The magic behind UX (and vice versa) — Pt. II
A continuation of a brief comparison between the art of creating the impossible and the discipline of crafting the possible.
In Part I, I wrote about how magicians and product designers share a love for concepts like attention, information dosage and knowing their audiences. I saved the very best for the second part, as I believe in the following concepts not only as key but fundamental and inescapable to any human experience, whether it’s a magic act or a design process.
Enough of an introduction. Let’s go with the first one: stories.
#4 — You’re telling a story
And people are stories.
There is a skill that both great magicians and designers share: storytelling. And I am not talking about being able to speak in front of a crowd –that would be oratory in any case–, but rather the ability to find a conducting thread in a given process (like a magic trick or a research phase) and use it to execute a more impactful, perdurable and understandable narrative in any form of communication (text, voice, diagrams, signs, etcetera).
When creating an illusion you need to know how to trigger the most important storyteller of all: the brain. Going back to the first point we discussed in the previous article, both designers and magicians need to know how to drive people’s attention and stories are one of the best ways to do that. Our senses collect an insane number of stimuli that the brain ultimately efforts to give sense and shape into what we call reality. Same as when you’re reading a book and you picture the characters’ faces, the landscape colors and even the sound of their voices without seeing or hearing them. Our brain takes these inputs and transforms them into a story that makes sense to us. It is by acknowledging this internal narrator that everyone has, that we can truly understand the importance of how the words, voice, tone and shapes we use, feed and impact people’s minds. How different approaches paint different pictures.
There are several articles about how important communication is for designers, and I think Storytelling in particular applies both to a magic act and a portfolio showcase. Whether you are presenting your work or articulating the decisions behind it; pitching a product idea or even on a first date: everything worth sharing can be shaped, essentially, as a story.
But what’s a story? Think about it for a minute.
To me, a story can be defined as:
“A chain of events aesthetically narrated with purpose”
- “A chain of events…” as in a sequence of things happening during a period of time. Stories are a succession of occurrences, despite being told or written chronologically or anachronically.
- “(…) aesthetically narrated…” because every good story follows or establishes a certain pattern, like the Story Shapes described by Kurt Vonnegut. This morphologic aspect of stories acts as another lever for creativity. Do you want to end on a high note? Or maybe it would be better to kick off with the punchline to get everyone’s attention right away?
- “(…) with purpose” because even if it is “just” for entertainment, there is always a goal behind good stories. To teach, illustrate, persuade, seduce, share, preserve our culture or move entire crowds; stories have always been the “how” for humanity to keep ideas moving forward.
But maybe we can expand more about storytelling and design in a different post, right? –and, yes, this is an example of a story cliffhanger designed to redirect your attention to what may come next and other psychological biases that designers and magicians use every day and that we can also cover in a future post perhaps…
Enough.
Let’s move to the final section.
#5 — It’s not about you
Don’t worry, we are not breaking up. It’s not about me either.
Why do magicians keep doing magic? Or more specifically:
Do magicians enjoy doing magic as much as witnessing it?
I probably wouldn’t be writing this comparison between Design and Magic if I wasn’t at least a bit of an enthusiast of the latter. As someone who enjoys practicing and occasionally performing an illusion in front of others, this question strikes me from time to time. But bear with me and let me better explain my point.
I believe that there is a certain magic quality that is lost forever once you know the “truth” behind a magic trick. It may still amaze you the amount of skill or practice or engineering needed to conceal it from the audience, but it certainly stops being magic anymore. But then: why do the people who know all the secrets behind still call it magic? After attempting many answers through the years, I’ve befriended one of them:
“Magic doesn’t happen in the magician’s hand, but in the spectator’s eyes”.
It’s not about one’s perception, it’s about theirs. When you practice, perfect and perform a trick in front of someone, it’s not so much about the execution, but about their reaction. We all know that the coin didn’t vanish in the air, and even if you think that it is hidden in the other hand, there is a brief moment of surprise and amazement in the spectator’s reaction. That’s where magic lives.
Same as someone arriving home safely after using an app to get a ride, or the parents spending more time with their children since they can have a virtual workplace. Same as all of those who set up a video call for the first time during the pandemic. Those unseen moments of satisfaction when something works the way you expected it to. It’s not how good the design is, it’s how the people are using it. Good design is invisible, or as visible as it needs to be.
Designers and magicians are ironically responsible for executing their crafts in a way that they can not fully appreciate. We are creators of experiences that are meant for others. And the more we leave our egos out of the equation, the better we can focus on delivering something remarkable, intended and meaningful. It’s not about us. Because design is also not in the designer’s hand, but in the user’s experience.
Outro
Wrapping up, there are a couple of things worth saying here.
Number one is that the same comparisons made in these series can be done with multiple professions and jobs. I once heard a contemporary artist and philosopher (my tattooer) say that:
“We need to find the political in aesthetics and the aesthetical in politics”.
And I found it deeply thought-provoking. To open our eyes and ears to the similarities and differences between two or more disciplines that don’t seem obviously related is a must-have skill in any creator’s journey. Is in this act of humility that creativity sparks to thread the, apparently unseen, connections and bring light to something new.
So yeah, magicians and designers may do the same crowd work and use the same principles to deliver great experiences to their audiences. But more importantly, we can be better at whatever we’re doing, why leveraging our likes, passions, and past or different experiences.
Having said that. Thanks for coming this far. I hope at least some of these thoughts sparked something new in you. If you liked it feel free to reach out via mail or through LinkedIn, and subscribe (it’s free) to stay in touch with future posts.
Until next time.
Best,
Carlos.
