Author: immst184

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Chapters 3, 4, and 5

1. Ethnographic tools are used to determine how users experience a product and what can be improved upon. In the case of an online banking website, these tools could be used you can keep track of what features users are interacting with the most and which features they are having the most trouble with. It could also be used to predict some features that users might be looking for but don’t currently exist on the site.

2. In a way the design process is never truly done. It can always be improved upon with aspects being added or removed. However, a design process can be considered done once it is able to serve a user and offer a purposeful experience. Upon reaching that stage it can be sold and marketed.

3. A product family I use every day is drinks. I’ll usually reach for a water or a tea, but I will drink Gatorade if I am exercising or playing a sport. It has been branded as a drink to be consumed before, during, or after physical activity and I associate it with that type of experience.

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Objectified Response

I agreed with pretty much everything the designers in “Objectified” had to say. They’ve spent their whole lives working in the design field so they are able to speak from experience and give a much better idea of what their lifestyle is actually like.
A few things stood out to me that changed how I thought about design. First of all, I never really thought about how almost everything I interact with on a daily basis went through a design process of some sort. Certain objects go through a more rigorous and thoughtful process, but even the most basic items had to be designed by someone at some point. Another thing that stood out to me was the idea of designing objects for “wearing in over wearing out.” The concept of creating items that improve over time and give the user more of an experience the longer they own it is intriguing. I don’t think this applies to everything though. Smartphones are incredibly difficult to design for “wearing in”. The technology is changing so fast, and unless you can constantly take the phone apart and continuously upgrade it on pace with the advances of technology you’re stuck buying a new device every few years to stay relevant.
Before watching the documentary I defined design as the “creation and construction of objects.” My definition after watching hasn’t changed that much but I think that there is more to it than simply coming up with an idea for something and making it. There is thought, observations, and testing that all factor into the creation of something.

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Review #2

For my one page website I decided to review brand.strv.com.  SRTV is a software development company that prides itself on beautiful design and intuitive functionality. Their “brand” section is an entire one page site devoted to sharing with potential customers the ideas behind their design while also showing off what they are capable of creating.

 

The experience begins with a fullscreen animated welcome screen with an arrow at the bottom prompting you to scroll down.  Upon scrolling, the welcome screen moves up and leaves the screen. The user is greeted with a page of mostly white space with a short paragraph about the company accompanied by some graphics in the center and a vertical menu on the left.  The menu allows you to skip up and down within the page, but it acts as a bit of a distraction from the experience.  Someone who wasn’t aware that the page was meant to be navigated as one page might take this as a typical homepage and use the navigation menu to, well, navigate.

 

As far as color and texture goes, the site keeps things simple.  Everything is flat, clean, and simplistic.  The majority of color on the screen is dominated by black, red, and white.  In fact, there’s a section on the page that shows these three colors and states that the company never uses anything else but these three.  The only use of other colors is when examples are given of what NOT to use, and even these are crossed out with red lines of the same color.  


Overall, I like the consistency within this site and I think the company who created it did a great job of portraying their brand’s idea and thought process.  As someone interested in design I learned a bit from this and might use some of their ideas of design in the future.
I give this site four <div> tags out of five, and I’ll throw in a bonus hex color code of #EFOD33 to honor their brilliant shade of red.

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Review #1!!!!!

Newegg has been my go-to website for years now when it comes to electronics. I’ve watched the site change and evolve over the last half decade, and I’m familiar with how the site works in its current state.  That being said, I do have some critiques.  First of all, the site comes off as a slightly more cluttered, less visually appealing version of Amazon.  The general layout is the same: Welcome banner, search bar at the top, and products below.  All the core components are their, but they seem to be arranged in a less efficient way than the competitor. Searching for and a product is simple, and it “doesn’t make you think.” You know instinctually to type what you want in the search bar, select the product from the auto-suggestion drop down menu. I chose a somewhat specific product (Intel i7 6700k Processor) and the process was as smooth as I could have hoped for. It was the top result on the page and I was viewing it in 2 clicks. As I hovered my mouse of the “Add to cart” button, another element of the page loaded on a delay.  My cursor was now above an option to add a 1 year replacement plan for $25.  I don’t know if this was intentional or if my internet was simply lagging a bit, but it acted as a hiccup in the buying experience and threw me off for a second.  Regardless, I managed to add the item to my cart.  Unlike Amazon, which offers a “proceed to checkout” option, I found myself on a page encouraging me to choose from one of their numerous protection plans (again) and a “proceed to cart” option. The whole process felt like I was dealing with the annoying associate at the register trying to sell me on additional charges I didn’t want. I understand this from the perspective of Newegg, but most people already know ahead of time if they’re going to get a protection plan. Eventually I made it to the checkout which was a smooth and easy process. I was able to checkout as a guest and had the confirmation page within a few minutes.  Overall, I think NewEgg is functional and gets the job done, but could use some visual tweaks.