“Prototyping Should Be Really Fun”
“When you prototype, you allow your design . . . to practice being itself.” I think we could go one step further and say that prototyping is the designer practicing helping the design become itself. Before reading What do Prototypes Prototype, I was under the impression that prototyping was a late-stage, one-time event in the design process. However, much like the overall focus of our class is asking questions and looking for substantive answers before moving on, the authors thoroughly explain the types of questions that govern different kinds of potential mockups. Their approach to prototypes is one that takes the time to first ask what is the purpose of a prototype — what does it need to test and who would be its audience — before determining its form. Along with this approach is the expectation that design development can and should utilize different types of prototypes at many points in the process. This is different from others who seemingly jump to the expectation that “prototyping is the phase in which the conceptual becomes real,” which suggests a more singular and late-stage mentality. Helpfully, this blog author refers to a book, Prototyping, which appears to be a full-length reference that mirrors the thorough approach described by Houde and Hill, and like them, encourages a real practice of “prototype early and often,” which even includes paper mockups and wireframes as early and legitimate prototypes. The author of the DesignShack post, separates wireframes and mockups as preliminary sketches, identifying prototypes as a specific, high-end integrative model. On the other hand and reinforcing the Warfel, Houde, and Hill approaches, Caitlin Kalinowski, former technical lead at Apple, in an exclusive interview, recommends creating more iterations, making ugly prototypes, getting to prototyping faster, and that “prototyping should be really fun. If it’s not fun, you’re doing it wrong.” Coming from a highly successful design developer, that sounds like the right approach.
Project Update: Preliminary As-Is and To-Be Scenarios
