IXD301 – Week Two: Content & User Job Stories

In Kyle’s class, we began to look at what content is, and where it comes from. We took a look at the different sources of content, and the benefits of content curation.

Why is content curation useful?

  • Become an expert in content
  • Easier than creating your own
  • Shows that you’re focused and dedicated
  • Allows you to grow your network
  • You can get more business
  • You stay informed

We also looked into what makes content useful, and understandable.

The basic principles of content:

Good content is:

  • appropriate
  • useful
  • user centered
  • clear
  • consistent
  • concise
  • supported

User Job Stories

We also took a look into user job stories, and how they can be useful in fulfilling design purposes. This method allows you to put yourself in your user’s shoes, and understand their wants and needs from a product. This is useful as it helps you, the designer, to understand better how your product should be designed, and what content it should and shouldn’t include.

Visual Grammar

We then took a look at visual grammar, and what makes a well-designed visual grammar. It is important to simplify your visuals as much as possible, focusing on only the essential parts of the visual. Any unnecessary information or images should be removed. It is also important to follow consistency. To do so, you can re-use elements over and over again, to create a theme for your work, and the minimise visual complexity.

In terms of visual typography, you need to ask yourself the following questions:

  • Who are you?
  • What are your values?
  • What’s your mission and purpose?
  • What do you hope to achieve?
  • How will you know if you’re successful?

When choosing typography, it is important to remember that less is more.

Crazy 8’s

For our next task, we were then asked to create a series of 8 sketches in 8 minutes. This allowed me to explore my creative freedom, and to see what designs I could quickly come up with. Some of them actually turned out very good, I definitely surprised myself with this task, as I find I don’t work well under pressure a lot of the time. This task definitely opened my eyes to my own capabilities.

 

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