September 2011
1 post
Usability Testing
After reading this article, I am definitely relieved when it comes to financial ability to do usability testing. What I have been mainly wondering is how do small companies afford successful usability tests? This reading definitely answered that question. I really focused on the tips for setting up usability testing and why focusing on some details can be really unnecessary, Time consuming, and...
August 2011
4 posts
Web Typography
Reading these articles was somewhat of review for me, but I still like reading about type and learning how to use it effectively. I think it’s awesome that we are now able to use a specified typeface on a web site. I think this will open up web design and make it much more diverse. The problem however, is licensing, as this article was talking about. Buying a typeface is expensive! and it...
Web Content That Persuades and Motivates
I really like reading this article. Although I have done writing in the past for classes, etc., I have always wondered what goes into writing successful web content. I really appreciated the examples that he gave, comparing the iphone ad with the droid and the other web sites. I just recently watched the movie The Greatest Movie Ever Sold. It was all about product placement and what goes into...
Communicating Design Personas
This reading was unlike many of the readings that we have done so far. Mostly because I have absolutely no knowledge of creating design personas. From what I saw in the article, preparing for design personas is alot of time and alot of work. I completely understand why they are necessary. There are so many sites that I have come across since I started this class that I realize didn’t take...
Wireframes
I am excited this week to be making this first wireframe for the oregon.gov site. We have discussed alot of information in class regarding wireframes so the much of the reading was a little repetitive. I felt like as I read through the document that it was being drilled into my head: simple, simple simple. I’m actually not sure what type of designer I will be: the one who puts more...
July 2011
4 posts
Week 3 - What Users Do
Well First off I will say the obvious: that this reading was much harder to get through then the other ones. Although there was some repetitive information, I did encounter some interesting things that I hadn’t thought about. Such as “Changes in Midstream”, “Deferred Choices” and “Streamlined Repetition”.
I thought deferred choices was interesting...
Week 3 - Don't Make Me Think
One of the things that this article covers that I didn’t think much about is what happens when a user is dropped into a random page of your website through using a search engine like google? The design of the web site should be good enough to where it doesn’t take thought in order to 1. establish where you are and 2. know how to get to where you need to be. Navigation designers can...
Week 2 - Elements of User Experience
This chapter definitely gave me more information on the different roles/jobs of user interface design: navigation design, information architect, interface design. Reading about all the choices that must be made for creating one web site, I have to say that I am actually really glad this isn’t all up to the graphic designer anymore.
However, As the designer, I definitely still want to...
Week 1
After reading this article, I am starting to understand more and more why this class and user interface design is going to be a vital part of my learning as a graphic designer. Although I have only designed two web sites so far, I have come to realize that many of my ideas for future sites may be a little bit to innovative, sacrificing the user’s experience for my personal preference as a...
