the influence of the enthusiasm consequent

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Why we skip Photoshop - (37signals)

Why we skip Photoshop Jason F. Jun 03 2008

When designing a UI we usually go right from a quick paper sketch to HTML/CSS. We skip the static Photoshop mockup.

Here are a few reasons why we skip photoshop:

You can’t click a Photoshop mockup. This is probably the number one reason we skip static mockups. They aren’t real. Paper isn’t real either, but paper doesn’t have that expectation. A Photoshop mockup is on your screen. If it’s on your screen it should work. You can’t pull down menus in a Photoshop mockup, you can’t enter text into a field in a Photoshop mockup, you can’t click a link in a Photoshop mockup. HTML/CSS, on the other hand, is the real experience.

Photoshop gives you too many tools to focus on the details. When you use Photoshop you can’t help but pay attention to the details. The alignment, the specific colors, the exact shapes, the little details that may matter eventually but they certainly don’t matter now. The start is about the substance, not about the details. Details are for later.

The text in Photoshop is not the text on the web. Once you’re looking at a static Photoshop mockup you can’t quickly change the text without going back into Photoshop, changing the text, saving the file, exporting it as a gif/png/jpg, etc. You can’t post it online and tell someone to “reload in 5 seconds” like you can when you quickly edit HTML. You have to say “Give me a few minutes…”. Also, type in Photoshop never seems to be the right size as type in HTML. It just never seems to feel the same. It doesn’t wrap the same, it doesn’t space out the same.

Photoshop puts the focus on production, not productivity. Photoshop is about building something to look at, but about building something you can use. When you’re just worried about how it’s going to look, you spend too much time on production value. HTML/CSS lets you be productive. You’re constantly moving forward towards something more and more real with every change.

Photoshop is repeating yourself. Ok, so you’ve spent 3 days on a mockup in Photoshop. Now what? Now I have to make it all over again in HTML/CSS. Wasted time. Just build it in HTML/CSS and spend that extra time iterating, not rebuilding. If you’re not fast enough in HTML/CSS, then spend the time learning how to create in HTML/CSS faster. It’s time well spent.

Photoshop isn’t collaboration friendly. I sorta touched on this before, but let me hit this point again: HTML/CSS lets you make a change, save, and reload. That’s our collaboration flow. “Here, let me change this. Reload.” These changes take seconds. “Here, let me float this left instead of right. Reload.” Seconds. No selecting a tool, changing a few items around manually, saving, exporting, uploading, giving people the new file name, etc. HTML/CSS is build for rapid iterative prototyping while Photoshop… isn’t.

Photoshop is awkward. You can’t help but know your way around Photoshop after working in it for 10 years, but I still find it awkward to get simple things done. Working with a pen feels so much more natural to me than going back to the toolbar over and over. A pen can draw anything, but in Photoshop you need to use the text tool to type, the shape tool to draw a shape, the menu bar to adjust this or that, etc.

None of this is to say we think Photoshop is bad or a waste of money or time, but for us we’ve found that going straight into HTML/CSS affords us the best iterative and creative experience. HTML/CSS is real in a way Photoshop will never be.

via 37signals.com

An older article I came across, but food for thought. I'm really not much of a designer, although I can hack up some graphics when I need to. As such, If I don't have a predetermined design available, I usually head straight to HTML/CSS wireframing to put my ideas into a workable environment. Graphical touches come later for me, and with the advent of CSS3, more and more visual accents can be accomplished with stylesheets in newer browsers, anyway. I'm still glad I have friends who can design well.

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Friday, February 11, 2011

The Kickstarter Blog - Thinking for Way More Than a Living

Thinking for Way More Than a Living
Posted by Elisabeth Holm

To borrow a phrase from his own “thought-provoking design content” site, Frank Chimero thinks for a living. The graphic designer, teacher, and writer recently launched a Kickstarter campaign for his book “The Shape of Design,” a digital and beautifully-bound 400-square-foot-apartment-cluttering book that seeks to “take design’s temperature,” exploring less of the how and more of the why we make things.

Growing out of an eponymous talk Chimero gave at the 2010 Build Conference in Belfast, the “Shape of Design” book will analyze the practice of design, digging deep into the creative process by “thinking about the topics that orbit that practice: storytelling, concept, craft, and improvisation.”

In his project video, Chimero tells us the book is a “cross-eyed philosophy” that has “no take-aways,” but instead promises to make readers feel “drunk with the idea you can go off and make anything.” Chimero’s readers are not just designers, but “anyone who makes things,” he explains, “(which is all of us.)”

And with that small parenthetical inclusion, Frank Chimero melted my pathetically-romantic-Kickstartin-idealist heart. This book isn’t written yet, Chimero says. “You’re just going to have to trust me. Will you?” he asks, handwritten on a yellow legal pad.

To be brief, Mr. Chimero: Hell Yes.

Just starting to dip my toes into the design pool, I was not that familiar with Chimero before this project, at least, not by name. But a quick poke around his website revealed that I’m often exposed to his work. His wittily literal graphic depictions of abstract ideas, complex phenomena, and philosophical musings have graced the pages of Newsweek, The Atlantic, Wired, GOOD, and The New York Times among others.

Chimero’s work makes simple poetry of difficult prose. It awakens the right side of your brain when you could’ve sworn you were just using your left. Browsing Chimero’s website, I was most struck by his sincerity.

In addition to the standard “Work,” “Shop” “Profile” “Blog” and “FAQ” pages, there’s also an “Ideas” section, a page Chimero defines as a “collection of significant concepts” that inform “how we make decisions around here.”

And then there’s the “Ethos” page. Maybe I’m a sucker for a solid aphorism, but Chimero’s “Ethos” page is what made me go from liking his work to being moved by his whole self. His one-sentence posts go back about two years, and scrolling through I found a few that I think really hit home for us here at Kickstarter. Rather than dissect them, I think — as Chimero gracefully does on his site — it’s better to just let them breathe:

Curation is storytelling

Tools can’t replace process

Make yourself skillful. Then, make yourself vulnerable

Collaboration is the new competition

and, his most recent post:

Thoughtfulness is free, and burns on time and empathy.

Scanning the 50 comments on Chimero’s project page, among the shipping queries, “right ons,” and gratitude from Chimero are some deeply thoughtful and appreciative words. One comment that struck me in particular came from backer Kyle Watt who wrote:

“The Shape of Design” project exceeded its goal the first day it went live on our site. With over 1,300 backers and funds swelling at roughly 250% of his desired amount, Chimero and his project are a bonafide Kickstarter success.

But it’s not the numbers that floor me. It’s the ethos at work here that’s so inspiring and worth sharing.

February 11 2011 | 1 Comment

via blog.kickstarter.com

Frank spent a short time hanging around the studio at my old web dev job. He's one of the most creative people I've met. I'm pretty excited about his new book. He looks good in those glasses, don't you think?

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Thursday, February 10, 2011

Blackbird Cathedral - "Arise & Go"

My band, Blackbird Cathedral is raising funds to finish off our new album. Check it out on Kickstarter and if you like what you see and hear, please pledge to buy a copy so we can meet our goal. There are lots of other great perks for pledging. That's it. Just spreading the word any way I can!

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Friday, January 28, 2011

Governor Nixon, Community Colleges Announce Tuition Hikes

Governor Jay Nixon is praising community colleges for capping tuition increases at five dollars per credit hour. KSMU’s Brandon Goodwin reports.

A crowd gathers in the commons area at Ozarks Technical Community College in Springfield. They’re here to see Governor Jay Nixon talk about statewide budget cuts for community colleges.

In his State of the State address last week, Nixon proposed cutting state funding to Missouri community colleges by seven percent. While in Springfield he talked about how this will lead to a slight increase in tuition.

“Our community college presidents, working together, are all recommending to their boards that tuition be increased by no more than five dollars per credit hour in all of our community colleges across the State of Missouri this year. It’s nice to get a tuition increase you can put on one hand, isn’t it,” he said.

Community college leaders say they were pleasantly surprised about the budget cuts because they were expecting the cuts to be much worse, somewhere in the ten to twenty percent range. They say smaller cuts means smaller hikes in tuition.

Hal Higdon is the president of O.T.C and chairman of The Missouri Community College Association.

“What the governor has done is, he said, you were planning on a ten, fifteen, or twenty percent cut. We think we can do a seven percent cut. Prepared to where we thought we were a year ago, it’s much, much better and compared to our sister states, it’s even better. So, a seven percent decrease for us is $750,000. If we raise our tuition cost by five dollars and take into account our other costs, we'll come out about even,” he said.

Bill Castleberry is studying culinary arts full time at O.T.C. He watched Nixon’s address from a table near the back of the room. A five dollar per credit hike will add an extra sixty to eighty dollars to his school bill each semester.

“It’s good to know our tuition is not going to be raised too much. A little bit is going to have to happen, but I’m grateful,” he said.

The new budget goes into effect July first.

For KSMU News, I’m Brandon Goodwin.