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User interface (UI) design is often associated with the arts, due to the clear connection to graphic design. But there is more to “user experience” (UX) design than just the graphical user interface, and the connection to the arts extends to dramatic performance and theater.
I’m lucky to have been involved with computers ever since the technology to support graphical user designs emerged from research. I also grew up in a visually stimulating environment, as my parents ran their own graphic design and printing business. Being able to trace roots back to camps -- technical and design -- explains some of my interest in user experience. But I think personality plays a role too. Part of me gets a kick from well-organized, efficient structures and systems. And the other part has a genuine empathy for the end user. I think it is important for me that others enjoy their interactions with computers as much as I do.
The point I’m building to is that, for a variety of reasons, I seemed to end up with the right mix of interests and drivers to cause me to pay attention to the evolution of computer user interfaces over quite a period of time.
For a long time, I was without a formal framework for talking about certain aspects of UX design. Then a lunch and learn presentation at Adobe introduced me to Brenda Laurel’s “Computers as Theatre” book. Remarkably, the book was first published in the early 1990s. And yet some of the core messages remain highly relevant today.
One point from the book that I’ll expand on today is that of “Freytag’s Triangle”. In 1863, Gustav Freytag, a German critic and playwright, produced a model to represent graphically the common stages in a play. Below is an adaptation of this model, overlaying the classic phases of a demo (good traditional technique) and more Learning-centric educational course structure.
The “big idea” is that this model is a good one for many kinds of “engagement”, whether it is a play, a demo, a class or, of course, a computer interaction.
It is easier to illustrate this with examples that break the rules. Skimping on adequately outlining the context of the engagement (e.g. present a blank canvas, as many programs do when first invoked), and users struggle to get to the next stage of “driving the application to achieve a task”. Breaking the rhythm of the engagement with inconsistent response times (sometimes quick, sometimes slow) often proves to be more disconcerting than responding predictably (even if the consistent time is on average slower).
One of the more common failures in UX design is failing to pay proper attention to the latter half of the triangle: e.g. things disappearing from screen abruptly when dismissed, and failing to provide a satisfying “denouement”. Attention to this is clearly been paid in operating system design these days (e.g. on tablets and phones), with windows satisfyingly “swooping” away, and animations as settings are turned on and off.
Brenda Laurel’s book contains many more great insights into user experience design. And as a professional user experience designer will tell you, there are many other perspectives and techniques to consider. But I thought the use of the Freytag model in this manner was particularly thought-provoking.
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