Wikipedia App

The company wanted to make their own stab at the Wikipedia phenomenon. I used the traditional iOS formfactor, but added elements to the design to hint at the expansion of Wikipedia. It's like a great giant ancient encyclopedia of the internet.
On the second screen, there is one thing I'm proud of and will keep using from now on - a Half-press switch. It simulates a switch that increases/decreases value in a more comprehensive way.

The app has a fullscreen mode for viewing content, accessible simply by tapping on the screen. Also, there is an image mode that allows you to 'bookmark' (essentially save) images into the app for offline browsing and use. Bookmarks work the same way for articles as well.

It should be coming out soon. A little birdie told me they just reached a stable beta build.

Dog Whistle

I was asked to design a simple Dog Whistle app. I was given no other directions. There are already few in the App store and they mostly do the same thing, except for one that has a lot of presets. I started thinking: "Where is the gap in this market?" It became quickly obvious. A lot of these apps are quite simplistic and are more of a toy than anything else. I wanted to provide the users with the ability to create their own whistles to actually help their dog associate the whistles with the trick you're trying to teach the dog. For users who aren't in it because of a dog, they can make specific whistles, like one they can barely hear and then press it around their friends to see if they can hear it too. I wanted a welcome screen to give the user a few tips on how to use the app, nothing too fancy. I thought it would be neat if the app had a theme that felt like a little classroom for a dog, hence the blackboard theme. I even had a little cute doggie icon...see?

To my dismay, before I could finish, I was notified that the target audience isn't people with dogs, but teenagers and people who just want to see if they can hear very high-frequency noises and annoy their friends. So I went for the traditional form factor which was asked of me. Then when that wasn't hip enough, I was asked to make a remote, something between a car beeper and a TV remote. The fact that there was a slider on there and a display for the wavelength pattern wasn't very remote like, so I made the slider look like it was taken off an old hi-fi. At first I made a plastic slider, which looked flimsy, then I found a picture of a metal slider which looked far more solid, so I switched to that. In the end, I'm pretty happy with the 'remote' design, but still wonder how the app would've done as a tool for teaching dogs tricks.

Stocks App

The main reason for this particular post is for me to stress one unwritten rule I've stumbled upon when designing apps.

Never make an app all white.

White as a background is commonly used for forms and lists in iOS. That's where it's generally a pretty good idea to use. The sole reason for this is that the design needs to be optimized for any brightness of the phone screen by contrast. However, this doesn't mean that if the whole screen is high contrast, it will make the app easier to use. Generally, most Apple provided iOS UI has a high-contrast brightness differentiation between text and other elements. Anything more than that and the brighter parts of the app will start losing detail against the contrast of the dark parts. Our eyes adjust to be able to read - they're looking for the dark against the white to recognize symbols ,letters and numbers, distinct shapes. So an app that has high contrast throughout the app will actually be harder to read than if there is a background behind the text which eases the contrast to a comfortable viewing range.

It is important to note that black on white design rules were invented for print. Screens actually expel light, so reading black text on a white screen is more tiring to the eyes than the opposite. This is why a lot of popular writing apps have a full-screen dark mode.

I was asked to design an app for a small San Francisco startup to propel their first patent for analyzing stock. My initial design was inspired by the Stocks app supplied in iOS. The app was supposed to be for traders to check perhaps a few times a day. With that kind of a target audience, you need to make the app simple to use and quick to operate. In the end I was asked to change the app to a design I was handed.

Showtimes

Initially, the idea was to create a simple app for showing movie showtimes and nothing but. The design should've reflected what it would look like if Apple made this app and it was already included with iOS. I modelled the design after the Weather app, as I felt that's what the app was- tap to open, look, maybe scroll if needed, move on. The initial design (first screen) is pretty much what the app looks like at this moment. Then we tried to resolve a few problems. Some people complain that the time-text is too small to see. This was fair, as although the text size is the same that of an app icon title, when there's a few lines of text, it becomes more cluttered and ultimately harder to read.

Then we tried to fix some of these issues by changing the time formatting. The next step for the app was to be able to view not only by theatre, but also by movie, as filtered per your selected theatres. The expanded design had collapsing showtimes, which required further tapping as well as potential scrolling, but the showtimes were bigger. Then instead of collapsing showtimes, we added the ability to change the day of showing, though the web allows only today and the next four days of showtimes and that's it, so the third design became quickly invalid.

The app is available in the app store, and got a nice review here.
Despite three additional designs to improve the app, it was decided that a wholly separate app using the same framework should be made called Movies. It is also available in the app store. To this day, I far prefer Showtimes. I don't care for spending 5 minutes to see when the movie's playing. I just want to make a decision in under 30 seconds, loading included.

Portfolio

Here, at last, a portable-ish version of my portfolio. It's 33MB in size, has 57 pages all-in-all, including covers. Large (10.75" x 12.75") printed copies are available, free for prospective employers, or signed and shipped for $75.

By the way, Frankentown is still being written. I haven't abandoned the project and won't quit until it's done, printed and sitting on your bookshelves.