And that’s what a computer is to me. What a computer is to me is it’s the most remarkable tool that we’ve ever come up with, and it’s the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds.”

Steve Jobs

]]> http://www.oysteinhusby.com/2013/a-tribute/feed/ 0 http://www.oysteinhusby.com/2013/skeumorphism/ http://www.oysteinhusby.com/2013/skeumorphism/#comments Fri, 22 Mar 2013 18:35:43 +0000 oysteinhusby http://www.oysteinhusby.com/?p=399 With the recent focus on Skeumorphism, I was motivated to share my own views on the matter. SM has been receiving a lot of bad press lately, fueled by the surprising shuffle in Apples corporate structure. Partly because of this, Apple – the gatekeeper of minimalist design – has become the face of this design esthetic. (SM) This raises a slew of questions. Why do they do it? And why do they get so much bad press?

And most importantly, what is Skeumorphism?

An ornament or design on an object copied from a form of the object when made from another material or by other techniques

dictionary.com

WHAT IS SKEUMORPHISM?

In cognitive terms skeumorphism makes perfect sense.In cognitive terms skeumorphism makes perfect sense. The human mind is an expert in association. In fact, in biological terms that’s all there really is. Neurons connected with other neurons. A complex web of interaction between old and new knowledge. Excercising your brain means stretching this web, creating more connections, encouraging mingling in your brain. Researchers know this, and it forms the basis of powerful memorizing techniques where you attach new knowledge to past experiences. Want to learn a long sequence of numbers? Pick a fond memory like your childhood home or your walk to school. As you relive the memory, create markers and associate the new knowledge to these past experiences.

SM works the same way. By mimicking, SM piggybacks on our past experience in pursuit of intutivity. Humans find comfort in familiarity, and dressing up new technology in old clothes makes it more approachable. By making a virtual book work exactly as a physical book, we already know how to use it. It’s a highway to ease of use. But like everything else in this world, SM also has a LD (Lethal Dose).

SKEUMORPHISM IN DESIGN

1948 Tucker Sedan – Streamlined Design

To understand SM in the context of design, it is helpful to explain the term MAYA. Postulated by Raymond Loewy in the 1960′s era of Streamlining, MAYA – short for Most Advanced Yet Acceptable – is an attempt at explaining the cognitive aspects of new products (innovation). MAYA describes the balance between the two opposing factors – Advanced & Acceptable, and their diametrical opposite relationship.

We define advance as ‘moving forward in a purposeful way’. Innovation is described in much the same way; ‘make changes in something established’. Both term describes a development or improvement from the current state. As things get very innovative, they shed their connections with current products. This becomes a challenge for people, because we have less knowledge of the thing at hand. We sometimes say that products are way ahead of their time, implying that we humans are not ready for it yet. Newton is a great example of such a product.

The newton

dictionary.com

Skeumorphism makes the advanced acceptable.While Newtons failure to succeed was a compounded matter, the biggest flaw was the inability to democratize the technology. It had handwriting recognition, wireless fax and email and a slew of other innovative features, but it failed to weave this technology into the web of our everyday lives. It felt very technical, and this also transcended to its user interface. It was hard to relate to, and using it did not seem straight forward. In short, it offered amazing prospects of the future, but that future felt too unfamiliar. Cold. Perhaps a bit scary.

If something is too advanced, too radical – it sheds its connection with present knowledge. This is where Skeumorphism comes to the rescue. Even though the product is very innovative, SM creates cues to the past.

What Skeumorphism really is then, is a governing factor of MAYA. It can help make something very advanced more acceptable.

Apple and SM

Why the bad press?

iPad Calendar App

In the case of the iPad Calendar App, it serves its function. Wether you prefer the esthetics is a personal opinion.

Progress bar trouble

The Podcast app is different. How many youths nowadays have even seen a tape deck, let alone an old radio player? It’s insane. Not only that, but it has severly impacted usability.

iOS is founded on some very, very strict graphic design guidelines, but SM has completely disregarded some of these. Take the progress bar in the Podcast-app. In the pursuit of mimicking ancient physical products the progress bar has lost all connotations of being a button that you can manipulate, and even if you still get it, the hit area has become ridiculously small. For this, Apple deserves the bad press. I am surprised to see something like this from Apple. Also, the radii on the buttons are very un-Apple.

A more uniform Apple

The future

We all know the term ‘A picture says a thousand words’. But if this is the case, could a video dish out 24 000 words per second?

Videos are multipliers of emotionsWhile this is a humorous thought, videos are incredibly valuable in the toolbox of a designer. If done right, it engages the audience and delivers your message loud and clear. Videos have an amazing power to capture attention and tell stories. Sure, you can tell stories through static images and presentations, but a well-produced video can take this to a whole new level. Videos are multipliers of emotions, and in the end – it’s all about emotions.

The first video I want to present is of one of my favorite things I have at home.

I find this kettle to be a great piece of design. While the kettles main purpose is to boil water, you also want to let the user know that the task is completed. I love the elegance of this solution. It’s balanced and efficient. It’s a closed loop design, where the consequences of one actions can be utilized for another. I think all designers pursue symbiotic solutions like this.

Our favorite things

For our class, each student chose their favorite thing and made a video of it. Out of the six videos made, we couldn’t resist the fire crackers video. Our professor screened the Norwegian short film ‘Døren som aldri smakk’ – ‘The door that never closes’ – telling the story of man whose mother dies. We were instructed to combine the topic of loneliness with firecrackers.

This is what we came up with.

We saw fire crackers as a ‘social crowbar’, so if you ever feel ignored, just bring some fire crackers to the party. The video was well received, but too inefficient. Principally, these are the only necessary elements of a movie.

Simplify, simplify, simplify. Efficiency is key. How late can you jump in to a clip? How early can you jump out of the same clip? If the clip has conveyed it’s content, move on. This is a direct analogy to product design. It’s all about reducing things down to it’s essence.

Curing loneliness

We have been collaborating with Novelda AS this term investigating how we can utilize their revolutionary radar technology in consumer products. With the governing topic of loneliness, we protoyped how their technology could ‘cure’ it.

The result is a fictitious product – a pair of glasses with embedded radar technology – to give back the gift of sight to blind persons. The movie has a much stricter dramaturgy. It is more efficient and any superfluous elements have been removed. The result is straight to the point and emotional.

Saving Lives

Out latest project was done in collaboration with Otivio, utilizing their unique technology to save cardiac patient lives.

Welcome, Model S

I am very excited to see the Model S finally shipping after nine years, marking the end of the line for the Roadster. I have always seen the Tesla Roadster as the electric twin brother of the Lotus, mostly because it is, but also in terms of design and target market. While the $109.000 Roadster was marketed as a two seater sports convertible for enthusiasts, the $49,900 Model S is a luxury sports sedan for the (rich) people. The Model S is the second step in a 30 year plan to democratize electric cars, courtesy of Tesla. The Roadster was the first step. It was a test bench for technology and means to bring in funding for the next step.

The Model S is the second step in a 30 year plan to democratize electric cars.

1. Build a sports car
2. Use that money to build an affordable car.
3. Use that money to build an even more affordable car.
4. World domination.

The Tesla Drivetrain

A new way of building cars

Electric cars introduce a completely different approach to car engineering. With a new drivetrain comes a whole new way of building a car. Gone is the huge engine block, the equally big gearbox and fuel tank. It’s all been replaced by two electric motors mounted directly on the back wheels, and batteries spread out evenly on the chassis floor. This efficiency in design leads to efficiency in performance. In gasoline cars, only 20% of the power is spent pushing you forward. In the Tesla S, this number is 70%. Less moving parts means less entropy. In fact, when you hit the brakes the Model S transfers it into energy again (through a KERS) charging your batteries as opposed to just converting it to heat.

Rear motors

‘Skateboard’ platform thickness

Range

Although electric cars are becoming more and more prevailent, they are judged based on two main factors – range and charge time. Although these factors apply to gasoline cars as well, the vast infrastructure of petrol stations have solved these issues. Wherever there are roads there are gas stations, and it will only take you minutes to refill. Where petrol cars will give you ~300 miles of range, electric cars have usually been limited to 50-150. Normally this would not have been such a big issue, if it had not been for the shortcomings of battery technology.

The motor

What about charging?

Electric cars’ largest advantage has also been their largest weakness – batteries. More specifically, the culprit has always been charging time. Where gas can be refilled in a matter of minutes, electric cars typically had to be charged overnight. I will never take my electric car out on long drives if it means that I will have to spend the night at a motel in the middle of nowhere while my car charges.

Tesla seeks to solve all these issues. The base model gives you 160 miles of range, at least 60 miles more than the competitors. Toss in another $20,000 and you will almost double that range to 300 miles. More importantly though, Tesla has vastly imporved charging technology. Connect the Model S to your wall outlet at home and it will charge at the rate of 32 miles per hour. Buying the $2,700 High Power Wall Charger and Twin Chargers doubles this rate to 62 miles per hour, charging the base model in less than 3 hours. Tesla is also rolling out their grid of high power charging stations across California, promising to charge the car in less than an hour. Instead of spending the night at a shady Super 8, you only have to relax an hour at a Starbucks.

While this is an substantial improvement, it is still a incremental one. For electric car world dominance, the product must be better than all the others. Electric charging must become as convenient as gas stations. This is the biggest hindrance of adoption. The severe lack of innovation in battery technology is limiting electric cars, just as it does with consumer electronics. I want to charge both my phone and my car in ten seconds.

Lots of space!

Seven

While the Model S is marketed as a luxury sedan, they still saw the opportunity to fit it wit seven seats. Yes, they are meant for your kids. Fair enough. Kids usually end up in the back anyways. Regardless, this an excellent example of how the new drivetrain frees up precious space, allowing the designer to rethink what a car should be. Now before I put my future kids in the back, I want to see some rear end crash tests to know they are safe.

The 17″ Dashboard Screen

Dash 2.0

Most of todays manual knobs and buttons have been replaced by a 17″ touch screen. I tried this out at the Tesla Showroom in San Jose, and while the thought of having a large screen in your car is attractive I am skeptical of the practicality of it. 17″ is a lot of real estate, and Tesla seem eager to utilize all of it. The result is information overload before the car is even moving. The lack of physical buttons is also worrying. Usually you memorize the button layout and can operate major functions like volume and temperature without moving your eyes off the road. That’s not the case in the Tesla. Not only are you forced to move your eyes down to the screen, but the complexity of the UI requires you to spend some time navigating it. This is really dangerous. Now all is not lost, and there is a really genius way of solving this issue. Gestures.

Imagine the 17″ screen as a big gesture surface. Two finger scroll, volume up and down. Three finger scroll, temperature up and down. Three finger rotation, fan speed up and down. The possibilities are huge, and I would love to see this happen. In fact I might just do a project like this on my own.

To summarize I am enthusiastic to see the continuous progress made by Tesla. They still have long way to go in many areas, and the Model S does not mark the paradigm shift from gas to electric. For that it’s too expensive and limited. That being said, Tesla are making huge leaps forward, and I am confident that I will own one of their cars at some point.

frog and Sharp’s vision was to create a sleek line of smartphones that would break out of the conventional Android model and offer a visually stunning, highly interactive experience.

Color me unimpressed

Enough with the placeholder phrases. A chance to redesign the Android UI deserves a bolder vision. A vision should not be within comfortable reach. A vision should give you a slight scare every time you hear it, and remind you of the huge leap you plan to make.

You said you wanted to break out of the Android model? –– I don’t see it.
Visually stunning? –– I see visual make up, that ultimately degrades the experience.
Highly interactive? –– Good UX design is not about cramming in as many contextual menus as possible.

What it really is

Feel UX is basically a stock Android with a bit of iOS, on top of some Windows Mobile 8 Live tiles. To add distinction, new features and swipe directions have been added. And of course the array of hidden menus, only accessible through arbitrary swipe gestures (This of course, being the first culprit. More is not better). All in all I feel like I _do_ need a user manual. It is the result of three individual mobile platforms mashed together, with the result of performing less than their individual counterparts. If this is what frog will continue to deliver in it’s attempting to become a interaction design oriented consultancy, I am worried.

What it should be

Be it interaction design or product design – good design is making easy out of the complex. It is to reduce to the bare essence and transform the experience to something innate. The feeling of knowing how to use the object, before you even picked it up.

Designing is doing all the heavy lifting so the user doesn’t have to. Or in culinary terms, it is doing all the cooking so the user can sit back and enjoy the meal. It is the case with art, just like it is with literature. A well written novel will use few means to convey strong emotions.

Feel UX is a great example of lack of innovation. It is an overly complex Android iteration at best.

I have been fortunate enough to intern at NONOBJECT this summer, spending my days working on some very exciting projects. NONOBJECT is not like any other design consultancy, with their own design philosophy set in stone by Branko Lukic:

Our focus is not just the perfect design solution but the charged space between the user and the product. The intangible space that defines the experience and enables deeper connections.

To educate others on this philosophy, NONOBJECT has published their own book as well as an iPad app. This way of thinking resonates strongly with me. Design should always solve problems for the user, but the powerful nature of design lies in affecting your emotions. NONOBJECT is influencing my perception of design in a very positive manner, constantly focusing on providing amazing experiences for the user. As well as a philosophical nurturing, working at NONOBJECT provides me with valuable hands on experience participating in the product development from start to finish. I am thoroughly enjoying my time at NONOBJECT. Palo Alto, Silicon Valley and the Bay Area is truly a place to prosper.

This project is not associated with POC.

This project is not associated with POC.

The VANGUARD sub-brand is the product of an extensive brand strategy process. During their short brand history POC has been able to differentiate themselves in the market with a unique aesthetic style. Despite this, POC fails to address important brand catalyst users. These users have authority in the sports and must be targeted to add credibility to the brand. VANGUARD was born out of this unmeet need.

This project is not associated with POC.

Solo is a unique new wheelchair combining the advantages of manual and electrical wheelchairs. With an electrical assist system, Solo increases the range and mobility of manual wheelchair while providing premium ergonomics and compact foldability. Heavily focused on aesthetics, Solo avoids the medical look and feel often associated with electrical wheelchairs and provides an unique new experience for wheelchair users.