guarantee a proportion of this information
will be lost, discarded or simply forgotten, but the nice thing with digital information is it is rarely physically destroyed. Just the ability to access it is lost.

The vast majority of this inaccessible information will be rubbish, old documents, photos and general digital junk, but some will be valuable and some might well be worth a fortune.

In the next decade we will reach a tipping point, when it becomes worth mining this rubbish to find the nuggets of digital gold hidden within.

And then sell them back to their owners or more likely the highest bidder.

Clouds Apps - Just Design and Build One Version

2011-06-30T11:29:00.002+01:00

Apple came along and created 'apps'
And very good they are
Everybody loves apps and everybody wants apps
Thus every platform and device needs to have apps
And of course a suitable app store from where consumers can fill there device

But for Apple it was easy
They have one device with one OS and one screen resolution
Creating an app for multiple platforms is no fun
In fact, it is a nightmare (believe me I have lived that nightmare)

You begin with one platform - lets say android.
Android define three screen sizes; small, medium and large.
For an app with 10 key screens
You will need to design a total of 30 screens.

Now lets add Java touch (think Nokia).
Maybe just two key resolutions
Thats another 20 screens to design

Now add Java non-touch, Blackberry and Windows
Suddenly you are designing 80 screens for your simple app
thats 8 variations of each screen

This is not a lot of fun for anyone involved in the project
And a huge waste of time and money
(and that is not to mention all the time coding each of these different versions)

This is another great reason to be moving towards HTML 5 apps,
or Cloud Apps as a colleague called them the other day.

We keep the strict UI - this is great for users
We keep the tightly focused functionality - also great for users
We loose the constant updates

And we only design and build one version

UX: Not just part of a design process

2011-06-14T09:11:00.000+01:00

The last 18 months has seen User Experience become the trendy buzz word of the moment.
Its been around for years, but suddenly clients are asking:
'Do you do you UX?' or
'Who is the UX expert in your team?'.

This has led to the idea that UX is part of the digital design process.
Something you do between requirements gathering and visual design.
You bring a UX designer in.
They do some UX magic.
And the end user gets a fantastic experience.

What I'm realising is that in reality UX is not just part of the design process.
It is the process.

UX Design is a way of thinking.
A point of view or a design philosophy.
It informs every aspect of the design process.
From requirements gathering through to visual design and the final coding of the site.

If you fail to consider the users experience at anyone of these points you are not truly practicing UX design (or should that be user centred design).

Books Ngram Viewer

2011-06-08T23:37:00.002+01:00

I'm sure I'm pretty late to the party on this one, but what a great tool for researching social trends - Google Ngram viewer.

Search occurrences of words in books published over the past 200 years. Although obviously it is only the books scanned by Googles Books Project (a pretty amazing thing in it self).

Even better you can compare occurrences of different words. To me this seems like a great way to search and understand social trends over an extend time frame (i.e. before the internet)

Here is my comparison of art vs design, (design in blue) interestingly since the late 70s design has begun to be mentioned more frequently - what does this mean?

It's also worth doing the same comparison on Google Trends and also Blog Pluse to get an idea of trends right now.

Slicky not sticky

2011-01-18T09:11:00.000Z

Convectional wisdom suggests websites should be sticky. The longer someone spends on a site the more successful it is and the better we have engaged them.

It struck me that this might be rubbish, that maybe we should begin to consider how spending less time on a site is an equally valuable measure of a sites success.

Most people when visiting a site are there to complete a particular task, be it find a piece of information or buy something. The quicker they can do this, the sooner they can get back to their life. The last thing they want is a sticky website that slows them down and distracts them from the task in hand.

So that's slicky not sticky, easing the process not slowing it down.

Physical Email

2010-12-24T08:45:00.002Z

I've been thinking about some sort of physical email for sometime now. Something that recaptures the tactile nature of receiving a letter while maintaining the convenience of email.

I stumbled upon this the other day – genius.

Tableau: physical email from John Kestner on Vimeo.

You can read more about his work here.

Zen Tools by Giulio Parini

2010-11-16T12:08:00.001Z

After taking a shower and when the bathroom becomes filled with steam, use the zen tools to decorate and play with the foggy mirror. Cool idea from here

Nice low tech interface

2010-10-28T09:54:00.001+01:00

I don't even know if this app exists, but it looks great.

Imagine google maps with this kind of look & feel.

Don't depend on rollovers

2010-09-13T09:39:00.000+01:00

Look at a site on an iPad, iPhone or in fact any touch device and you will notice the rollovers no longer work. Yes this is pretty obvious, touch has no hover state, but it means that if you are relying on this to let users know that they can interact with something it's not going to work on a touch device and you users will become confused and frustrated.

A good example of this is Light box. On a touch device those little arrows that indicate you can click on the left and right of the image no longer appear. So users who have never seen this before don't know they can interact with the image to see more. Another example is mystery meat navigation, suddenly this becomes impossible to understand and requires wild guessing to navigate.

As more interaction takes place via touch devices we can no longer depend on rollover states to inform users of how they can interact. Sure we can still use them, but just don't depend on them.

Blurring reality and fiction: Theoretical Block by Aron Lorincz

2010-08-16T08:45:00.000+01:00

Theoretical Block by Aron Lorincz from Dezeen on Vimeo.

I love the concept behind this, this kind of subversion of reality.

Pressure-Sensitive Drawing on iPad

2010-07-14T10:49:00.004+01:00

Loving the potential of this.

Brilliant idea: Bottle Bank Arcade - TheFunTheory

2010-06-23T12:14:00.000+01:00

Brilliant

Wimbledon Mobile App

2010-06-17T10:27:00.001+01:00

Nice integration of augmented reality, although the app looks a little complicated - feature bloat?

Interaction design meets architecture

2010-05-17T14:57:00.001+01:00

I've recently been thinking about whether interaction/user experience design can be elevated to the same level as architecture.

In many ways I think there are significant similarities between the two. Considering the increasing amount of time people are spending digitally interacting with systems and each other, this field is certainly growing in importance within society.

With this in mind, I spotted this article about Interaction Design and Architecture on Johnny Holland. The videos explore the point at which architecture and interaction design meet. This one is fantastic

Dan Hill-Keynote: New Soft City from Interaction Design Association on Vimeo.

Shantell Martin talks about the power of collaboration

2010-05-05T09:13:00.000+01:00

Talking about collaboration she says
"... and they get to put a little spin on your work and you get to take that and spin it back. And the more you do that the more you create something that is propelling it self much higher than you could ever do by yourself."

10 Most Common Misconceptions About User Experience Design

2010-05-04T09:00:00.004+01:00

Watch presentation

Tokyo Marathon via social media

2010-05-04T09:00:00.000+01:00

Joseph Tame is possibly bonkers but what a great experiement. From PechaKucha Tokyo. (if you don't know what PechaKucha is find out here).

Live from the... Tokyo Marathon!

Brands are interfaces and interaction

2010-04-23T11:45:00.000+01:00

The ascent of interaction design to a critical role in brands is largely due to the changing nature of brands themselves. The new reality of brands is that they’re programs to deliver value through customer interfaces and interactions. They’re no longer the realm of top-down symbols, slogans and promises. In their new mode, brands are more social and cultural than “corporate.” They’re collaborative expressions of companies and their customers, formed in a structured process that builds the brand from the customer up.

Some definitions:

A brand interface is where the brand works with customers
A brand interaction is how the brand works with customers

Yes, brands work with customers. The brands that count are working brands, not display brands. They’re brands that roll up their sleeves and team with customers to get things done.

From Interaction design: the new key to brands

6 Foundations of Great Digital Creative

2010-04-20T13:35:00.000+01:00

Interesting although foundation number one should be a "bloody good idea".

Tim Brown urges designers to think big

2010-04-09T09:00:00.000+01:00

Fraser Davidson Showreel 2010

2010-04-08T09:00:00.000+01:00

Fraser Davidson Showreel 2010 from Fraser Davidson on Vimeo.

Microsoft, maps and augmented reality

2010-04-07T09:00:00.000+01:00

Blaise Aguera y Arcas demos augmented-reality maps at TED

Amazing timelapse tilt shifted film

2010-04-06T09:00:00.001+01:00

One day around the tower (Zaha Hadid - Marseilles) from Exmagina on Vimeo.

One day timelapse tilt shifted film around the new Zaha Hadid tower of CMA-CGM in Marseilles - South France

Shot between June and december 2009 with Sony EX1, Letus Elite and Nikon D90.

Edited in Final Cut Pro, post and grad in After Effect.

Score performed by His Boy Elroy : Revolve (R Mix)
avalaible on iTunes & Amazon

Things to do with video online

2010-04-01T09:00:00.001+01:00

Lots of interesting ideas in this presentation. Including this great video.

Keep it simple stupid

2010-03-31T09:00:00.000+01:00

This article asks the interesting question of weather the traditional web is dead and if we are moving to a more app based model? A model where we access online content via apps rather than the browser window.

The ipad will certainly increase the amount of content accessed via applications, I guess the next question is whether a standard application platform will appear for none mac devices, will this be an Adobe platform Flex or Air or HTML 5 and jquery.

What ever the answer, and their is probably not just one, the key lessons to be learnt from the app model is that successful solutions "distill their apps down to the very basics and focus on only the most essential features"

As they say: keep it simple stupid.

Crowdsource video

2010-03-30T18:00:00.001+01:00

This is brilliant, I wonder how long until we see this as a TV ad.

Genius, a capillary calendar

2010-03-17T13:19:00.002Z

Ink Calendar makes use of the timed pace of the ink spreading on the paper to indicate time. The ink is absorbed slowly, and the numbers in the calendar are ‘printed ‘ daily. One a day, they are filled with ink until the end of the month. The calendar enhances the perception of time passing and not only signaling it. The aim of the project is to address our senses, rather than the logical and conscious brain.

The ink colors are based on a spectrum, which relate to a “color temperature scale”, each month having a color related to our perception of the weather on that month. The colors range from dark blue in December to three shades of green in spring or orange and red in the summer.

The problem is not ideas...

2010-03-03T11:29:00.001Z

"The problem is not ideas, ideas are there, the real problem is to know which ideas you invest in and which ideas you give time to" – Ron Arad

Brilliant Animation: HP – invent from Tom and Matt

2010-03-02T10:03:00.000Z

HP - invent from Tom and Matt on Vimeo.

Unique interface

2010-03-01T09:23:00.000Z

Maybe the audience could txt messages onto their t-shirts and guitars??

Lexus LFA Digital Speedometer

2010-02-28T17:59:00.001Z

Nice interface

Friday Fish

2010-02-26T14:04:00.002Z

Kuroshio Sea - 2nd largest aquarium tank in the world - (song is Please don't go by Barcelona) from Jon Rawlinson on Vimeo.

Make sure you watch it full screen

2010-02-23T09:41:00.000Z

We set out to broaden our ambitions; to create a design philosophy and world-class design standards that all designers across the business could adhere to. We wanted to find the soul of the BBC. We wanted something distinctive and recognisable; we wanted drama. We knew whatever we created needed to be truly cross-platform and that we needed to simplify our user journeys.

From a fantastic post on the BBC blog charting some of the work that is being done on the redesign of the BBC site.

A New Dimension to Touch

2010-02-22T11:42:00.003Z

Looks like pressure sensitive touch screens could be just round the corner according to this article on the BBC. The added dimension this could add to interaction is pretty exciting with a few examples shown here and a bit more about QTC, the magical material behind this, here.

And in a completely different vein, but some how related, is this amazing video.

Glass Is Liquid. from Mike Call on Vimeo.

Stefan Sagmeister - Things I have learned...

2010-02-19T09:45:00.000Z

...in my life so far

Worlds first augmented reality t-shirt

2010-02-08T16:21:00.000Z

This is great - what a lovely idea.

Personality in UX = Brand

2010-02-08T09:10:00.000Z

Here's a good article on about whether technology should have personality.

I agree with the idea that interaction design should consider personality, but I don't think it is as simple as just making the technology and interaction nice and friendly.

I think we need to look beyond this and start thinking about Brand interaction. That is ensuring how we interact with something is a reflection of the personality of the Brand it represents, whether it be a website, application, mobile phone or some other piece of technology.

Dieter Rams’ ten principles to “good design”

2010-01-22T07:11:00.000Z

Good design is innovative
Good design makes a product useful
Good design is aesthetic
Good design makes a product understandable
Good design is unobtrusive
Good design is honest
Good design is long-lasting
Good design is thorough down to the last detail
Good design is environmentally friendly
Good design is as little design as possible

A Digital Scrap Book that works

2010-01-20T13:40:00.000Z

For years I've collected things I find interesting and inspiring, most end up in a folder somewhere on my computer, the better stuff will end up on the wall. All the guys I work with do a similar thing, but we all agree, we rarely look at all the stuff we have collected.

So yesterday I grabbed all my files and put them into a little digital photoframe, it sits on my desk and serves up little nuggets of inspiration through out the course of the day.

With a bit of luck the video will be working soon.

The fold is dead, long live the fold

2010-01-19T10:08:00.000Z

This article from CX Partners demonstrates, based on the findings of user testing, why it is no longer vital to get all your content above the page fold.

However, how we design the area above the fold does effect the likely hood of somebody exploring further down the page. For example, having less above the fold actually encourages exploration as shown in the results of this eye tracking test for Bristol Airport.

Here are their three tips to encourage user to explore below the fold:

Less is more – don’t be tempted to cram everything above the fold. Good use of whitespace and imagery encourages exploration.

Stark, horizontal lines discourage scrolling - this doesn’t mean stop using horizontal full width elements. Have a small amount of content just visible, poking up above the fold to encourage scrolling.

Avoid the use of in-page scroll bars - the browser scrollbar is an indicator of the amount of content on the page. iFrames and other elements with scroll bars in the page can break this convention and may lead to content not being seen.

Read the full article here.

Next Generation Symbian UI

2010-01-18T09:16:00.000Z

Screen shots of what Nokia wants to see in the next generation Symbian^4 UI.

As posted on The Register

The titlebar has new, more compact signal strength and battery indicators that appear no matter what app you're in. The title is application-dependent - on the homescreen, it would name the operator, for example - and would double-up as a tappable space to call up a dropdown Options menu, signalled by the down-facing triangle.

Read the full article here.

Edit
Here is a little more about this story

Ambient User Experience

2010-01-12T10:10:00.000Z

An article about Ambient User Experience, that is the elements that don't server a vital function on a web site, but none-the-less build part of the overall experience.

For me this is all about the personality of a site or application, and how the UX should reflect the Brand it represents.

Here's a couple of examples of stores that reflect very different personalities through the UX: Nike vs Dell

Obviously they are visually very different, but look beyond that at the way they function. Nike is playful with lots of gadgets while Dell is almost purely functional and yet both allow the user achieve a similar objective, to choose, customise and buy a product.

Gesture based interaction comes of age - maybe

2010-01-07T21:08:00.000Z

The cheesy promo videos I have seen about Project Natal to date have always put me off...

...but watching this, I'm thinking again.

Loads more info about Project Natal here.

Don Norman and Emotional Design

2010-01-07T10:19:00.000Z

Don Norman's book The Design of Everyday Things was one of the first books I read about user experience, or ergonomics as we were calling then. Here he talks about the emotion side of UX and how it can make you happy.

Oakland: A Word-of-mouth Guide

2010-01-04T10:37:00.000Z

From Cool Hunting, see the top five Cool Hunting videos from 2009 here

More Augmented Reality

2009-12-15T09:43:00.000Z

The Playful Experience

2009-11-26T11:50:00.000Z

The digital space is conducive to play—exploration, imagination, and learning. And many successful digital products are built for play or incorporate play into their interaction design. No matter how important our jobs, serious our responsibilities, or stiff our personalities, all people need to play—whether we admit it or not. Is the boss looking?

An interesting article about the importance of playfulness in user experience design.

Review of usertesting.com

2009-11-17T19:31:00.000Z

Low cost user testing.

www.usertesting.com

The Future of Interface Design

2009-11-06T11:30:00.000Z

Interesting article about The Future of Interface Design from UX booth.

Although I'm not convinced by Project Natal.

Non linear story telling

2009-11-06T10:39:00.000Z

This has been around for a while now, but still stands as a great concept.

That’s what I do

2009-11-03T19:53:00.000Z

He took something very complicated, and made it simple and easy to understand.

That’s our job

Simplify, clarify, and deliver in a memorable way.

That’s what advertising is.

From Dave Trott's blog here.

This can be applied to all forms of communication and interaction design.

Ideas and success

2009-10-28T20:12:00.000Z

from this TED talk

The great Twitter search engine deal

2009-10-27T21:01:00.000Z

5. Twitter's only going to get more important for marketers. This announcement shows how important Twitter is becoming to the internet ecosystem. If both Microsoft and Google have decided that Twitter is the only game in town when it comes to this sort of real-time search, then you can take it that it's going to be an ever more important part of the way people navigate the web. If you haven't already got a Twitter strategy in place then you're going to need to get one quickly - Twitter's audience is going to jump massively as a result of this announcement and if you're not on board then you're going to miss the boat.

Lots more interesting stuff in this article by Doug Platts on Revolution Magazine.

Could twitter become a back door way of posting directly to search engines?

Brand = User Experience

2009-10-26T10:16:00.000Z

I was more and more certain that the correct equation was
Brand = User Experience. Translated back into theory: The Interface was in the equals sign, not on the other side of the equation. The interface is what connects the worlds of Branding and User Experience Design. It’s the tunnel. The elevator. The wormhole. The throat. more

An interesting concept from Oliver Reichenstein of iA. Maybe it over complicates things with all the analogies, but the idea that Brand = User Experience is important. Although I would argue it should be the other way round, i.e. User Experience = Brand, because a brand is built from more than just the user experience.

Augumented reality - gets useful

2009-10-20T15:20:00.001+01:00

Two platforms/applications – Wikitude & Layar that uses AR to add an additional layers of info to the world around us. Both are on Android and iphones and both support 3D layers.

Wikitude

Layar

I suspect this will be hugh, particularly in the travel guides / tourism industry, but what if we see the 3D layers develop to the point where we get decent resolution images, maybe with animation – imagine a school visit to site of the battle of hasting. Hold up your phone and watch the battle take place around you. Or a trailor for a film set in London, stand in Trafalgar square and watch a key scene take place around you.

Interesting perspective

2009-10-18T22:36:00.000+01:00

Interesting stuff, but does he believe it?

Its all about presentation

2009-10-15T20:10:00.000+01:00

What a lovely way to present yourself.

It made me think of this article about data visualisation on Smashing Magazine. One of my favorites is We Feel Fine

I love the pure humanness of it. It kind of embodies some of the great stuff about the web – this sort of global connectedness that would not be possible any other way.

Another great data visualisation project was done on aircraft going in and out of LA X, I can't find the exact one I was thinking of (there are loads out there now), but it struck me that it was kind of similar to what Kevin Cooley is doing here with his photograph.

2008-07-15T09:42:00.000+01:00

2008-07-14T10:13:00.000+01:00

2008-07-11T14:48:00.000+01:00

Got to start somewhere

2008-07-04T20:50:00.000+01:00

Paula Scher read more here