5 things we can learn about UX from The Mandalorian
Like many people, I have been enjoying the new Star Wars TV show The Mandalorian. It has proved to be a huge success for Disney and was the flagship show in the launch of their Disney+ streaming service in November 2019. It has been a hit with the notoriously difficult-to-please Star Wars fanbase and is currently rated at 87 on IMDB — higher than every Star Wars movie except The Empire Strikes Back. Importantly for Disney, it seems to also be popular with a wider audience as it was rated the number one streaming show in the US in December 2019.
After watching last week’s episode, Disney+ suggested I check-out a ‘making-of’ documentary called Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian. Intrigued at the prospect of finding out how they make Baby Yoda so cute, I duly binged all eight episodes. One thing that became clear while watching was a number of similarities in the process of making the show and those I use designing and developing digital products. So I thought I’d highlight five key things user experience (UX) professionals can learn from how they make of a hugely successful show like The Mandalorian.
1. Start at lo-fidelity
After a script is written on The Mandalorian, the next step is storyboarding. The episode director works with a storyboard artist to sketch the key frames of each scene. To get a feel for how the story is working, they edit these sketches into a video with temporary voices and effects. At this stage they are able to get feedback and iterate quickly to iron out any problems with the story and the way the episode flows.
Image source: screenshot from from episode 6 of Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian
As part of your UX process, working in lo-fidelity at the start is equally important. Whether it is simply pen and paper or using collaborative online tools like Freehand or Mural, quickly sketching out initial ideas, getting feedback and iterating at this early stage is a vital exercise.
Image source: screenshot from a Clarivate Freehand file. © Clarivate. All rights reserved.
2. It’s expensive to make changes later on
The majority of a live-action TV show’s budget is spent filming — a huge amount of talented people are required on a set to capture footage. During post-production, if things don’t work well, there is a huge cost to bring everyone together again for a reshoot. On The Mandalorian, producer Jon Favreau put a creative process in place to minimise the cost of shooting and help to negate the need for reshoots. As well as storyboards, they use video game technology to create pre-visulations of every episode. This allows the director to make changes and improvements long before the costly exercise of shooting the episode.
“It forces the filmmaker to commit and fail early when it’s cheap and easy”.
Jon Favreau, Producer of The Mandalorian
Image source: screenshot from episode 6 of Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian
The same can be said in developing digital products. The further into the process, especially after the development team start writing code, the more costly it is to make changes. Software such as Sketch and Invision make it easier than ever to design screens and stitch them together into clickable prototypes. As early as possible, test your design concepts with users in order to avoid having to make expensive changes later in the development cycle.
Image source: screenshot from a Clarivate Sketch file. © Clarivate. All rights reserved.
3. Work with real content
The Mandalorian is filmed on a state-of-the-art soundstage nicknamed ‘The Volume’. It is a room with huge wrap-around LED screens on the walls and ceiling. Pre-rendered animated backgrounds are played on the screens, instantly transforming the room to an environment from the Star Wars universe. On most other live-action films and TV shows, they would use a green-screen and digitally paint in the backdrops later. By injecting the backgrounds in real-time, it creates a fully immersive experience for the director and actors which allows them to instantly see what the scene looks like, rather than using their imagination and hoping for the best.
Image source: ILM
With UX design, working with real content and data applies too. It is easy to create beautiful looking mock-ups with great images and text lengths that perfectly fit the page layout. But how practical will the design be with real content? One of the best tools for producing more realistic designs is the Craft plugin from Invision. It allows you to inject real data into your designs so that you can cater for edge-cases and avoid having to make changes later in the process.
Image source: Invision
4. Get technology involved early
On most live-action films and TV Shows, the visual effects team get involved during post-production once the footage has been shot. On The Mandalorian, they follow the process used on animated films and engage with technology at the start of the creative process. Being involved from the start means the visual effects team help push the boundaries technologically, especially on initiatives like ‘The Volume’, as outlined above. They also help to provide push-back and constraints to the directors to make sure their ideas can be realistically created on time and within the budget.
Image source: Laughing Place
Getting the technology team involved early in the UX process is equally important. Like on The Mandalorian, it will help tech teams to better understand the vision and contribute to it. Include engineers in your design critique sessions and invite them to give feedback on your prototypes. By collaborating early, they can help push the boundaries on what is technically possible and provide guidance on whether features are feasible.
Image source: screenshot from a Clarivate Invision file. © Clarivate. All rights reserved.
5. Small details matter
While watching an episode of The Mandalorian, you can tell the production team have focussed on hundreds of small details to create the authentic Star Wars look and style. The attention to detail — in the sets, costumes, props and background characters — hugely adds to the experience and makes it feel like you’re watching a quality product. There’s even a number of hidden easter eggs to delight hardcore Star Wars fans.
Image source: screenshot from episode 3 of The Mandalorian
A similar approach can be applied to UX. The cumulative effect of getting all the small details correct is a higher quality experience. For example, we recently received a great piece of feedback from a user who has to export multiple data tables from one of our products. She loves the fact that the exported files are labelled consistently with the correct disease and region as it saves time in her workflow. This is in contrast to her experience on a competitor platform where every exported file is labelled ‘data-export.xls’. Getting as many of the small details correct is important and leads to a much more satisfying experience for users.
Image source: Giphy
