Capstone: Review with a Professional

This week I had the opportunity to meet with Megan Anderson, a St. Louis-based Product Designer, who is currently designing for Twitter!

If you have not read my first post, What is Capstone? click here. I also suggest looking at my Project Brief post to see a more in-depth explanation of my capstone project.

It is always important to have as many eyes and professional opinions on a project as possible, especially when it is a project as large as capstone. During class I receive valuable feedback from professors and peers, but presenting to fresh eyes every now and then can be extra helpful. Now that we are almost halfway through the semester it was time to share the work I’ve done with a working professional.

I was paired with Megan Anderson, and met with her via Zoom to go over my project direction, identity, and review the beginnings of my first product. Megan currently works remotely for Twitter as a Product Designer II, and has previously held positions with MasterCard and HLK. I was excited to meet her, knowing that her talents in typography and UX are aligned with my interests, and would benefit my project greatly.

We met for about forty-five minutes and during that time I was able to share the project brief, identity system, and walk through the homepage of my project’s website. Megan said that she likes my identity system and the bright color palette that I chose to work with. She said that my alignment and sizing looked good, with only a few minor exceptions. We also discussed what I might like to go into post-graduation and talked about how I can tailor my project to fit that type of work. Since I am interested in UX, the website will be a major component of my final project suite.

Megan gave me some great tips that I’ve already began to implement;

• Color palette: She loved the bright colors, but she had some concerns for legibility and accessibility. She pointed out that they may not work for those with visual impairments or color blindness. I used Adobe Color’s accessibility feature to test their contrast after the meeting and found that they did not pass the test. Megan suggested that I keep the bright palette and add secondary colors that work well and meet accessibility standards. I’ve began to build the secondary palette and I am happy with how it has worked into my project. I will remember to test for accessibility earlier in the design process next time!
• Below the fold: Megan shared that the idea of content on a website being “below the fold” isn’t super relevant anymore. We don’t have to include bits of the next information in every screen because scrolling is inherent and natural now. Users know that they should scroll and don’t have to be prompted anymore like they may have been years ago. She pointed out that this is about preference and that I didn’t do anything wrong by showing that there is additional content on the page.
• Navigation: Apple recently introduced lower navigation bars that are found just above the keyboard when using Safari. This has to do with the users’ thumb reach and making that bar easier to touch on the screen. Megan said that I could consider making my mobile website’s navigation be found at the bottom of the screen rather than the top to make it easier to touch based on thumb reach. I would like to try this idea and complete some user testing with navigation at the top and bottom to see what users find more natural and easy to use.

I was very appreciative of every comment or suggestion Megan made during out first meeting, and I am happy with how it went. If I were to re-do the first mentor meeting I would have had more screens of my mobile website ready for review. It would have been nice to get feedback on more than my homepage, but I will take the lessons learned from this critique and remember them as I build the rest of my website.

I am grateful that I was paired with Megan as my mentor and I am looking forward to setting up another meeting soon!