Topic: Opinions/Reviews
Designers: Are You Asking Questions About UX?
A few weeks ago I posted a tweet to designers saying, "If you're not asking questions about the UX that gets handed to you, you're not doing your job." Responses varied from general agreement to my favorite sarcastic remark, "If you're not asking questions about the UX handed 2 u, you're not doing your job MY BEST FRIEND" (by UXer @malhinha)," and "If you get handed UX at all, you're luckier than most designers" (by @simonmeek).
The Case for UX
If you don't have wireframes and other UX deliverables to work with, I empathize with you, because I've been in your shoes. It's not fun! It's time-consuming and limits your ability to do your best work. Many designers are often left wearing the UX hat because UX is the new design...anybody can do it, right? I was guilty of thinking this until I started working with great UXers who are incredibly skilled at their craft. We don't treat our UX team as a luxury, but rather as a necessity. The value that they provide to project teams and clients can be measured in time, money, conversion rates, innovation ... The list goes on.
Continue reading "Designers: Are You Asking Questions About UX?"
If You Love Fontspring So Much Why Don’t You Marry It?
The following account represents one person's unabashed love for an up and coming web font service.
As many know by now, the dawn of true web type is finally upon us. Dozens of service offerings have sprung up, pricing models have become more reasonable, and @font-face usage is becoming far more ubiquitous than it was just a year ago. I couldn’t be more thrilled.
We’re so close to the typographic possibilities that web designers have always dreamed of, but there are still some roadblocks in terms of what works best for agencies and clients. I won’t weigh the pros and cons of different services and options. That’s been done elsewhere already. I'd rather explain why I love Fontspring so much for our needs at Viget. For a more technical and pragmatic view on exploring the realities of @font-face usage see Doug's post.
Continue reading "If You Love Fontspring So Much Why Don’t You Marry It?"
In Defense of the Humble, Often Overlooked Contact Page
For awhile now, I've been obsessed with contact forms and contact pages. When I happen upon a site that looks nice, one of the first pages I check out is the contact page. Not because I'm just that eager to tell someone how lovely their site is, but because I'm always on the lookout for what designers are doing with contact pages.
Why? It seems, more often than not, that the contact page gets ignored in the design process and in the end it's nothing but a plain form and a brusque list of ways to contact a company or person. It does its job, but it doesn't look particularly appealing while doing it. It's the vegetables of the website dinner plate. Not even fun, tasty vegetables; it's squash.
As a designer, I understand how that happens. Often the contact page is one of the last pages to be put together. It's an after-thought. It gets lost in the shuffle of all the higher-level, more exciting, seemingly more important pages that need to be designed.
But the contact page deserves better treatment than that. If the page has a contact form (most do, these days) you hope that users are stopping and spending a decent amount of time on the page, filling out the form. It's not like a quick, factual form; name, email, address, done. Hopefully they're there to open up and share their thoughts, ask about your product, offer you work, etc. So you want them to feel comfortable and welcomed, and like what they're saying will be read by an actual, living person.
The contact form is where a user is reaching out to get in touch with you. A thought-out contact page and form is meeting them halfway. Caring about the contact page conveys that you care about what users are sending from said contact page. It's a way of reassuring them that you want them to contact you, their message won't just be shuffled away into some anonymous email account, and they will get a response.
That's not to say that a contact page should be ostentatious; it still needs to be a straight-forward, easy to use page. But I'm always impressed with a contact form or page with a little extra thought put into it, a fun design touch, a delightful interaction, a bit of a twist, some fun, conversational content. These are the contact pages that show that a site truly was thought out, down to the last detail.
Okay, enough talk, let's look at some well-done contact forms and pages!
Continue reading "In Defense of the Humble, Often Overlooked Contact Page"
…And Now a Brief Message About HTML Emails
We've talked about everyone's favorite thing, HTML emails, before. Jim posted an invaluable list of resources. And Keith posted about a buildout trick that will save the day 99% of the time. But I do a lot of HTML emails around here and just read Mathew Patterson's "Create Stunning HTML Email That Just Works!" so I've had them on the brain recently and wanted to share a quick rundown of what Mathew Patterson, and my own fair share of experience, has taught me about the oft maligned HTML email.
Continue reading "…And Now a Brief Message About HTML Emails"
Refresh DC November 2010 Recap: Designing for One Billion People
Refresh DC returned in a big way a week before the Thanksgiving holiday with a top-notch talk on "Designing for One Billion People."
Clearspring's Director of User Experience, Jim Lane, spoke on a number of topics relating to how his company tackled design challenges at tremendous scale. Clearspring builds and supports the AddThis sharing platform and currently serves 2 billion share button views every single day.
Continue reading "Refresh DC November 2010 Recap: Designing for One Billion People"
Consumption: How Inspiration Killed, Then Ate, Creativity
For creatives, the definition of the word "inspiration" has lost its meaning. It's no longer a spark of intuition to solve the uniqueness in a problem, but a search for the current and complacent solutions created by others. As a creative collective the term "inspiration" has driven us to become lethargic to the realities, foundations, and intentions of our chosen craft.
The misinterpretation of inspiration is bred into our culture. In school we are taught by the examples of others, given information to digest and remember, instead of being handed problems to analyze and interpret on our own. As children we are taught to fear failure and to learn from the mistakes of others instead of experiencing them first hand. Many times curriculums centered around creativity and exploration are pushed out of the way to make room for ones rooted in practical application and applied theory. An example of this logic is painfully evident in design schools that focus more time on learning design applications than nurturing creative exploration and development.
Continue reading "Consumption: How Inspiration Killed, Then Ate, Creativity"
Talkin’ Pen Tablet Talk
Up until recently, I was the only one at Viget HQ to regularly use a pen tablet. So naturally it's a bit of a curiosity around here. And before I got mine I was very curious, but worried about buying a relatively expensive accessory like a pen tablet without knowing what they're really like to work with. There are a ton of reviews and information out there on the internet about pen tablets, but I thought I'd talk my personal experience with using a tablet, what's surprised me when I first started using mine, and why it's ultimately an awesome tool for designers.
2011