Stuck on a design? Try the Crazy 8s method

Marc Dandoy
Nov 5 · 4 min read
Photo by PicJumbo

Today in class at Lambda School we studied UX sketching. Sketching is one of the most important things you can do as a creative problem solver. It allows you to get those vague, abstract ideas out of your head and onto the paper where it takes form.

Writing vs. Sketching

To me there’s really only three ways you can supplement and enhance your thinking (by yourself that is). You can write, or you can sketch. Both have their positives and negatives.

For me, sketching is much faster. If you’re a practiced sketcher, you can get your ideas onto paper at almost the speed of thought. It’s also cheap. You don’t have to draw the perfect rectangle every time, it just has to look like one.

In contrast, writing out your ideas can be much slower than simply drawing them, however words have one big advantage over shapes: they can communicate functions and properties with much more clarity specificity than a diagram could.

Of course, the best thing to do is to combine the methods, which is why I’m writing this blog post.

How to do the Crazy8s

If you’ve ever mindmapped before this is a similar method.

  1. Grab a sheet of paper, pen(cil), and a timer
  2. Fold the paper into fourths for a total of 8 sections
  3. Set the timer to 1 minute.
  4. When you start the timer, spend that minute cracking away at 1 idea in 1 section.
  5. Repeat steps 3–4 until you have eight ideas.

My Attempt

I won’t waste your time showing every idea but here’s my top three I came up with.

#8 — Finder Explorer style Layout

Tim Apple

This was the last idea I came up with. It’s actually my favorite one since I don’t think many sites seem to do this any more. It’s organized like Apple’s Finder. You have News Categories on the very left, then individual posts in the next column, and finally the actual article on the right-most column.

#3 — Skeumorphiuc Magazine Stand Bottom

Apple… Tim

This one has main article displayed big in the left while the posts are on the right.

At the bottom the categories are laid out in distinct heavily detailed icons that represent that publication. I think this display will be appealing to older audiences. Since 50+ year olds are the people who read the most news, this will have a significant impact since it’s more visually communicative. This is the one I actually ended up going with.

#4 — Card Style

In my head
Michelangelo would be proud

I just have a soft spot in my heart for card style interfaces. I think they just look cool. With this layout all the information pertaining to one article is enclosed in one neat card.

Developing on to the Idea

Here I’ve sketched out what it would look like if you search for something.

After the crazy 8’s section you typically want to pick out the idea you think is the best and draw it out in further detail.


Conclusion

I like this method of ideating. It’s loose enough that you’re not constrained but doesn’t have so many tedious rules that you’re limited. One of it’s main big advantages is that you’re not forever stuck on one idea. It keeps your mind nimble; you have to keep moving because of the time limit. So you really have to think really high level. If you’re stuck on a design, give this method a shot! It will help you break that mental block.

Marc Dandoy

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