The Three Golden Keys
A couple weeks ago I had the pleasure of teaching with Haig Armen and a lineup of local design pros in the SFU Publishing Summer Workshops. The course, a four day design intensive, was geared to bring graphic designers and others with careers in publishing into the world of web design.
We structured the four days around creating something concrete rather than just hearing the faculty wax philosophic, and with hypothetical design briefs in hand, the students applied each lecture across the four days and on the final day pitched their concept designs. It was simply incredible to watch the ideas take shape and turn into concepts that I would have loved to work on.
In addition to speaking on research methods, card sorting and sketching, I also presented on usability. There was a real challenge here, as I had 40 minutes or so to speak, but the lessons and methods of usability are too numerous and in-depth to pack into such a small amount of time.
The approach I took was to boil things down to three golden keys, crafted to pair with Kathleen Moynahan’s presentation on usability testing methods. I also included a fourth tip on creating engagement through progressive disclosure and the idea of the Mystery Box, but I won’t go into that to keep that part unique to those who were there.
I could tell you those three keys, but Crissy Campbell at Boxcar Marketing has done a great writeup of them as part of a guide on giving websites an autumn tuneup. Thanks Crissy!
Links
- Haig is the founder and creative director of LiFT Studios
- Kathleen’s website
- SFU Summer Publishing Workshops
- JJ Abrams talks about the mystery box as essential to compelling narrative
