Graphics and multimedia

See also: visual design

Discussion articles

• Better graphic design
  Graphic designers are asked to perform the difficult task of being creative every single day. Often, our main priority is to feed our client's fascination for originality. We experiment with colours, composition, typography, and photography in order to deliver an original visual solution. This sort of free-ranging experimentation is often the expectation of graphic designers. However, this approach is becoming less and less effective.

• Graphic design plays a minor role on the web
  "The best websites are highly functional. They are task-focused. Graphic design has an important, though limited role. Don't try and force the Web to be what it's not."
  (Gerry McGovern - New Thinking)

• Graphic design vs usability
  The GUI Olympics is an annual event where top graphic designers converge to design the latest and greatest "skins" for the Winamp media player, Windows themes and icons. The event is in its final week, and while it's wrapping up it might be useful to reflect on a couple of note-worthy items that relate to popular misconceptions of usability and graphic design...

• Learning to love the pixel: exploring the craft of icon design
  Designing web-based enterprise software involves creating complex artifacts like architecture wireframes, object models, screen flows, and clickable prototypes in order to articulate aspects of the online experience for product stakeholders. But what does "craft" mean for interaction designers?

• Talking head video is boring online
  "Eyetracking data show that users are easily distracted when watching video on websites, especially when the video shows a talking head and is optimized for broadcast rather than online viewing."
  (Jakob Nielsen - Alertbox)