Design Blues - out of the blue design - san francisco » User Experience

Essence of Good Design

admin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 06:15:31 +0000

Braun Citrus Press User Manual ~1960

The great functionalist designer Dieter Rams gave us ten provocative definitions for good design.

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.

Excellent Tool for Designers and Web Developers

admin — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 19:45:32 +0000

Graphic artists, interface designers, web developers, and user experience designers should check out Pixus. This is a great tool that makes it easier to measure anything on your screen. If you are not into counting pixels, then you will love the preview mode and the ability to lock in the aspect ratio. It is an easy to use Adobe Air application for anyone who needs to crop or re-size anything from photos to ui elements.

Design to Go

admin — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 18:19:17 +0000

The days of cluttering the studio with computers with multiple browser settings are over. Thanks to the Adobe Browser Lab we can now simulate user experience for common browsers and OS systems. Seeing what users see makes it much easier to design. It will also helps trouble-shoot new sites before bug reports show up. This is a huge step forward for our designers.

Website Fonts: Massive Upgrade for the Internet

admin — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 04:07:57 +0000

We finally have an alternative to Arial and Times Roman! Typekit could easily change the way we design websites because it provides designers with the ability to use “real fonts” to keep your corporate identity consistent across all media.

Every major browser now supports the ability to link to a font. This means you can write a bit of CSS, include a URL to a font file, and have your page display the typography you want. For designers and developers, this is a significant step forward. No longer will you need to trap your content in images or Flash just to express yourself visually. Pages will be more usable, accessible, and indexable.

Find out more about Typekit at: http://typekit.com/

Cross Roads: Key to Navigation

admin — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 18:05:06 +0000

Sometimes you need a bit more information to make a decision especially when creating navigation systems for interactive products. Predictability and ease of use are the foundation of a great user experience.