Over the past year my research and design activity has been heavily influenced by my work in electronic media and the process of responsive web design. For the upcoming conference I will be presenting my findings and will be sharing my thoughts on the future of web design, especially related changes in the the processes of designing web experiences. Here’s the abstract for the paper:

Responsive Web Design and A New Web Aesthetic

The proliferation of web-enabled mobile device usage has prompted a design shift from static, pixel-measured sites to modular-driven, flexible architectures that respond to the various screen spaces that contain them. While this application of responsive web design via coding and construction techniques is allowing designers to specifically address the spatial contexts of changing web browser constraints, the techniques employed in doing so are beginning to define a new web aesthetic. In this paper I examine the use of responsive web design techniques and how the features and limitations of their coding underpinnings has influenced the formal and functional qualities of responsively-driven web sites released in the last two years. Through this examination I present evidence that, influenced by the use of these techniques and the devices and users to whom they cater, an aesthetic specific to web sites is emerging. To this end, by evaluating this shift from web design as print-related publishing to a medium with its own visual and verbal rules, greater understanding may be gained for the evaluation and development of future sites and adaptive electronic spaces.

Just from sifting through the abstracts for presentations and papers for the conference I can safely say that it looks to be two full days of engaging with some fascinating and enlightening research and connecting with other design researchers for potential future collaboration… and a beer: that’s a must.

When I worked through the process of designing this site I looked long and hard for a serif typeface for body copy. I wanted one that would be clear and easy to read, had a full set of characters including small caps, felt classic and refined but with a modern bent while working on both the web and in print. Hoftype’s Cala won the day and I couldn’t be more pleased.

Today, designer and design historian Paul Shaw posted a review of Cala where he addressed Cala’s character and its lineage. Read the full post at Typographica.

The Cheatham Christmas Card Critique

We looked over all of the cards we received this year and grouped them into three categories: traditional cards, photo cards, and clever cards. My wife and I discussed each card carefully and chose a winner in each category who moved on to the best in show competition, rendering the award for best Christmas/holiday card we received (this year). The cards have had the names removed to honor the privacy of our family and friends, just in case they aren’t as open to identity theft as we are.

Here’s the 2011 Christmas Card Critique!

Best Photo Card

“Glorious Blessings”

This card, a Stacey Day design produced by Shutterfly showcases some sensitive typography combining serifs, sans serifs and a custom-looking script, supporting the photograph while not distracting from it. A single photo was used ensuring the card didn’t get too busy and the photography and styling has a friendly feel thanks to the family’s casual dress and the not-too-industrial, vintage scene. The sentiment is well-written and concise, with “glorious blessings” at its core amplifying the extent of the well-wishes to an extreme and abundant level. All together, this card was Christmas-y without relying on clichés and avoided getting too “look at me” in the way it used photography.

Best Traditional Card

“Rustic Christmas”

We didn’t receive many cards in the Traditional Card category this year but of them, this DaySpring card was the most successful in wishing Christmas greetings with style. The simple color palette kept this card from being too busy and also helped give it a classic feel, supported by the winter woodcut scene. The card does get a little busy through its use of four different kinds of borders and two different sentiments, but the woodcut and snowflakes help ground it as decidedly rustic and traditional.

Best Clever Card

“Christmas Scream”

We always receive cards that are funny/clever, and this year’s winner shows how you can take a “challenging” photo with Santa and make it something so much more. By using the sentiment “Hope your Christmas is a scream!” the senders of this card took the “lemons” they were given and turned them into lemonade. We’re glad they did because we got a big laugh out of the terror shown on this kid’s face. Even more funny is the fact that no one else even seems to mind that he thinks the man with the bag is going to devour him.

Best in Show

“Glorious Blessings”

Props and thanks to the senders of this card for decking our halls so nicely. This card won Best in Show because of its simplicity, quality of production, well executed typography, and cohesive, friendly visual presentation.

See you next year!

Here’s wishing you all a Happy New Year. As always, our Christmas cards will be sent out in July to bring you a bit of glad tidings when it’s needed most: in the middle of our 110-degree Texas summers.

One of the most powerful lessons I learned from Keith Owens.

It’s said that designers are great conversation at cocktail parties because we know a little bit about many things because the work we do calls on us to interact with many industries and products. In my case I can talk about aircraft racing engines, hearts of palm, the Christian liturgical calendar, residential fencing, at-home health care and elementary school textbooks to name a few. But at the outset of this semester if you would have come up to me at a party and asked me about design research I would have been fumbling for words. Granted, after a semester of work I am still developing my own definition and getting my bearings but the past four months has allowed me to conclude two things:

1. Design Research is what I was made to do.
2. Every interaction, thought, relationship, product, value and generalization has been put on notice: I will never see the world the same way again.

This “What I Learned” is hardly comprehensive: I would wear out a keyboard typing all of the things I discovered. So, in the interest of brevity (and with hopes that you will actually read all the way through to the end) here are the highlights:

Design Research Theory

Keith Owens

Studying in the Graduate Studio for our (intense) final exam.

“Theory” was a scary word before August 25 when classes started. It was still a scary word a few weeks in. But over time I learned to embrace Design Research Theory with open arms and now I’m at that awkward spot where we’ve hugged too long to be just friends anymore… and I’m okay with that. Let’s just say, “we’re close.”

Theory is just a tool for making sense of the world. I liken it to a set of binoculars you can use to see further: depending on how far you want to see, you pull out a different set. But the looking isn’t the fun part. I have learned that theory has significant value for designers and especially design researchers. If you’re a practicing designer about to scoff at me for waxing academic, let me preface my jaunt with a question that I hope will pique your interest:

If there was a tool that could help you discover new creative, organizational, commercial and production possibilities, would you use it?

Well, theory is that tool.

Many of the theories we studied, like Bruno Latour’s Actor Network Theory, Terrence Love’s Meta-theoretical Structure for Design Theory, and writings on Critical Design projects like those of Dunne and Raby gave me frameworks from which to explore the relationships between ideas, products and values. These theories may have daunting names but at their most basic level they are just tools to assist those using them to determine patterns and to highlight relationships. In all, I learned that through using theories I can gain great insight as into the way things are and why they’re that way, offering a great opportunity to make more informed decisions in the design process. The set of theoretical tools I have begun to explore has allowed me to identify connections and interactions that take place between and within environments, products, organizations and systems. From my experience I believe that as designers, our work will be more effective if we examine interactions (and potential interactions) more clearly and theory is a powerful tool in doing just that.

Design Research Theory also gave me context for my career and life-work. In short, I discovered the why of my design work. I’ve been doing design and solving problems professionally for over 13 years, but exploring different design theories on design knowledge itself, design processes, and the roles design plays gave my daily work a name. All these years I have been doing the work but have never payed attention to how or why I’ve done it. But as I read through and studied the work of a variety of researchers I learned that I am not alone in the big scheme of design. I learned that the processes and methods I have learned and have been using to create have names, have been documented, have been proven to work, and have extensions that I am starting to explore and apply in my design and research work.

One hypothesis I generated posed a what-came-first, "chicken or egg" issue, highlighted by this drawing on one of my papers.

Design Research Theory challenged me in many ways, but maybe the greatest is the simple statement that the problems we define are more important that the solutions at which we arrive. I learned the importance (and fun!) of problem formulation. As designers, our first and most important work is to define the problem properly. Think about it, if we solve the wrong problem, our solution may be brilliant (functionally, aesthetically) but will be pointless because we missed solving what really needed to be solved. I learned that, whether it’s in design practice or in design research, taking the time to define the correct problem is essential. Thanks to Design Research Theory, I am far more interested in problems, then solutions.

Aha!

There’s nothing “theoretical” about the study and use of theory.

Design Research Methods

Michael Gibson

Michael Gibson delineating the difference between methods and methodologies

While the “doing” of the Methods course was more like what I’m used to in my study of Anthropology and in my own design practice, there was plenty of room for discovery, especially in the work of learning a new language. Terms like “validity,” “causality,” “literature review,” “longitudinal study,” and “basic research,” stormed into my Thursday night vernacular and have since spread into my everyday work.

Learning methods for design research, their benefits and uses (and pitfalls!) gave me the beginnings of a set of tools I will now use to put the theories I discover and formulate into action. Among scientific research methods I also learned specific methods that are effective in design research. While many of these methods are helpful in conducting research and gathering data, my greatest discovery was that, through the use of methods in research, new connections, ideas and relationships can be discovered. Sneaky, sneaky methods.

The commute to Downtown Dallas for classes was taxing at times.

One method we explored over the semester was that of concept mapping. At first blush I was skeptical. I mean, I’ve researched, developed concepts for and designed many information design projects and how much different could a concept map really be? In case you’re curious my words were slightly sweet, tasting like apple and cardamom with a slightly woody finish.

The power of concept mapping is in its ability to force one to stop and examine next steps. In that, it’s kinda like a Choose Your Own Adventure book. By creating a node then thinking about possible steps that come from that nodal decision step and mapping out all of the possibilities, you limit yourself to the decision steps that are directly connected to the present step, removing thinking about the entire problem and focusing problem solving on just the immediate step. As one repeats the process it becomes clear that:

1. one problem can trigger many new problems
2. problems often bring with them seemingly infinite variables
3. you’re going to need a bigger boat (methods and theory)

I never expected that I would discover research opportunities through doing. But through the semester I augmented my collection of theory binoculars with a toolkit of methods. I can’t imagine one without the other and I never imagined each could be used to both do and discover. Coming out of the semester, I have a view of the research landscape that was previously nonexistent.

Aha

A research method is only “good” if you know how to properly use it.

Seminar in 20th and 21st Century Art

Dr. Jennifer Way

After coming off of an enlightening semester-long study of Modernism and Modernity last semester with Dr. Way I was eager to jump in again for another foray into modern art. Looking back at my recap from semester two, my  ”a ha!” for the course was: “The advance of technology affects everything.” Considering Fall 2011′s topic for this Art History Seminar was Art and Technology, I believe a successful segue has been completed.

One of our field trips was to the Amon Carter Museum in Ft. Worth.

Technology is an odd thing: always present, a driving force in society, revered and hated, foreign and familiar but so difficult to define. I have found that too often, the use of the word “technology” triggers thoughts of all things digital but at its core technology is really just science put to use. Through my study this semester I am convinced that any study of technology must be done in context: the environment in which a technology is used must always be considered. I guess I always knew this, but as I waded into the waters of this course the importance of keeping that concept in the front of my mind continued to surface.

Think about it: a printing press, a calculator, the mapping of the human genome are all manifestations of technology just in different time periods having different influences during those times. Technology is such a contemporary, here-and-now phenomenon that examining the technology plus that which surrounds it is important in gaining an accurate, unbiased view of that very technology. The act of examining the roles of art and technology taught me the importance of removing myself from my place in contemporary culture so I can place myself in the “shoes” of those whose views of technology are not my own, whether they be from a different time period, geographic place, societal position, gender, language or technical ability level.

To my 96 year-old grandmother, the advent of radio was likely just as revolutionary as the emergence of the internet was to me. But at the same time both of our past experiences and perspectives likely colored our views of the respective technological advances in different ways. Our conceptions and misconceptions colored our reactions the new technologies. In this reasoning I found the most important lesson I discovered this semester: the value and importance of context.

The semester brought lots of reading with it: glad I had the iPad (and Chick-Fil-A)

Over the semester my classmates and I were introduced to various pieces of art. Pieces like Vertov’s 1929 film, Man With a Movie Camera, the E.A.T. Pepsi Pavilion from Expo ’70 in Osaka, Japan, the seemingly design research-like work of Stephen Willats and Wafaa Bilal’s challenging work, Domestic Tension on the power of technology to dehumanize raised my awareness of art’s value in challenging what technology is and what it can do to and in society. We read work by writers and cultural critics like Marshall McLuhan, Raymond Williams and Judy Wajcman, highlighting issues where technology, culture and gender collide. I discovered scholars like Nicolas Bourriaud whose writings on art and its impact on and role in society elevated art’s relevance as a discussion and I delved ever-so-briefly into issues of bio informatics, human genome mapping and ethics in bio art by Eugene Thacker. I was inundated with ideas from all sides and was challenged with many contextual perspectives. And after all of the reading, viewing, thinking and discussing I arrived at one powerful conclusion and one sad realization:

Powerful Conclusion:
Art and artists are raising some very important, poignant, powerful and thought-provoking issues in ways few will, can, or has.

Sad Realization:
Either not enough people are listening or the art isn’t reaching the people or no one is taking the time to care (or all three).

I know that’s a glaring and gross generalization (and my professors will likely join Bruno Latour in hacking my site to also berate me for making it) but I state it only because this semester I have gained such a respect for modern art as an important means of societal commentary with regard to technology. I think it’s easy to discard art as an “individual activity” that’s only about expression and aesthetic, but the way art was framed (I know, ha ha) this semester allowed me to see art and artists’ value in sparking discussion as a reflection of contemporary cultural practices. The issues are there. Why aren’t more people talking about them and doing something about it?

Aha

The humanities and the sciences need one another, desperately. They can solve more together than they can, apart.

Context

This semester was a turning point. I believe I learned as much about myself as I did the content covered in my classes and all of it amounted to one thing: context.

I discovered the importance of context: of knowing where you are, what’s around you, where you’ve come from and the effects of your environment on you.

I gained context: that design research is what I was made to do, how just studying problems or just formulating problems or just solving problems is not enough. I want to do all three.

I better understand context: by looking through a theoretical lens, a methodological lens and a historical lens, I understand that when they converge, position is triangulated and context is gained.

Up Next

I’m full of ideas. I’m full of passion. I’m full of Christmas overeating. But need to strengthen my reasoning and writing abilities in the “off season” so I am reading. A lot. Over the break, my focus will be on reading books on classical rhetoric, critical thinking and philosophy in advance of a spring semester filled with writing, research and more art history. I’m at the half way point now and feel that, equipped with some clarity gained from the past three semesters, new discoveries await.

I am thankful for:

1: Direct perception of realities
The sound of my colleagues sharing their own epiphanies.

2: Description of Objects
A quiz question that contains the word “Weltanschauung.”

3: Behavior of Elements
A red pen that has rendered my lit review illegible due to the density of marks.

4: Mechanisms of Choice
Times when I have had to decide to sleep or to read Latour for the nineteenth time to attempt to understand him.

5: Design Methods
How my colleagues gather before Design Research Theory to skim content, then discus, and then at some point to talk about how we will all never think the same way about design again.

6: Design Process Structure
The influences that led to project group names like Margolin, Butterscotch, and Wilma.

7: Theories about the Internal Processes of Designers and Collaboration
How my colleagues and I all are so different in our practice backgrounds but how we use those nuances to enhance our collaborative work.

8: General Design Theories
Design someday becoming a discipline. Though this presumes that upon graduation my colleagues and I can convince others that the design of a Fruit Loops box has politics and in turn is as dangerous as a loaded rifle (this one made of sugar) that will eventually be used to gun down children and puppies alike leading to a post-apocalyptic, totalitarian state (that is, unless others start seeing design and designers for what they’re worth.)

9: Epistemology of Design Theory and the Theories of Objects
Design research being so fraught with identity crisis that we’re all asking “what the heck is this thing and will we even know it when we see it?”

10: Ontology of Design
The Design Research Center card reader’s erratic behavior prompting me to reconsider states of being “inside” or “outside”, though it has helped clarify the state of being “tardy.”

Here’s hoping you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving and that the turkey, NFL football, your iPhone, the relish tray, neighbor’s yappy Shih-Tzu, sour Chardonnay and your felon-brother will all stay balanced in the great Actor Network Theory of your holiday. And if things get a little crazy, just black box those suckers and go read some Buchanan so you can better understand the wicked problem that is “quality time with family.”

At the institution where I’m teaching and also where I received my design education taking any time at all to think past the next due date can be a daunting task, based on how much and what quality of work is expected, but from my experience if you don’t think three months, one year and five years ahead, you’ll have little chance of getting to that future. Now that doesn’t mean that you won’t experience roadblocks along the way, but if you keep your wits and look for opportunities you can find ways of doing the kind of work that will make your future happen.

Greg Christensen posted a story today on his blog Makin’ Ads titled “How to Double Your Salary” which touches on this concept through the lens of money. In stressing his point how Creatives should put themselves in positions to do great work (and to make their futures happen) he shares his own experience of working at a place where he was able to do the work that would get him to his “future”:

I was very lucky to be the writer on that campaign. I was lucky to be at an agency that championed great work, even when the clients didn’t. I was lucky to have a partner who wanted to make the work better, and a creative director who knew how to make it better.

Greg made decisions to put himself in a position to do the kind of advertising work that would help him (a-la Laverne and Shirley) “make all his dreams come true”. But it doesn’t come without planning.

So, think ahead to your future. What kind of designer do you want to be? What kind of quality do you want to produce? Where are you headed? How hard will you need to work? Now look for opportunities that will get your work and your skills in a position to get you there. When you know what you need to learn you’ll be far more likely to find the opportunities that will help you get there.

Bookmarking is Everywhere

There are lots of tools out there for organizing digital assets and it’s up to the individual designer to decide which one to use based on their own personal preferences. Some tools like Flickr are great for uploading images to save for later. Other tools like Zootool are great for visually bookmarking just about anything. Delicious and other bookmarking sites have come a long way in adopting visual interfaces that are helpful for saving website links. Instapaper has become a popular tool for saving the text of stories found online. There are thousands of options for how to save information for future access and many of them also allow new opportunities for discovery by following other users recommendations, the key is to choose the one that works the best for you.

But Can You Find it Once You’ve Saved It?

The most important component of any bookmarking system, filing cabinet, 3-ring binder or photo album is being able to sort and find content after you’ve saved it. When choosing your own resource library system, make sure you can tag, categorize, and or group things in a way where you can find them. I have chosen Zootool for my own cataloging because I can create sets like “Futurism” or “Grunge” or “Zany” that are perfect for future style reference. Through the use of tags and descriptive information, I can label images clearly the way I like so I can find them later. So when I have a client who has no idea what anime looks like, I can filter and find the style quickly to show my own personal, favorite examples. Saving lots of information is a powerful thing: but if you can’t find what you need when you need, you’ve wasted your time finding it in the first place.

Time to Embrace Digital

Designers my age and older are quite resistant to digital resources. There’s invaluable insight to be gained from physical resources like books and magazines, trips out to physical sites to take photographs, and sketches or notes from personal research. But at the same time there’s a wealth of digital resources out there that shouldn’t be ignored and can be extremely helpful for future design work. My charge is to embrace the pixel and find a way to catalog your findings that will compliment your physical library of findings. Your work (and career!) will be better for it.

Now that the Texas Rangers are in the World Series and it’s all over the news here in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, I can’t help but wax poetic. StarStruck was discontinued on  May 28, 2007 after 70 shows. Lots of fans, Astros or otherwise participated in the show and it was a great run. Here’s some of the audio and photos to remember it by.

StarStruck Promo 2005

StarStruck Promo 2006

Jeff Bagwell hitting in Game 4 of the World Series.

At the Houston Astros Fan Fest in 2006 with SS Adam Everett and RP Dave Borkowski.

A few episodes of StarStruck…

StarStruck #20, October 17, 2005: Deflated

StarStruck #22, October 19, 2005: World Series Bound!

StarStruck #26, January 23, 2006: Winter Thoughts and Spring Dreams

StarStruck #29, April 3, 2006: Opening Day

StarStruck #63, April 9, 2007: Rough Start

In the second year of the show I invited callers to call in and to be part of the show intro by saying that they were “StarStruck”. I’ve collected all of the intros and have placed them into one mp3 file:

StarStruck Intros

Interviewing players for the Corpus Christi Hooks.

The 2005 National League Champion banner at Minute Maid Park.

In true designer fashion, the podcast had t-shirts, stickers, business cards, and banners. In all, it was a fun way to connect with my favorite team and also with other fans who share that die-hard attitude. Here’s wishing the Texas Rangers and their fans the best… it looks like the Astros (the worst in baseball this year) have a long way to go before we’ll see another World Series come down to Houston.

This summer, a developer friend of mine told me about media queries and about the book Responsive Web Design by Ethan Marcotte. I’ve read a number of books from A Book Apart and have never been disappointed. I picked up a copy and it was then that I knew two things:

1. This would change everything.
2. I needed to try it out with my own redesign.

Well, now that I have completed this site as a responsive site that self-formats based on the device on which it is displayed, I have several quick bits of knowledge to share.

1. If you know CSS, media queries are super-easy. You’ll pick them up very quickly.
2. When designing responsively, the designer must closely consider how the page will evolve as it is modified for each device. This means that designers have to focus more on developing a tool for information delivery instead of a fancy, drop-shadowed, textural, image-fest that will never change and the creator’s vision will last forever (in web time, that’s 2 years). I learned very quickly to plan for the evolution of the site after developing version 1, which was an utter failure once it I started implementing media queries.
3. Responsive web design is the answer. I’m convinced that this is the correct way to develop for web in a way that respects the reader and honors the content, simultaneously.
4. Don’t develop a site like this while in graduate school and working at the same time unless you abhor sleep.

That’s the short story of it… I plan on writing a paper to share my experiences developing this site and am also using what I learned to inform a very large-scale site I am designing with a developer that will launch before year’s end. I’m sure I’ll keep posting updates as I learn more and as the site gets used in ways I never intended or tested.

I’m excited to see what designers will do with responsive as they create sites that are more tools for information dispersal, than iconic monoliths of permanence. I’m convinced that the flexibility of responsive web design will allow more of our users to engage with content, wherever they are and whatever they’re using.

…for more on responsive web design, check out www.mediaqueri.es, a showplace for responsive web design that’s emerging.