Earlier this week, I was conducting an interview for my prototyping book with Jed Wood. During our conversation, we discussed the typical reasons for prototyping:
- Getting internal buy-in
- Gauging technical feasibility
And then Jed highlighted a third, and probably the most useful reason for prototyping: as a method for working through a design. Jed sees prototyping as a way to work through a design the same way a product designer uses sketching to work through product designs.
Thanks to Jed for that little insight.
2 Comments
Architects also regularly “sketch” in model form. By working in three dimensions you can see how forms interrelate and start to understand the experience of the design.
I agree with #3 completely. I regularly construct prototypes to experience the design myself. It lets me use Coopers’ empathy to feel the frustrations first hand – or let my brain generate new ideas by actually doing the tasks. “Oh, I just did X, now I wish I could do Y”.
It also lets me leave and come back to the prototype to re-use it. The time in-between lets me further distance myself as a designer and place myself more in the seat of a real user. Especially first thing in the morning when my mind is fresh and blank. It’s a great methodology I just couldn’t do without.