Artist talk: Joshua Buckwalter

Yesterday we had Joshua Buckwalter come in and talk to the class about his work with user experience design. He is the creative director at Inovat and also the president of the central pa chapter of AIGA. He started of his presentation with explaining the difference between user experience (ux) design and user interface (ui) design. Mostly what I got out of it is that a ui designer only does 1/3 of what a ux designer accomplishes. Next Joshua went into specific projects he has worked on and ways that he and also his team got to the end product. With the case study: The Engine Yard, he went over different exercises the group went through while brainstorming. First there was card sorting where you describe what the product should look and feel like. Then scales which helped determine how formal a product was supposed to be by use of imagery. The last was a bible, this was basically the project brief, rules, languages/definitions, concepts, process, and user stories all bundled into one. The next project he discussed the the entire process of design. You start with discovery, gathering as much information from the client as possible and asking questions. Don't just rely on what they tell you, ask as much as you can to get the answers you want. Next comes wire framing and then style tiles. It was interesting to see his version of style tiles, and also see them in use. I've completed a couple different style tiles throughout my classes and it was nice to see that they really do help for a client to see what they like. Next he talked about having an open design hour where everyone sits down and draws for 20 minutes individually, they then have 10 seconds to present their idea and if it takes longer then 10 seconds, it's not a good enough idea. The last step is finalizing the design in photoshop 100% complete to show the client. It was a very good experience to be able to listen to what Joshua had to say, he is highly successful in his career and had so much knowledge about user experience design which is something I dont' know much about, but am willing to learn more.