Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Flat Design Era

layervault.tumblr.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 99 posts

Re: The Flat Design Era

#81

Post by polyfractal »

nostromo wrote: post #13

Microsoft seems to be the biggest current proponent of flat design, and I must say it's not so great for usability. When I see this: http://www.istartedsomething.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/... I have no idea what is and is not a button. I suppose it's all a button. But there are zero affordances in this UI. This is now finding its way to Microsoft's websites. On outlook, I can't quickly find the buttons to do key…

Once you play with metro for like 20 seconds, you understand how it works. My phone is WP7 and I absolutely love the interface. It is simple, fast, intuitive and most importantly...it get's out of your way. I can't stand all the chrome and bevels and transparent bobbles on Macs for instance.

(Everything in that screenshot is a button. That's how Metro works)

Re: The Flat Design Era

#83

Post by DigitalJack »

cooop wrote: post #44

How in this context is 'flat' honest? Honest to what? These guys are confused, they're lying to themselves. Honesty in the context of industrial design takes into account the materials, manufacturing and physical form. And in graphic design, respecting the limitations of print. Pixels are intangible. The 'honest' that's respected within industrial/graphic design, fields that have influenced this new 'flat' digital st…

Honest to goodness.

Wordplay aside, I completely agree with you. I think throwing in that an interface or scheme is "honest" is just another way to make one feel good about their decisions.

"honest" is the new "clean"

Re: The Flat Design Era

#84

Post by nchlswu »

egypturnash wrote: post #43
nchlswu wrote: post #24

yet another trend that has its merits and draw backs. There will undoubtedly be designers and designs that go too far with this approach and those who do it well. I feel like this is well along the lines of minimalism for the sake of minimalism. Not enough differentiation can become very confusing and over minimalistic aesthetics which espouse "function over form" often end up doing the opposite. I find it funny that…

I would submit that the most prominent use of "flatland" is probably the book of the same name. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flatland

ah. I had no clue that's where it originated from. thank you for pointing that out!

I can still say that Tufte was probably the most prominent to use it in a design sense (but I'm probably wrong about that as well..)

Re: The Flat Design Era

#85

Post by saint-loup »

nostromo wrote: post #13

Microsoft seems to be the biggest current proponent of flat design, and I must say it's not so great for usability. When I see this: http://www.istartedsomething.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/... I have no idea what is and is not a button. I suppose it's all a button. But there are zero affordances in this UI. This is now finding its way to Microsoft's websites. On outlook, I can't quickly find the buttons to do key…

>>> Microsoft seems to be the biggest current proponent of flat design [...]

Think about it: Microsoft is a big proponent of a design language, and helped the trend to take off.

Re: The Flat Design Era

#86

Post by muan »

pdenya wrote: post #63
goldfeld wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Simple doesn't equal lazy. "A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing else to take away" --Civilization IV voice-over guy.

I don't mean simple is lazy in any way, I mean what I said: "Flat design looks lazy". Not having hover states for your buttons looks lazy. Not making it clear to users what pieces of the page they're meant to interact with looks lazy.

For the purposes of making things clear, "not having hover states for your buttons" and "not making it clear to users what pieces of the page they're meant to interact with" have very little to do with flat design as a style, the exact same things can happen with skeuomorphic design as well(suggesting of skeuomorphic is the contrary style). Your 2 examples sound more like a lack of user experience consideration rather than a poor design style decision.

Re: The Flat Design Era

#87

Post by jcromartie »

SoftwareMaven wrote: post #82

And on the "flatly" designed http://layervault.com/ is a safe behind an open, hinged painting. Wouldn't that easily fit within the definition of skeuomorphic that everybody is railing on? After all, it isn't really a safe.

It's a picture; a genuine illustration. It's not supposed to be any kind of context for or element of a user interface. It would be another story if users had to interact with it.

Re: The Flat Design Era

#89

Post by muan »

jhermsmeyer wrote: post #2

If your audience is developers and designers, a pure flat design is great and will likely work well. But normal people need their hand held as to what a button is. Subtle drop shadows and gradients are the best way to instantly get someone to understand that yes, this element does something. Something important is lost in flatland. On a side note, the vault and picture frame image on the main homepage for layervault.…

Cannot agree more on that layerVault's audiences being designers and developers sure does make things simpler. It's simply true that "designing specifically for tech savvy people OR a group of 60 years old folks" has each a set of very different things to take into consideration. Although if we are saying that those 60 years old non tech savvy people would eventually disappear, then sure, why not?

I adore flat design in a aesthetic way, but saying flat design is the answer to or even plays a part in UX decisions making just sounds silly. Is there really a point in advocating an aesthetic? It is subjective in every way. Though if the purpose is to make a style trendy, the article perhaps does make a great deal of sense. Flat design and skeuomorphism are both styles, whereas applying affordance IS a means to an end.

Re: The Flat Design Era

#90

Post by jiggy2011 »

The advantage of 'psuedo 3d' in interfaces is that things like buttons stick out and make it obvious that they are intended to be clicked.

We experimented on a website a while back with making stylish "flat" buttons vs bog standard grey embossed buttons. Turns out the grey buttons made site navigation way easier, people who were given these buttons spent more time on the site on average.

Also for a company that talks about good design, I actually couldn't look at their home page for long because the rotating image at the top started to genuinely make me feel slightly sick.

Post reply on HN