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Do you design in the browser?

9 years ago from Wes Oudshoorn, Co-founder at AppSignal

  • Wes OudshoornWes Oudshoorn, 9 years ago

    I found it quite interesting that you were talking about the certainty your client needs about knowing what the end result will be. This is a big issue why people like "finished" designs early on in the process.

    I heard people say: "Showing your client a Photoshop mockup is the best way of showing them something their website will never look like." I hope we find ways of giving our clients certainty without showing them final designs in photoshop.

    Thanks for sharing your thoughts :)

    1 point
    • James Young, 9 years ago

      You don't need to give them absolute certainty. Just confidence.

      I've heard all the quotes about how Photoshop isn't like "the responsive web" etc and I've happily drunk the KoolAid as much as the next man trying to find a good balance between code prototypes (costly in initial time to code relative to a rough visual), hard to ammend without lashing more HTML and CSS at something and quite often once a prototype has been through several rounds of feedback and tweaks, the code is so hacked up it needs rewriting anyway.

      I've tried combining that approach with style guides which is a reasonable halfway house to establish a look and feel but again, if a client doesn't "get it" and can't piece together a style guide mentally then I no longer feel its worth my time to force the issue when I can give them a rough representation of their website.

      In the many years of doing design work I've happily tried a lot of stuff and my earlier comment feels about right for my current projects and our clients and works for us.

      As ever, your mileage may vary and depending on which person is flavour of the month on twitter or speaking at a conference you'll probably end up hearing some sort of absolute statement about how X is wrong, do Y or something like that!

      2 points