Ooh la la prototyping

dorelvis — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 00:11:09 +0000

Just had a really great conversation with my team about innovation, mental models, navigation and visual hierarchy. What helped spark all this great thinking? An interactive prototype showing three slightly different versions of an idea. The designer worked with a prototyper – it took about a week to turn around, because as it was coded she began to codify the design and work through the interactions. The team topped it all off with an interesting design review where we openly discussed the various model’s successes and failures, what we might change/add, and how we might use the prototypes to sell our idea.

Now this may not seem out of the ordinary for many of you, but our development model here has been not to waste effort, and that means prototype using reusable code. For me, that just defeats the purpose, but changing how things are done is not an easy feat. I am working to sell the idea of prototyping at all levels – from designers and dev to PMs and biz folks. But its slow.

In the past, I’ve been all about prototyping – from quick and dirty paper sketches to throw-away html. Or full-color mocks linked to mimic an interactive experience. Depending on what we were trying to learn of course. We are designing interactive experiences – we need to think about those interactions, and only using mocks/wireframes doesn’t always cut it. We have to think about the entire experience.

RANT: I am so old

dorelvis — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 01:24:44 +0000

In NY I stayed at the Paramount Hotel. The website talks about “lobby socializing,” and I say, yeah — you have to socialize in the lobby because your room is so small you can’t actually fit another person in it.

My room was just barely bigger than the queen-size bed.

There were no extra outlets, except in the bathroom, so if I had had a place to put my laptop (there was a small cafe table, but the artful lamp was so low to the table that I couldn’t open the screen) there was no place to plug it in. I ended up unplugging the clock.

The bed was on the floor. This is NY guys! I’m not sleeping on the floor – who knows whats down there?

There was a small closet with 6 hangers. Inside the closet was a small “dresser.” In quotes because it wasn’t as nice as something you might buy at IKEA. Three drawers — about 10 in x 6 in with a 3 in depth. So I could almost fit my underwear and socks in it — but no place for my actual clothes.

There was a full-length mirror on the bathroom door — but to actually stand in front of it meant I’d be standing on the bed.

The space for the toilet was maybe 24 inches. not very much room to manuver if you get my drift.

The elevators were each lighted with colored lamps — but they weren’t very bright. I’m not getting into a blue elevator with some stranger I can barely see in NYC at 3 am. Just not gonna.

And can we discuss the hallway lighting? Pretty. Dim. Not good for NYC at 3 am. Not very conforting.

I was fracking longing for a holiday inn! I’d trade trendy for functional any day. Substance over style.

Dorelvis » rants

Ooh la la prototyping

RANT: I am so old