UI Design

As well as working as a front-end developer… another passion of mine, is in design through sketching ideas and UI layouts.

Below is a homepage sketch from Oct. 2008.

Alongside sketching ideas, I often carry out guerrilla user testing sessions with family & friends to learn quickly how people interact with websites, data and information when visualised.

I’m fortunate enough that my colleagues ask of my opinions when user testing in labs and got the chance in March of 2008 to work with the team at Creative Good in America to improve the JustGiving user experience. It was an extremely fascinating to learn cultural differences and ways in which different people work. One great example is how users call charities, ‘Non-profit Organisations’ (obviously with a Z rather than an S) rather than the term charity.

Another example of some of my designs were with giving different types of users the perspective of time remaining. An option that JustGiving pulled out of, yet rival organisation Virgin Money Giving have used.

I’ve also been part of the team to improve user experience from more than just a functional level, but on an emotional and compassionate level.

And then there’s much more kept in my moleskin notepads. Often these ideas get pitched internally and externally to different business members. Sometimes being implemented or put on hold for other projects.