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The Process |
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The process of design if often simplified into a five step process that covers the basics of any HCI creation.
1. Empathize:
Put yourself in the shoes of your users. By getting a better view of what any user may or may not want in the design, you've given yourself a base to work off of, and a mindset to use.
2. Define:
Now that we know who we're making our design for, it's important to get a concrete idea of what this means. We now build out and define a problem statement using the needs and wants of our users. This gives us something we can continuously look at during the entire process, a concrete definition of what we want to do and what requirements we need to look out for.
3. Ideate:
With a more concrete definition of what is needed, we can now start the more "fun" part of design, ideation. In this stage the goal is to get as many ideas as possible written down. No idea is "bad", and no idea is perfect. It's important not to get attached to a single design in this phase.
4. Prototype:
This is when you can start taking a more critical viewpoint at all of the ideas you've created. It's time to flesh some of them out into a stronger more compelling design. Some designs will fail, and others will flourish. This is the phase where we find out which ones work. This often includes pushing the design into a physical state that requires more attention to detail.
5. Test:
The last phase. Now that you've got those couple design mostly figured out, it's time to test it. This is where you find out if your design really worked. Do people like it? Is it feasible? If you still have these questions by the end of this phase, you haven't tested it enough.
It's possible, and even likely that you finish these five steps without finding a good design that fits the requirements. At this point, we need to repeat steps. What step you return to is up to you. Did your problem definition (2) put you on the wrong path? Maybe you just need more ideas and sketches to work with (3).
Do this until you get the design you were looking for.
1. Empathize:
Put yourself in the shoes of your users. By getting a better view of what any user may or may not want in the design, you've given yourself a base to work off of, and a mindset to use.
2. Define:
Now that we know who we're making our design for, it's important to get a concrete idea of what this means. We now build out and define a problem statement using the needs and wants of our users. This gives us something we can continuously look at during the entire process, a concrete definition of what we want to do and what requirements we need to look out for.
3. Ideate:
With a more concrete definition of what is needed, we can now start the more "fun" part of design, ideation. In this stage the goal is to get as many ideas as possible written down. No idea is "bad", and no idea is perfect. It's important not to get attached to a single design in this phase.
4. Prototype:
This is when you can start taking a more critical viewpoint at all of the ideas you've created. It's time to flesh some of them out into a stronger more compelling design. Some designs will fail, and others will flourish. This is the phase where we find out which ones work. This often includes pushing the design into a physical state that requires more attention to detail.
5. Test:
The last phase. Now that you've got those couple design mostly figured out, it's time to test it. This is where you find out if your design really worked. Do people like it? Is it feasible? If you still have these questions by the end of this phase, you haven't tested it enough.
It's possible, and even likely that you finish these five steps without finding a good design that fits the requirements. At this point, we need to repeat steps. What step you return to is up to you. Did your problem definition (2) put you on the wrong path? Maybe you just need more ideas and sketches to work with (3).
Do this until you get the design you were looking for.