Review #1

While it is fun to talk about your own work, there is also joy in appreciating things that inspire you and make your inner designer smile. Our brilliant Visual Designer Sachin, found an exciting website to share. This is black negative, they are a multi-talented bunch with a website that is really telling of their talents. Have a look at a these screenshots.

Case study #1

Staying ahead of the curve

Creating a property search app posed some challenges from the beginning. The discussions started at a time when commonfloor didn’t have too many mobile users. With growing mobile data usage it only seemed relevant that we think ahead. Since the beginning we knew that we were building for the future. The decision came with risks but a property search app would be the first of its kind in India.

Property Search App

The app would be for Property search and property posting but we slowing realised that it was becoming much more than that.

Round ‘em up

App development can never be a one man show. We must round up the usual suspects. The product designer, visual designers, developers, marketing and management had to join hands. The app development team – Apprick – based out of Delhi, Vaibhava, a design consultant and a project management were brought on board along with UX Brigade and other in-house teams to make the app a reality.

How to let go of ideas and other wisdom

In the first month we had really intense brainstorming sessions. Evaluating ideas, examining user scenarios and understanding features. Soon we realised we had to let go of our ideas, learn from our mistakes and move on.

Blood, sweat and a lot more

Soon we had a final list of features. Some were direct interpretation of the website but some were thought out entirely afresh for the app.

The discussions turned into wireframes. Three major screen-frames were identified.

This also gave us the interactions that would happen on the app.

Getting our hands dirty – Visual design begins

Based on the wireframes, iterations and takeaways from the discussions, we started creating the visual design for the app. The first requirement was to make it resonate with the existing website design.

Visual Design

A guideline was created for the Visual design.

Showing off a little

AUGMENTED REALITY for REALTY

And once again this is not where we stopped. The map search included an augmented reality feature. This took the dynamics of UX to totally different level.

SHORTLIST

Sometimes a simple feature adds more value to your product. This feature helps users shortlist potential properties, which they can then visit at their convenience.

The icons

Main Dashboard Icons

Action Icons

Ameneties

Getting everyone on the same page

Based on the needs of the project we used a variety of project management tools. Populating trello lists, managing excel files and Google drive to share information.

Adjusting to the platform – ANDROID

We had to re-visit initial visual design to adjust to android. Besides the basic differences between iOS and Android, we also had to keep in mind the multi-screen ecosystem that Android supports. We worked closely with developers to understand how to make the changes and get the user experience right. [pic]

Quality is key!

Once the app was running, we needed to be sure it meant both design and development standards. This was achieved through user testing and intensive checks for best practices.

KEY LEARNINGS