Loving this site because I wasn’t sure if I was the only person that did stuff like this when I was bored/frustrated at the status quo of information design. Best part is the resulting visual conversation that emerged from the widely acknowledged need for the boarding pass overhaul, which is surprisingly carrier agnostic. I love how the process is revealed from rough sketches to finished design to someone adding the most personal of touches (necessary with a crowded market of identical offerings) below. Via Core77.
I don’t remember which Twitter feed led me to this site but it’s definitely worth spending some time on based on variety alone. When it comes to infographics there are plenty of sites dedicated to them, such as graphjam and flowingdata, but few recognize and acknowledge the legacy of geographic maps, newspapers, and textbooks from which they originate. Little more than visual shorthand for displaying data sets these have become increasingly important as of late due to the scale of data points in the cases of finance and the environment. We all heart it when people get witty (or use super clean graphics) in order to enforce their point though.
Sure, this was all over the interwebs a few weeks ago but it has taken me time to re-post because I needed to process it a bit. There are some obvious limitations, first of which being the large scale required in order to make this effective, secondly the battery life in order to make it feasible for long enough to create discernible formations, and third, environmental variables such as wind complicate things. Computing power (insert cloud pun here) wouldn’t really be an issue since the signals would include not much more than: x/y/z coordinates, light intensity/color, battery life, and motor strength/speed.
http://www.vimeo.com/9681874So what about the Flyfire project bothers me? It’s the limitations, at least in the near future, for this display system to be used for anything other than entertainment purposes. Each LED enabled helicopter acting as an independent pixel is remarkable, although it requires precision and synchronization. I did see the perfect application in the next 3-5 years; fireworks which require little precision and can be viewed at a distance which allows the helicopters to be much larger in size which affords greater control. Still a sweet little concept project from SENSEable City Laboratory, as seen on various sites including Giz and Cpluv.
Information Architects posted a great article on designing for the ipad you can find here. It makes mention of the dangers of mixing UI controls and other visual metaphors as well as the best philosophy for viewing the ipad, and how it changes the typical Human/Computer interaction paradigm. It does seem to be Apple’s reinterpretation of computing, but it’s too early to tell how this may effect individual applications as opposed to the obvious reprecussions to the consumption and (eventual) production of multimedia content.
Analog Human/Digital Machine is another in a long line of love notes between Core77 and Portigal Consulting. It’s little more than a conversation about how the fundamental differences between complex data-based systems and perceptions based in evolutionary needs maintain the importance of interaction paradigms. You would think that no one else is having these thoughts based on the pretentious nature of the article, but if you don’t know the history it makes for a nice read.
Oh, and Pasta and Vinegar posted a really nice subset of images from the analog-style paris metro map I wish I had known about when I was living there in ‘99. Images are difficult to read in terms of implementation, but the accompanying content has a nice spin on things.
Harvard Business Review’s UX-centric blogging has been on the rise as of late. Unfortunately they aren’t really covering new topics in the UI/Experience space as much as they are addressing issues the larger business community is unaware of outside of an errant RSS feed or two. The Social Media Bubble and Why Design Thinking Wont Save You are still worth reading, but bear in mind the intended audience–if you read my blog, it’s most likely not you. Either way, their approach of guest bloggers will most likely serve them well over time in this space, they know enough to call in experts.
I worked with a guy (currently a reformed Human Factors researcher) that conducted a similar study with almost identical results; when it comes to progress meters it’s better that they are somewhat animated in nature as opposed to being relatively static (one color or limited to a soft gradient). Anything that tricks users into thinking that time is elapsing faster than reality works to the advantage of the system’s perceived response time. This study takes things one step further in granularity, looking at specific animations. I do have reservations about the design of the study but at a high level the results are consistent so it’s good enough for me. Via Gizmodo.
I recently came to the realization that there are a lot of Usability-related items out there online that I don’t post about on a regular basis. Maybe it’s because it shows off my passion for cognitive processes, or it could possibly be due the fact that research simply isn’t a hot topic for most people. Either way, in an effort to show how split-brained I am I plan on posting one of these ’roundups’ every week or so. Enjoy….or ignore I suppose.
A great process-related .pdf from The Big ReThink conference that shows the importance of being able to sketch (rebranded as ‘Scribing’?) in order to create system maps and illustrate process can be downloaded here. Check out an old article titled ‘Whats In A Number?’ that touches on validating the Virzi approach to usability testing in no smaller sample size than eight. Scrolling and Attention is a recent post from Jacob Nielson which shows that just because content is ‘below the fold’ doesn’t mean that it isn’t as important, or that people won’t read it.
I’m usually a fan of the digital/physical merge. This concept takes things to a whole new level when it comes to interactivity. I heart it. Check out an unusual degree of detail on the concept here. Via Cpluv, who finally returned with a new server this week.
At $2,800 items like this define ‘Limited Edition.’ Not sure what this actually does but still kind of want one? Me too…..Check out the video below for how a lower-end model functions. I assume the higher end would follow suit in terms of the input/response relationship.
Either way it’s stuff like this that convinces me I need a machine shop, or at least access to a laser-cutter+cnc. That being said I still wouldn’t be able to play one like it’s an instrument due to my painful lack of rhythm. Via IA’s killer twitter stream.
For £15 the Date Ruler by André Klauser is better than having a really expensive large scale screenprinted calendar up on the wall. The ‘calendaruler’ is made from polished 1mm stainless steel with 12 inch/months, 31 cm/days and two different colored magnetic rings. Love the magenta and teal since their position on a color wheel mimics their functional relationship. Via IanClaridge.
FlowingData has an excellent series of infocharts called Underloadbased on information culled from various sources. In the case of the image above, the blogger maps out Google responses to ‘Life is like….’ Sure, it’s a little bit ‘GraphJam‘ in nature but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Not sure why ‘Highway’ or ‘Board Game’ aren’t even .5 million data points though, suspect sample perhaps?
