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Showing posts from September, 2016

EXAMPLE FOR FILIPE

https://www.dropbox.com/s/id2hfrd1y8o091h/example.zip?dl=0

Don't Make Me Think Response

Something that popped out of the reading is the section is was " Everything can't be important!" As designers, we are often told how to be thoughtful about what we are placing within a design. I feel like we fret about the tiniest details within the design because we are always told everything is important. It was refreshing to know that we don't always need to sweat what's important .

Don't Make Me Think

The conversational tone of Don't Make Me Think  subtly communicates exactly what the author is intending to convey in the literal content. The book itself is a well-designed representation of proper formatting and scannable design. Additionally, in recent years, most content on the web has transitioned to the conventional, scannable style that Krug describes in chapters 2 and 3. Any given article on a brand blog or news outlet will feature clear headings, easily interpreted bullet points, and well-positioned call-to-action sections. These elements take into account the user's natural inclination to scan , not read, while allowing for a greater absorption of information. Effective web design will increasingly rely on understood conventions of user behavior. Now more than ever, Steve Krug's insights are relevant to increase usability and engagement in online content.

Don't Make Me Think ch.1-3 (Thoughts)

It's crazy that the world wide web doesn't just stop at what is given to the users by the creator. The creator can't just create for themselves and their view on how things should operate/work. The idea that things should be self evident or if not evident, explanatory is brilliant. Without thinking about the customer and users, the world wide web would not be where it is now. There will be frustration and either the user will blame the creator or blame themselves for not knowing what to do and this is where competition comes into play. If a user feels a web site is too complicated then they will go to a website where things are clearer to them. Then there are those who have no choice but to continue using the site but with a bad review, word will get out and people with stop using your site because it is not efficient enough and someone will make something better eventually. Complexity and layout makes a difference in design. The three "fact of life":We don'

Reflections on "Don't make me think"

Don't make me think exposes many aspects of the web that we take it for granted because we are born in the internet generation. First, the terms that he uses are very understandable by most readers because it is direct and it has a natural conversation tone. After all, chapter 3 got my attention because it has a down to earth approach on the design aspects of the webpages. As Krug writes, certain features of a webpage are definitely safe if following traditional approaches. The best comparison to it is the stop sign one, as red and green are universally accepted as stop and green respectively. Krug points out many aspects of web design that we take for granted but still can be further explored. First, a web page is not a book page, so the visualization process of a page is affected by its content presentation. Also, web layouts have many aspects that users are used to for years, as where logo or menus should be places for easy identification. However, designers that break traditi

OFFICE HOURS

Hey everyone I know i may have been a little difficult to track down this past few weeks. With moving and settling in and a bunch of final move details, my schedule has been a little fuzzy but i wanted to share that my OFFICE HOURS will officially be T W TH 3-5 PM Or by Email appointment if you need longer than 30 minutes of help [i will spend as much time with you as needed if there is no one waiting of course] If no one is there by 4PM I will be in SPLASH PAD Thanks for your patience as i have gotten settled here @ UCONN. Evening Classes are new for me :-) Patrick

Ch. 3 Response

Chapter three of the textbook talks about how the overall look of the website is very appealing to anyone who's interested. I think it was very helpful how this chapter talks about hierarchy on a web design. It helps designers to shift the user's attention depending on its color, text font and image. This chapter referenced the newspapers's headlines where the bigger the font the more relevant the story will be. This reminds me of html coding, with heading elements with h1, h2, h3 and so on.  Complex websites for newspapers, blogging, or business have a lot of context. It was very helpful to understand how this chapter explained to put containers on each section of the website and put hierarchy on each container. It was also helpful that this chapter showed how to break up pages on a website. To not put a solid vibrant border around it but make it more appealing into the eyes. Seeing photos of web designs back then made me think about how important color palettes are.

Chapter 3 Response

The first thing I read in chapter 3 is the author telling us about stops signs and how the color and shape always tells us that we need to stop. Red is a color that stands out among others and there was a design process behind the stop sign. Same with every car, if each gas pedal was in a different place for every car then we will have a bunch of confuse users. I believe that this applies to the web. It is good to innovate like the author said but it is very important to understand the value of what we are replacing. I think the web is something we can do a lot of things, designing a website can have a lot of possibilities. Just browsing through the chrome experiments we can see that there are many ways to manipulate particles and there a tons of cool designs out there. But how do we make them innovative and user friendly?  We do have to keep in mind our headers or at least highlight the most important things while we are designing out website. The author mentions that is im

Response to "Don't Make Me Think!" by Steve Krug

This definitely is not the first time I've read this book. I've probably read it at least 3 times by now since I first found it in my high school sophomore year. At that time, I was only making websites as a hobby and hadn't considered it as something I could potentially make a career out of. One of the things I love about the book is that Krug also practices what he preaches. The book is easily scannable, easily readable (using concise vernacular), and is a very unintimidating read. The concepts that Krug talks about (in these chapters, 1-3) are timeless ideas. I think that the most important chapter in this set is the second one, describing how people don't follow any optimal path the designer has set for them. User behavior is the thing you absolutely cannot control in an environment that developers are used to being able to fine tune. Even if everything is 'technically' correct, if you don't keep in mind and attempt to plan for real user behavior, you

reflection on 'don't make me think'

Chapter 3 really caught my eye. When I first read about "conventions," I really didn't know what the author was talking about. Once I started reading, I realized what conventions were. Stop signs all have a universal meaning/ look to them for a reason. Cars all have a universal set-up for a reason. Websites really have changed over time with the layout. It's so different than every day things we're all used to seeing (cars/ stop signs). People expect there to be a logo and a navigation bar, but there are plenty of designers that want to 'break the rules' and do what makes them happy, not what others want. That's what I love about web design. You can do whatever you want. You can create whatever content you want because it's about YOU (well, at least a portfolio site). Doing things against what other people say is a hard thing, especially when society is expecting certain things out of you (certain placements on the website, certain content, cer

Don't make me think.

The first thing that got my attention on this book was the kind of language it uses. It is very conversational; it applies humor to a subject that can sometimes be boring. The result it is an engaging read for us.  I like the way the author often analyses the human behavior and attitudes toward the web. For example, in chapter 2 he states "We don't read pages. We scan them." He explains his observation, illustrates it with an unusual analogy – the point of view of a dog when its owner is giving orders – and makes a conclusion.  On that topic, I totally agree with Krug. We only see what is interesting to us while we are online. Unless you have a lot of spare time, we often go online to find specific information or personal interests and we bypass everything that is not related to what we are trying to find.  He goes on with that scanning process in chapter three. The way information is presented online must be simplified. Designers shouldn't treat text like

Conventional web design? Would you go this way?Chapter 3 thoughts

There are many things you can do when you are a designer. As a designer you want to be the most creative you can be, you want to explore new things and be innovative. Why not? This is why we have been studying all of these years to become "artists" of the web, animation, marketing... There are many things we always want to end up doing, and I am pretty sure we all want to land in a job and be the best we can be... but did you know that sometimes is good to use the conventional and let your creative self to one side. Being conventional does not mean that you are not a creative person, it means that you know that sometimes to achieve what your audience is going to interact with, you have to keep what they already know. For example, as explained in chapter 3: the stop sign. It does not change even if you are in another place of the world.It is always red and with the same shape; the reason being that conventions make life easier to digest! When designing for the web, there a

The Medium is the Medium (Thoughts a Little late with this).

Marshall Mcluhan understood the transfer from oral communication to print communication. From my understanding he believed that there will be a balance where all of our senses would be unified and understood in different ways. I believe he began to talk about the internet as we know it today. The idea that any consumer can become a creator to potentially appeal to others around the world doing animations, Vlogs, and many more kinds of great content to match the style of the medium. People who create content on the WWW are subconsciously writing language to the new medium and is why new innovations are important and have to continue to happen.  The technology that transfers the message, changes us and the society we live in.

VR and Snapchat Issue #50

I found this particular section of Issue #50 in Dev Dinner kinda of surprising. Before reading this issue I had thought of VR as a newer technology that has yet to come to market at a mass scale however this particular section of Issue#50 was all about particular VR enthusiast to follow on snapchat. Reading about how the are already influencers on snapchat dedicated to VR shows me not only how much more quickly VR is coming to the market but it also demonstrates how much more quickly early adaptors take into account new technology. While most people only consider what new mediums will look like web designers have the task of thinking how they will design for these new mediums and VR is no exception. 

Issue #54 - Dev Diner

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Dev Diner - Daniel Corey on making MORIARTY, his virtual reality comic

      For the Dev Diner assignment I chose to read " Daniel Corey on making MORIARTY, his virtual reality comic ." The article interviews Daniel Corey, a comic book artist that has been pioneering incorporating VR in his comic book, MORIARTY. When Daniel talks about the process that goes into making  his VR comicI can help but to smile. He talks about elements that I am somewhat similar with. He mentions that layer division that he goes through in photoshop, along with help he receives from the company VRLA. Even though I am a currently a novice in many programs, I can understand the concepts that are mentioned in by Daniel. I find the premise of reading a comic book as an interactive experience to be highly interesting. I love reading comics and manga. I've seen websites incorporate music into their comic books, and it really enhances the experience and sometimes adds emphasis to a certain scene.

devdiner - cassie

https://devdiner.com/opinion/why-snapchat-making-augmented-reality-glasses-isnt-that-bad-an-idea I'm obsessed with social media, so to read that snapchat was thinking AR glasses was awesome to me. I've seen Google's cardboard glasses and haven't tried them, but it seems so cool. After reading this, I really didn't realize how much Snapchat has changed over time. I know it's made huge changes over the years, but it never really stuck in my head that they were legitimately big changes. With the filters and the stories in Snapchat, it definitely may be leading up to a AR aspect. That's what I love about how they're being secretive about it. We won't know until they truly release it and all the speculations will begin.

Dev Diner

After reading Why Snapchat making augmented reality glasses isn't THAT bad an idea  on Dev Dinner, I have a couple of thoughts. First off, Snapchat is low key in the best position out of all the tech companies (hardware and software) to integrate augmented reality into everyday life. It's already getting its users hooked on augmented faces and what not, which has a huge following in the Millennials-and-younger generation (this would be a prime target for quick adopters to new augmented reality hardware). Traditional hardware companies like Apple produce hardware platforms (computers, phones, etc.), where AR hardware may have a harder time catching on and proving useful in the short-term (think the initially slow sales of the Apple Watch). Snapchat, on the other hand, can release a quick AR hardware package with limited yet powerful functionality in the form of glasses and integrate that nicely with its own app. Also, reading a website named Dev Diner makes me hungry. Sour

Dev Diner#50-VR Snapchat

Virtual Reality (VR) is on the rise and now Snapchat will be here to document the whole experience but wait will they also be joining the market? When VR is mentioned I think of the functions and how the marketing for a VR product would work. I supposed influencers would be a good technique since most people are on social in today’s world. Snapchat has such a strong user base and addictive face filters seem to have a strong plan in action for their augmented reality glasses named “Spectacles”. Some of the features included are Bluetooth that will post directly to Snapchat and 115-degree angle lens that are closer to our eyes. Being one of snapchats loyal customers I am extremely excited for what is to come!

BlokDust Experience

Confusing website at first, but nothing that a little exploration and some time playing with it can solve it. This is what I came up with: https://blokdust.com/?c=NJpZNvq2-&t=Blokgen%20Vols Wish I could figure out ways of creating something less linear or didn't loop.

Dev Diner Issues: Elon Musk

In the Issue #41 on the Dev Diner website there was a link redirecting to an interview with one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the world – he is the CEO of Tesla and owns a spaceship agency company, SapceX.  In the discussion among many topics, he mentions how simulations and reality are becoming more and more indistinguishable from each other. He is concerned about the use of Artificial Intelligence and is watching it closely. He invested on one AI in California company just to watch over its outcomes rather than for profit. He is afraid other leaders in the industry won't be as careful as he is and will end up using their advanced resources for wrong purposes.  I think is interesting that a person with such knowledge and power on his hands cares about the future of technology. I think he is right that we should be making sure our virtual escapes and simulations don't take over our real life, this would defy the purpose of human existence.  It's no wond

Pokemon Go Reality Check

Overall, the article   It is time for a Pokemon Go augmented reality check, was a refreshing read. Video games are something of a hobby for me, so the article reinforced some of the trends I had been noticing within the  gaming community. For a gamer like me, these changes are not so new.  From a developer and content creator standpoint, the easy access and simplistic nature of the Pokemon Go AR makes it easier to introduce AR capabilities to the general public. As developers, we know the technology to make AR in apps is possible, but what can make or break an app is  the ease of use and the familiarity of AR to the user. Pokemon Go is a stepping stone for early adapters, helping other developers experiment with AR.

Dev Diner: E-Skin

The e-skin is a sticker that's flexible and thin enough to be applied on your skin with LED lights on it. The article talks about how this can be applied to many different technologies but completely disagrees on selling this product to people. I completely agree with the statement because LED on skin will definitely raise skin irritation in the long-term effect. However, if this e-skin allows LED light to be flexible, this can trigger a new design for screens and how we can access them other than attaching them on our skin in the future. The article also mentions how AR can be applied to the e-skin by targeting depressive people who are stuck in their own perception of the world and are afraid to interact with anyone else in the real world. I think, if this e-skin can be applied to clothing like gloves, it can be very useful to help people interact with digital object.

Virtual Reality Comic

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My strange blokDust sound!

Here is the link to the "sound" music i created on blokdust! https://blokdust.com/?c=EyR01gun-&t=Poiqwetyuowoeirutpoiqwe

Mixed reality video: the best way to show your VR app to the world

When I started to read this article, I asked myself "that is a good question... how do you should the world how an app or a game in VR works if they people watching are not living it? Well, You could take snapshots and lose the opportunity to sell the app and game you created... but what this article tells us is that the best way to advertise VR is by doing mixed reality videos. But... how do we do that? Doing a video like this involves not only the the VR experience, but what the person in that VR experience feels like. So how does it look like? Well, you will see the real person in the Virtual world all at once! Isn't this a great idea?