How We Use Design Prototypes To Create Effective Mobile Apps
One thing we’ve learned is that simple is beautiful. People today tend to want apps that are visually compelling but breathtakingly simple.
Designing a great mobile app can be a long, frustrating process, it’s hard enough to translate ideas into action, never mind turning design into development. But it doesn’t have to be that way!
Annotate
Before we even started working on building Annotate for iOS, we discussed the different ways we might approach building a tool that allows people to communicate visually with simplicity and style. We decided that prototyping was the most efficient vehicle to get us there.
We’ve experimented with a number of prototyping tools, but currently Framer Studio remains our hands-down designer favorite.
That’s partly because Framer Studio has a seamless integration with Sketch, and partly because the built-in toolset in Framer allows our designers to create prototypes that look and act like the real thing.
And isn’t that exactly what you want a prototype to do?
This gives us a chance to get a real working idea of how the final product might be improved as well as get feedback from prospect users, allowing us to make changes and refine the UX without spending any additional developer time.
One of the best things about prototyping VS static mockups is that the process is highly dynamic and iterative. Ideas just tend to flow while designers explore different interactions, and that was definitely the case with Annotate.
Glimpse
Glimpse, on the other hand, was always an experiment.
We wanted to find the fastest method we could, to capture and share a photo or video. And when we say “fastest” we mean RICKY BOBBY FAST!!! ☺
Working on this prototype was both fun and intriguing. It gave us the opportunity to experiment with gesture based interactions, which we learned a lot from.
Annotate for iOS and Mac is now available on the App Store. Many of the learnings from our experiments are evident in the UI/UX of the app.
As we continue to refine the experience of our products, prototyping will always be a very important part of our design process and we encourage every designer that hasn’t already made it part of their process to do so.
Thank you for reading.
