Digital Product Design Practices
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In January 2020 I began teaching Interaction Design Practices at SVA’s Products of Design MFA program. As I built out projects, themes, syllabi and started teaching, I found myself writing to better articulate my perspective, process and bring clarity to the complexities of user experience design. Additionally, after each class I sent out a “Post Class Review” that helped me fill in any gaps and hopefully provide some inspiration to get making.
As we reach the end of the semester, I realized those Post Class Reviews could help other designers get unstuck, test out a new process, and explore new technologies.
Who’s the audience?
If you’re studying to be a designer, early in your design career, or interested in AI and Data, you might find some of the posts interesting. I’ve tweaked and edited my original posts to make the content more approachable.
What to expect?
I’ve organized the class into three themes that have an associated project.
- Project 1 /// The digital user experience: AI considerations and automated communication patterns
- Project 2 /// How humans perceive information and make decisions: data-driven visualizations
- Project 3 /// Our emotional relationships with technology: Contextual interfaces and communities using virtual, augmented realities
I won’t post the full project briefs, but will give just enough context of the course to bring clarity to the content I post. Also, I’ll be posting about once a week. Eventually there will be content on how we moved into a fully virtual classroom.
Thank you and acknowledgments
Allan Chochinov told me to think about how I could make this course a reflection of myself. I passionately believe that design is not an autonomous experience, so I want to recognize some of the folks who gave me advice along the way.
Allan Chochinov, Jessica Karle, Tim Hoover, Siri Betts-Sonstegard, Drew Cowdrey, Rob Harrigan, Nick Mrozowski, and Virginia Sasser
Throughout the course, I’ve brought in guest designers to speak on specific topics such as Design Languages, User Testing, and Typography, who have graciously given their time to share their expertise.
Wonil Suh
Chris Brause
Lexi Malouta
Aura Weirner
Rob Harrigan
Siri Betts-Sonstegard
Seth Johnson
Melissa Dain
Lavy Kumar
Ann Niou
Sarah Nelson
Iris Sprague
Also, to the students who are tackling some significant and important issues. You all got this.
