If you’ll bear with me for a bit, I’d like to give some of my background, which might explain why I’m so stoked on UX design lately (and maybe by doing so find other people like me out there). I was an art student in college, and took up web design as a hobby.  I loved creating sites from the ground up, designing as I coded.  I considered myself a web designer, and when I moved to Portland a couple years ago I applied for designer jobs.  Luckily, I took a developer job at eROI, because I’ve realized over the past 2 years that I am not a web designer.  At least, not a good one.  I’m definitely a better developer.

But just because I work with code all day doesn’t mean I’m no longer interested in visual art – I still draw all over my notes during meetings, and I love sketching website ideas (even if they are just for my own amusement and never leave my notebook).  Recently for a new project involving multiple blogs I drew some sketches to help me understand how the site would be set up and how users would use the site step-by-step.  Drawing them helped me wrap my head around the project – and apparently they helped others too.  We used them as rough preliminary functional specs and eventually (thanks to the mad skillz of Information Architect, Frances Botsford) they evolved into full blown user flows, functional specs and wireframes.

Although what I was doing may be called “information architecture” and not so much “UX” it really turned me on to the idea of sketching ideas, using pencil and paper.  It was great to hear from Leah Buley that paper sketches make up the majority of her process as she is working through a user experience design.  The great thing about using pencil and paper sketches is that you can get a lot of ideas down, fast.  Oftentimes designers may get trapped inside their own brains, trying to come up with the perfect idea the first time (I know I do).  Buley uses a 6-up template to sketch out rough ideas.  Because the boxes are small you don’t get bogged down thinking about details right off the bat.  And because there are 6 on a page, you feel compelled to fill all the boxes and so come up with 6 different ideas (though you definitely don’t have to stop at 6).

Another really cool tool that Buley uses is a worksheet called “Design the Box“.  The purpose of the exercise is to imagine the site as a box on the shelf of a grocery store, lined up with all the other products’ boxes.  What does the front of the box look like? What makes it stand out? What information goes on the back?  It’s a great way to think about the project in a fresh, new way.  Using “Design the Box” and her other worksheets are great ways to get more folks involved with the idea sketching process, especially those who don’t think they can draw or don’t know where to begin.  Sketches are an efficient way to gather ideas from many different people, be they clients, users, project managers, developers or other designers.

Designing user experience can involve more than drawing rough wireframes, however.  Sometimes you can explain a complex interaction or process better by telling a story through pictures.  Complicated user flows, multi-step processes and other overwhelming concepts can be broken down by using storyboards, drawing people using the product, and other visual components. Brandon Schauer, another user experience designer at Adaptive Path, says:

“Showing a solution is more vivid and far less abstract than talking or writing about it; pictures are both louder and more clear than words.”

For some examples of what I’m talking about, check out this Adaptive Path newsletter covering various tools for sketching. In addition to talking about tools of the trade (sharpies, pencils), it has some great examples  of non-wireframe types of UX sketches.

If you’re as pumped on UX sketching as I am, there is an intensive 2-day hands-on workshop in San Francisco in April, called “Good Design Faster“.  Leah Buley will be there, along with other user experience professionals from Adaptive Path.

If you can’t make it to California for two days, Buley will also be holding a half-day workshop at Web Visions right here in Portland on May 20.  I’ll be there, Sharpies in hand!