Autodesk Sketchbook Pro

If you're unfamiliar with it, Sketchbook is a desktop / tablet PC application aimed at designers as a tool for quickly sketching out ideas, concepts or simple renderings. While it doesn't offer the same level of realistic simulation of real-world media such as pencils and paints provided by some other applications, its strengths lie in how it enables an emmersive sketching experience.

Its tools quickly feel so second nature that you forget about the application and remain in the flow of what you're working on, something that few applications achieve to this degre

What makes this application feel so 'right'? Here are some of the strengths and a few weaknesses to learn from:

This application is highly specialized to its context, in particular the use of pen input. Marking menus take advantage of spatial memory and allow actions to be made with a single flick of the wrist. A radial set of icons appear to show what actions are available, but you quickly learn which action corresponds to which direction and the gesture becomes second nature without requiring a moment's pause.

Careful attention has been paid to the direction that would be most natural for certain actions. For instance, previous and next page are left and right respectively, adding a layer above is an upward stroke, and so on.

A mistake they made in the first version was to treat undo and redo the same way. What they failed to address is that you often want to do several undo steps in quick succession, and for this repetitive motion marking menus are quickly fatiguing. The repetitive action of undo is more quickly and easily achieved with a button, which they implemented in version

Speaking of flipping pages, a weakness lies in their handling of separate pages as separate files, putting the burden on the user to manage the names and locations of these files. While their defaults work well for when you're working on a single project, it still takes you out of your flow, and is not as natural as just flipping a page. It's even worse if you want to flip between several sketchbooks for different projects.

Another widget that feels perfect is the zoom/pan tool, which can be setup to be invoked by a stylus or pen tablet button. A single ring appears, where dragging around the edges allows you to pan, while the center allows you to zoom. Again, this quickly becomes second nature, allowing you to move around and focus in on any portionnof an arbitrarily big page, without interruption the flow of your work.

One last critique: the name. In general, I find products that tag "Pro" onto their name generally aren't. This one is an exception to that rule, but I think they do themselves a disservice by including the "Pro" in the name.

Sketchbook is a tool that I'm going to continue enjoying to use on a regular basis.

Vélib

BBC radio recently presented an excellent documentary series entitled the Bicycle Diaries. Programme one spoke about Paris' Vélib auotmated public bicycle rental system, and included some very interesting commentary from Vélib designer Patrick Jouin.

The excellent e² series, has also done an episode on Vélib, featuring a number of other people behind Vélib. There's a short excerpt from the series here, and the entire episode can be viewed on e2-series.com in their "Webcasts" section.

Beyond my enthusiasm for both cycling and urban issues, this a great project where urban design, industrial design, service design and interaction design come together to improve life in the city on many level

These documentaries highlighted some of the thinking that went into the design of Vélib:

• Patrick was very cognizant of the potential visual impact of 10,000 bicycles (since increased to 20,000) in the city. While some wanted the bicycles and stations to be brightly colored to draw attention to the new system, he knew that he was designing something for the long term and successfully convinced people to stick with a grey-brown color that would disappear in Paris' existing palette.
• Patrick also spoke of the importance of making something beautiful, so that more people would want to treat it with care rather than destroy it - a real issue when creating a self-serve system used by the public.
• They also wanted the system and bicycles to be seen as sleek and stylish, to shake Parisians' association of bicycles with the olden days.
• The creators of Vélib carefully analyzed successful and unsuccessful bike sharing programmes in other cities. In so doing, they recognized that for it to be successful, it had to have a critical mass of 10,000 bikes from day one. Otherwise, potential users would have a bad experience not being able get a bike, and that would forever taint their perception the service. We've all seen the fate of many projects that were thrust upon their audience before they were 100%, in the mistaken belief that they could evolve over time. As designers, it's often our responsibility to argue against going public with a half-baked solution. When I'm comes to bike sharing programs, many cities around the world are now trying to recreate Vélib's success. I truly hope they are successful, but fear they will not follow Vélib's lesson of investing enough to ensure success from day one, rather than trying to start with a half-hearted "pilot project" that is doomed to marginalisation and failure.
• They also spoke of how they didn't simply copy other successful systems, but adapted Vélib to the particular context and needs of Paris, something that so many people fail to appreciate when they try to duplicate a success.

Vélib has been enormously successful. This can be seen not only in the figures of 80,000 users per day, but also in ways that the designers could only have hoped or imagined:

• The 1500 stations have become centers of neighborhood activity. Users help one other with the bicycles. People use the stations as places to meet up with one another.
• In an interesting example of grassroots interaction design by users of a system, Parisians have taken to turning the seat backwards as a way to tell other users that a particular bicycle has a flat tire or other problem.
• Users speak of the joy of getting around by bike, and the feeling of being more aware of and connected to the city.
• Beyond the immediate but relatively small positive effect of all these people cycling rather than using more energy-intensive modes of transport, Vélib seems to be starting a deeper transformation. These documentaries spoke of the streets no longer being seen as the exclusive domain of cars, and how riding of personally owned bicycles has risen severalfold since the introduction of Vélib.

Interaction 09 Wrap-Up: Best Quotes

To wrap-up my series of posts on the highlights of the Interaction 09 conference, here are some of my favourite quotes of the things I heard:

• Kars Alfrink, in his talk on Play and Tangible Interactions, cut through all the debate that's been happening around the definition of Interaction Design, how the title User Experience Designer is inappropriate since you cannot design someone's experience, and what we should call ourselves anyways. Kars likes to call himself a "Possibility Architect". Brilliant.
• In the same talk, Kars quoted Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman from their book Rules of Play: "Play is free movement within a more rigid structure"
• "I learn by going where I need to go" - Theodore Roethke via Dan Saffer
• Our job is to create the "The Right thing, at the right time, in the right place, for the right person", and "To create interactions that go beyond needs & expectations" - Miles Rochford

And then there was Dan Saffer's "Danifesto" that was full of quotable points that really capture some important points that we all need to take to heart:

• "Stop fetishizing simplicity"
• "There are no best practices"
• "Nobody gets excited about wireframes"
• "Follow the emotion"
• "belief & attention are the same fact"
• "make the visible invisible, and the invisible visible"
• focus on creating "beautiful, meaningful, functional products"
• to raise awareness of our profession, we need to "make interaction design stars"
• and last but not least, forget about trying to define Interaction Design - "Each individual defines personal frames of his role ... move between frames."
 Dan then went out to point out that UCD (User-Centered Design), ACD (Activity-centered design), and Genius Design are frames too, and none are the 'right' way to do things all the time.

Interaction 09: Parti

Luke Wroblewski's talk at the Interaction 09 conference was entitled "Parti and the Design Sandwich". As I mentioned in my post on the highlights of the conference, I didn't feel that the design sandwich portion of the talk brought a lot new, the parti part was worthwhile.

Luke spoke of how he's been influenced by the book 101 Things I Learned in Architecture School. One of the things talked about in the book is the importance of having a parti. Parti refers to the central idea of concept in a building / project. In architecture, it typically takes the form of a diagram illustrating the general organization and it's a phrase describing its experiential and aesthetic sensibility, such as "finger pointed into woods" or "odd shapes intrude into pure space".

Although different people call it by different names in Interaction Design, I agree about the value of having a clear statement of the essence of what it is you're building. Not only does it help to ensure that everyone involved in the project is working towards the same vision, but it can be invaluable in helping to guide design decisions.

Some of the key things that Luke said about parti are:

• Parti, as it relates to Interaction Design, derives from customer insights, market factors, and resource alignment.
• Poor designers will attempt to hold on to a failed parti. When you realize that your parti is not leading you to a successful design, don't attempt to cling on to it, but don't abandon the idea of having a parti altogether. Instead, use your old failed parti as a helpful indicator of where to go next, and create a new parti.
• "The design process is the struggle to create a uniquely appropriate project"

Interaction 09: Foundations of Interaction Design

As I mentioned previously, David Malouf's talk at the Interaction 09 Conference was about establishing a common language and understanding for the foundations of interaction design.

To set the stage for his talk, Dave began by referring to the foundations for design domains such as industrial design, as summarized in Gail Greet Hannah's book Elements of Design. In such domains, the common understanding of the foundations such as line, plane, volume, value and color serve as a basis for discussion when designers are critiquing one another's work.

This led into the focus of his talk, which was asking the question as to what are really the foundations of interaction design that we can use to facilitate critique of aesthetics in our field

Below are the foundations that he spoke about. While there's certainly plenty of room for debate as to whether this is the list, he certainly hits on many of the important elements that are at the core of IxD.

• Time: duration, frequency, rhythm (predictable vs syncopated), delay
• Abstraction: level of directness
• Metaphor: map what we see to real world explanation
• Motion: pleasing movements (aesthetics), intuitive gestures

In response to the question of whether behavior is one of the foundations, he made the astute observation that behaviour is not a foundation - it's not part of what we are building. Rather, "we craft conditions that ... insist on behaviour".

Interaction 09: Sketchbook Techniques

As I mentioned in my post on the highlights of the Interaction 09 conference, Tim Wood's talk was aimed at how to get the most out of your sketchbook.

During his session, he used examples from the notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo, among others, to illustrate techniques we can use to help refine our craft.

These are some of the techniques he spoke about:

• Resolve only as Needed - This may be obvious to many, but it's a useful reminder. The purpose of the sketch is generally not to fully detail everything, but to focus on one aspect and refine that. In other words, only draw one part at a a time, leave everything else vague. Resolve just one issue, then move on.
• Focus - Take a thematic approach to each page.
• Draw & redraw - Again, this will be natural to many, but it's useful to remember that simply repating the simple act of drawing is a great way to passively stimulate new ideas.
• Overdraw - The message here is to not to put each idea on a separate page, but to let ideas overlay and flow into one another on a single page, as this juxtaposition can lead to new combinations and new insights
• Never erase - Because I like to work digitally, I'm accustomed to constantly modifying and rearranging my sketches. I realize, though, that this means I can loose earlier ideas, and can ocassionally get too focussed on perfecting the sketch rather than letting the ideas it evolve naturally
• Be page conscious - Tim's suggestion here is to use your sketchbook as a way to flex your composition skills. I think he also makes a good point that create some visual interest in your sketchbook can help to further inspire you.
• Notate - A good reminder. It may be tempting not to write down details that we have in our head, but the simple act of notating our sketches is a great way to force ourselves to really explore details more deeply.
• Cut & paste - Tim encouraged us, when we have something interesting, be it something sketched on the steretypical napkin, printed from the computer or cut out from a magazine, to encorporate it directly into our sketchbooks. It certainly serves to make the sketchbook more varied, interresting and tactile.
• Return to what you've done - Again, something we know intuitively, but it's good to remind ourselves that returning to a previous idea with a fresh eye can lead to new insights. Here, Tim referred to a quote from da Vinci: "art is never finished, only abandoned"

ToneGrid

Here's a fantastic merger of music and computers.

It's Stimulant's foray into designing a collaborative music composition tool for the Microsoft Surface.

They're the first to admit that they've been heavily influenced by the work if Toshio Iwai. But I also think they've brought a lot to the table (pun intended) in how they've designed this music application.

Their goal was to make something that novice musicians could walk up to and compose music that works. At the same time, you can see that more experienced musicians could also have a lot of fun with this, and create some more nuanced music.

Check it out.

Interaction 09: Designing Natural Interfaces

One of the highlights of the Interaction 09 conference for me was the session on Designing Natural Interfaces by Nathan Moody of Stimulant.

As described by Nathan, Stimulant is an agency focused on design work for comptuers that don't look like computers. A lot of the work they're doing is on wall-sized interactive installations, which invite the public to walk up and immediately start exploring.

Natural user interfaces are characterized by touch and multi-touch interaction, where traditional computer UI widgets take a background to interacting directly with the content. Designing for such interfaces requires us to rethink a lot of the habits and assumptions that we may bring from a GUI design background.

Here are some of the things Nathan touched on during his talk:

• GUI vs NUI - GUI is for accuracy, NUI is for creating less of a feeling of work, allowing you to suggest an emotional association to play.
• Direct Manipulation - Eliminate proxy controls to create immersion; instead of traditional GUI controls alongside the content, the content is the interface itself. Touch, drag, and push around the content to interact with it.
• Unlearning GUI Design Habits - This is an example of having to unlearn past habits - never control by proxy what you can control directly.
• Users have a desktop habits too - Remember that people's expectations will come from their desktop computer experiences
• Needs to be guessable - without the affordances provided by a GUI, people need to be able to quickly figure out what they can do.
• Realizing that it's Interactive - For public displays, the furst hurdle is that people to need recognize that something is interactive. Stimulant has been successful with the approach of encouraging exploration vs explicitly instructing.
• Imply touchability - and make it something that a person feels like they want to touch
• Trust People's Curiosity
• Always keep Occlusion in Mind - Always think about blocking of the display by hands, or even other users in a multi-user installation, and design accodingly. For instance, have things appear immediately above where the user touched.
• Foregiveness - Rethink defensive design, since every input is recognized.
• Don't be afraid to make things hyper-real - The classic dragging photos on a table is the perfect example of real vs. hyper-real. They look real, like photos on a table, and can be dragged arround and re-arranged as if they were real photos. However, you can do things that you can't do in the real world, like stretching a photo to make it larger.
• Real World Gestures Matter
• Understand Egonomics - He pointed people to the classic egonomics book "The Measure of Man and Woman".
• Consider showing both text & objects

Interaction 09: Highlights

It was great to go to the Interaction '09 conference in Vancouver Canada a few weeks ago.

I feel I've come home feeling energized from the conference. Now that I have a chance to reflect back on the conference, there are definitely a few highlights that have stuck with me:

• Carpe Diem - A "Danifesto", as one Twitterer aptly dubed it in the moments leading up to Dan Saffers's talk, this was an energizing call to action. Dan's messages were around focussing on what it important in design, rather than getting bogged down in definitions of our roles, or oversimplified and overcodified ways of approaching design.
• Sketchbook Techniques - Are you making the best use of your sketchbook? Tim Wood's talk provided some concrete techniques to apply to your sketching, such as giving a theme to each page, allowing ideas to overlay and flow into one another, and returning to refine and redraw what you've sketched previously.
• Foundation and Critique - If you look at a design field such as architecture or industrial design, designers have a common language to use when critiquing one another's work, based on foundations such as line, plan, and volume. David Malouf spoke about establishing a common language for the foundations of interaction design, such as time, motion, abstraction, and metaphor.
• Natural Interfaces - Nathan Moody of Stimulant gave an interesting talk about natural interfaces and work being done with "computers that don't look like computers". The focus of is talk was the need to rethink the habits we've learned from the GUI world, which he presented very well. I also liked that he accompanied his talk with interesting and inspiring examples of work that other designers are doing - something that I wished for more of in other sessions.
• Parti - While the "Design Sandwich" part of Luke Wroblewski's talk didn't connect with me, his comments on having a Parti - something that captures the central idea or concept of a project - were very valuable. So many projects lack a clear vision of the core essence of what is being built, that can bring focus and help to guide design decisions.

If you'd like to see videos of any of the sessions, keep an eye on ixda.org, where the IxDA folks are planning to release several per week over the next little while.

Interaction 09

Registration is now open for IxDA'sInteraction 09 conference taking place in Vancouver, Canada on the 5th - 8th of February 2009. It looks like an exciting lineup of speakers, and it seems the previous conference also attracted a great group of attendees. I'm hoping to make the trip over there to take it in this time around.

Just some of the highlights I see are:

• Design Studio half-day workshop led by Liquidnet's Liya Zheng. From the description: "Interaction Design is a young field that spans many industries. Many of us learned the tools of the trade on the job ... bring together conference participants who are interested in seeing how others practice the craft"
• Drawing Ideas led by Mark Baskinger and William Bardelis looks at approaches to rapidly sketching ideas.
• A keynote by John Thackara.
• A roundtable discussion led by Jared Spool of UIE.
• A keynote by Fiona Raby of the CRD Research studio at the Royal College of Art, and co-author of Design Noir: The Secret Life of Electronic Products.
• Rhythm of Interaction led by Peter Stahl of eBay.
• Metaphor Brainstorming led by Chaucey Wilson of Autodesk.
• Design for Life by Identifying the Lifecycle of an Experience led by German Leon of Vodafone. The synopsis starts with the very promising: "Experience design has become a very popular term these days. Most designers believe that we can design an experience, which is not the case, and experience is something that we can improve or simply think through."
• Bringing Design Critique to Interaction Design led by David Malouf
• Lo-Fi Sketchbook Techniques for Interaction Designers led by Tim Wood of EffectiveUI.
• Journeys in Motion led by Chloe of R/GA.