Interaction & visual design

In broad terms, user-centered design (UCD) is a design philosophy and a process in which the needs, wants, and limitations of the end user of an interface or document are given extensive attention at each stage of the design process. User-centered design can be characterized as a multi-stage problem solving process that not only requires designers to analyze and foresee how users are likely to use an interface, but also to test the validity of their assumptions with regards to user behaviour in real world tests with actual users. Such testing is necessary as it is often very difficult for the designers of an interface to understand intuitively what a first-time user of their design experiences, and what each user's learning curve may look like. The chief difference from other interface design philosophies is that user-centered design tries to optimize the user interface around how people can, want, or need to work, rather than forcing the users to change how they work to accommodate the software developers approach. Our Interaction and Visual Design methods are carried out in an iterative and collaborative manner enabling us to structure and design content and functionality to meet business objectives and user needs.

Information Architecture

Information Architecture can involve various methods to structure and visualise information. Architecture commonly includes process flows, traffic flows, site maps and user journeys.

Interaction design

We create paper or rapid prototypes (wireframes) to visualise where design and content elements will appear. Our interaction design work acknowledges any previous research findings and helps identify content or usability issues that could otherwise prove costly.

Functional Requirements Specifications

Before a project goes off to get designed and built, we create a document that details the functional specifications of an application. It includes a sitemap, process flow diagrams and wireframes along with annotations for our client and the design and develop teams. The document is used as the blueprint for production.

Visual Design

Sixeight offer a range of visual design services working alongside our design partners. We ensure that the interaction and visual design are closely aligned.