It maps things out in "flows", for ex, if user goes here, then they can go here (A) or here(b) and from there they can go to (A) or (C) or (D)... so this is more like a map of rooms than point A to point B storyboarding.
The experience can be related to how we walk through a building... Unless you are an architect, you likely take for granted how everything works to make you feel comfortable (temperature control, safety, lighting, etc). We only really notice things when they don't work or when our experience is not intuitive - such as when you get lost, or when you notice the heat is on too high. Your phone apps or experiences on websites can be seen in a similar way - the good ones are intuitive, easy to navigate, and don't take too long to figure out.
"[Good design] is driven by a vision that guides and justifies every design decision.”
(I wish I heard that as a sophomore.)
PS:
Some more resources that my friend from Google sent me to begin thinking about UX:
This is something I have been thinking a lot about because I am creating a high fidelity social prototype of a phone app for my thesis project. Here at Tyler, we don't have a lot of direction in UX, so I have had to take it upon myself to do a lot of research about it, and I've just begun to scratch the surface of this fascinating subject. In this article, Robert Hoekman - a forefather of UX design - lays out the 13 tenets of user experience. I've found these tips to not only be helpful in my inspiration for my phone app, but also in how I think about design in general.
Coming back to the initial metaphor about how UX is like architecture - Hoekman mentions in this article that good UX design leads rather than manages.
“A user’s experience belongs to the user. An experience cannot be designed. It can, however, be influenced. A designer’s job is to be the influencer.”
Hoekman doesn't go in to any detail about what he means by this, but I'm imagining the antithesis of good user experience to be similar to reading a book: By this, I think he means that good design presents users with options rather than giving them a linear narrative like a book, which only really gives you one option for absorbing information: from point A to point B, or beginning to end.
And to end on a slightly different note about a different tenet - I've been thinking about this tenet for weeks now, and I think that it beautifully sums up something I haven't quite been able to put in to words for the past few years in my experience with design:
(I wish I heard that as a sophomore.)
PS:
Some more resources that my friend from Google sent me to begin thinking about UX:
Emily –
ReplyDeleteThis is a cool topic – I’m glad you’re writing based on information you have learned from self-initiated research. User Experience design is so huge now, and this is a good introduction for your peers who might be interested in breaking into this field when they graduate. Overall, your tone and grammar in your writing looks great, and you use pull-quotes well to break up the flow.
My main critique is that you can make your writing more concise by breaking up long sentences. For example, I’ve revised one below. My suggestion is to re-read your article and pick out instances of wordiness or run-ons that can become more clear.
Example: “Here at Tyler, we don't have a lot of direction in UX, so I have had to take it upon myself to do a lot of research about it(.)I've just begun to scratch the surface of this fascinating subject.”