Visual design of the website: The Emotion Board works together visual design

I. Realistic dilemma of visual design

There are many uncertainties about the visual design of Internet products, such as:

You design it according to elegance, but he thinks it's "fresh"?—— the subjectivity of Judgment & see the picture to understand

Sometimes do not like some design works, but can not immediately tell the reason-the subconscious

Start asking for a style, quickly change your mind to another style--don't know the user

If "User-centric design" is not a gimmick, we can try to let "user" to give visual design a direction.

Although traditional user research methods are helpful for "understanding users", they seem to be powerless to "direct visual design".

Is there a user research method that can simultaneously solve the problem of "judging subjectivity" in visual design, "seeing the actual work to understand", "not saying the subconscious feeling", and then "directing the visual design directly"?

Two. The theoretical basis of the emotional plate method

The emotion board is a kind of research method that uses the image, inspires and explores the user's experience, and then makes the visual design. It is possible to investigate and form "style feeling" and "design elements" that have a guiding meaning.

The core principle of emotion board is to rely on "image", communication product and user, user's subconscious and consciousness, user's sensibility (emotion) and rationality, its neuropsychological basis is:

Most of the communication is not language

Thinking is created by images.

Sensory imagery is an important metaphor, and these images are mostly visual.

The deep structure of thinking is palpable.

Experience is a mixture of reason and sensibility (emotion)

Three. The process of emotional Board method

Complete Process Overview:

Get keywords:

Collection of picture materials:

Invite users to participate in creating an emotional board:

Four. Emotional board for visual design practice

The third part of the article has described in detail the process from preparation to participation in creating an emotional board, this section will not repeat the process, focusing on how to analyze and use the results of the emotional plate, and with the visual design of a good combination (in terms of current practical work experience, this part may be more important than the previous stage of the production process of the emotional board).

At the app Store, choose a mobile phone application "old folk remedies", as a practice.

The "Old folk remedies" using the emotional board of the user research methods (the specific process omitted). The emotional board results are as follows:

Emotional board results analysis, and extraction of visual elements:

Design process:

Background

Navigation

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Final results (comparison)

Summarize:

There are two cognitive processing modes in the work:

Top-down processing refers to the process of using an individual's existing knowledge and concepts to process the current information during cognitive activities.

Bottom-up processing, also known as data-driven or material-driven processing, emphasizes the importance of stimuli themselves in pattern recognition.

At ordinary times, our visual design work may be used more than the bottom of the processing methods, and if you can fully and carefully analyze the results of the emotional board, and play the full use of subjective initiative, it can help us to exercise top-down processing methods (and this initiative to play also has the right direction of protection). Repeated rotation training and combined use of two cognitive processing methods help us to improve the thinking level of design.

Thanks to Zhao Designer, the latter part of the "Old Folk prescription" visual design of the demonstration by her completion.