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Issue link: https://digital.macdirectory.com/i/1359241
One of the biggest challenges when it comes to developing a robust application for the small screen, a lot of decisions need to be made about making a UI friendly and convenient, but keeping as much of it off the work surface as possible. Artists need an uncluttered place to create (though this may apply more accurately to their canvas than their studio). As a working artist as well a Senior Experience Designer at Adobe, Jinjin Sun straddles both worlds. “It was important to make the UI easily accessible, while staying out of the way—and that’s something that needed to be tried out in the context of a real drawing workflow to get the balance right.” Playing With Prototypes Jinjin gives a lot of credit to Adobe’s own design tool, XD, to make that happen. “We were able to prototype options for changing brush size or how much of a layer stack should be showing and pick which option worked best based on experience.” She made a few discoveries as she played with interface ideas. “I would occasionally draw with my thumbs, and I noticed that stippling is especially satisfying to do with your fingers.” For some of their more advanced prototyping needs, they called in a specialist, Ming-en Cho, a Macromedia veteran who also spent some years at Frog Design (the company behind the look of the original Macs, among other things). Quickly and easily being able to turn around prototype designs not only sped up the design process, it permitted the team to do some outside-the-box thinking. “We tried options that were unconventional and playful, to make sure we didn’t miss an even better option, in order to create the best user experience,” Elissa Welsh explained. “In order to get the most realistic feedback, we had to prototype.” That feedback came from the artist community, both inside Adobe and out. “We always start by talking to artists and understanding their pain points, what they love, what they feel they are missing and what would make their work easier,” added Ms. Welsh. They found that there were two aspects of Fresco for the iPhone that were particularly critical to get right. One was how the app would work in full-screen mode, being able to get the UI out of the way and just draw. The next was the toolbar design. When it was needed, it had to be easy and intuitive to access not only the tool and the options that came with it. That, Elissa told us, required a lot of design iterations and user-testing. Adobe is well known for working with creative professionals extensively both in the design phase of a product and afterwards as they work to improve and enhance it. Though keeping their work quite tightly under wraps, the design team did have a group of trusted artists they worked with as the project progressed. Feedback from Fresco’s early iPad was a source of much of the team’s inspiration. “When we launched Fresco on the iPad and on Windows, we heard immediately that some artists wanted to be able to use Fresco on the iPhone as well,” said Welsh “Some of them wanted to create art from start to finish on the iPhone. Others wanted to be able to work anywhere…” That work could be a quick sketch of a new idea or making a change to something that is nearly complete. That Sync-ing Feeling That is a major ingredient of Adobe’s not-so-secret sauce that’s proven so useful to artists. Fresco’s artwork lives in Adobe’s cloud, available to its creators anytime and anywhere, able to move from platform to platform and often, between apps. As an artist, Jinjin concurred. “…many artists might use