#minoruxd

This class was a big confusing to get my head around but in the end I was okay with my outcome. Changing the space of the Centraal Station overall would provide a comfortable and interactive experience for travellers waiting at Centraal Station for longer than normal times. Just knowing that there is a space for them to sit at and either charge their electronics, play with the devices, or look at local art installations or small museum exhibits greatly enhances the user experience of the whole station. By looking at the situation through the AEIOU lens that the teacher suggested, I was able to identify what problems were occuring and find a solution quickly based off it. Redesigning the space changed my original AEIOU outline for the better. In the future, I think looking at a problem through a lens will help me identify user needs and wants and what could be done to solve the problem.

The first formal introduction to UX design was in this class. Learning the exact terms that I would later be using for the rest of the course and in my life was a great introduction to the semester. It laid the foundation that each course then subsequently used. I created a cultural probe to find out certain things about a user to create the ultimate user experience for a certain product/system. These methods can be used in any project moving forward. Below is the experience map that my partner and I created to detail the exact experience a typical user would take in our experience.

We’ve finally arrived in Berlin! This is the station that we got out to go to our hostel in Ostkreuz. All of us were ferociously hungry so we went to Burgermeister, the famous burger spot of Berlin, to grab some delicious burgers. 

The next day we visited Aperto. The office was in a revamped old piano factory which alludes to Aperto’s modern approach to design and design thinking. They specialize in what they call “soul-mining” which is unsupervised experiments in creative culture. The employees are able to soul-mine and end up creating amazing things! Surprisingly to me, they don’t do long term research always. They prefer short term user centric research to fuel their design. Lean design is also very important to them. At the beginning of each sprint, they decide what their MVP will be and then focus on those items. Of course, they still create tons of iterations to perfect their product.

Next, we went to Icon/Incar. This was a very interesting presentation for me because this was my first encounter with a car specific user experience agency. The presenter spoke about their process and development framework. The different phases that they go through to complete a project lasts around two years and is very intensive leaving enough room for multiple iterations. I’ve learned from these two companies that even if the first iteration is great, you must continue creating iterations to reach the ultimate final product.

For our free time, I decided to go to the East Side Gallery and check out both the art and historical scenes of Berlin. Here are some shots that I took along my walk that ended up lasting the whole day!

Even the children’s playgrounds were graffiti’d! There was graffiti all around the city. Some more obtrusive than others.

This area looked like an abandoned warehouse section but actually each warehouse was being used for something. Be it clubs or a circus, these buildings were covered in beautiful graffiti embodying the spirit of Berlin. 

I like this abandoned building (which was right next to the famous club Suicide Circus) specifically because of the creepy rocking chair in the center (zoom up).

This might be one of the most famous pieces of art on the Berlin Wall. It’s by the artist Dmitry Vrubel and is a political piece mocking a real photo. 

Although the former is the most popular one, this is my favorite piece at the East Side Gallery. The simple text and art style is straight to the point. Simple and easy to understand, just like good UX!

As part of the more historical architecture side of the day, we saw the Brandenburg Gate which was opened in 1971 by orders of the Prussian king of the time. We also climbed to the top of the Victory Column to get an amazing panoramic view of the city (not pictured).

This weekend, the Minor UXD class will take a journey to Berlin. As a city with a lot of history and turmoil, the art and design scene has only been growing exponentially since the shut down on the Berlin Wall. We will be visiting two companies in Berlin, Aperto and Icon/Incar. Aperto is an IBM owned firm that basically rules IBM’s design in Europe. They do projects ranging from wearable tech to creating user friendly apps for supermarkets. The culture at Aperto is one that encourages their employees to delve into their own creative projects for weeks at a time. Icon/Incar is a user interface design firm that specializes and focuses on car interfaces. They are very secretive about sharing their work due to non-disclosure agreements but they are one of the biggest design firms for the car industry and their specific design is one that I’m really excited to hear about since I’ve never heard of or been interested in user experience interfaces in cars.