Happy to meet up with designers and like-minded good folk: live in Oakland, work in SF.

hello@aayushis.in or @aayush are the best ways to reach out.

In spite of our best efforts, building a community of designers around you is really hard. You may be a solo-designer working at a startup, new to a place, or just not the best at small-talk.

We faced the same problems, and are hence trying to fix it by starting small with the first in a series of events that focus on conversation, understanding and most importantly, building a sense of community.

Start by reading Emma Ryan’s post on Medium. A signup link is included there. I’m happy to answer any questions too!

Here's mine, about 6 months out of date. Mobile version is being overhauled: http://www.aayushis.in

I personally made the same switch, but it was a lot more organic. [Story coming up]

I used to serve as the Creative Director for Volkswagen’s India business, and whilst managing the digital arm was fun, the campaigns were often a digital afterthought which led to banner production, and well... more banner production.

So to change that, I started pushing for Digital-Products-as-Campaigns: for example, Volkswagen Live was pitched as an alternative to pushing banners around sporting events, and became a full-fledged, short-run iPad app.

It’s still within the agency mindset, but you get to practice all the good stuff product designers have to do: attention on users, constant iteration to improve, building logic blocks that are reusable, etc.

And, side projects: VERY important, and I always kept making things. Even if it’s a product JUST for yourself, it still uses principles of product design (try not designing just for yourself though :D )

I’ll start, I suppose:

I presently work on a productivity app called DoNext, and live in San Francisco. Before this, I spent time on a (unsuccessfully funded) Kickstarter designing a tiny hardware jukebox called piq. I’m also actively building an iOS equivalent app for it.

You can find me on:

Web: http://www.aayushis.in Twitter: @aayush

Has hints of Univers to it, and is very legible. Interesting choice for a primarily all-caps interface.

Look and Feel, or Animations can mean different things in different stages of your design. Early on, it could refer to the spatial model that your app conveys - should this push left? Is this invoked modally?

At this stage, I’ve found Marvel App particularly useful. I also use XCode’s storyboards at this point with PNGs to simulate motion - which may be of use to you.

As you get closer and closer to refinement, your demonstrations may be about fidelity instead of viability. At this point, tools like Quartz Composer and Framer are great. Using the former (particularly if you are a fan of the POP framework) might help add some level of finality towards the design.

Thanks Wes. The feedback is great. I believe we’re at a point in design right now, where the "Why this is needed in the world" is stunningly clear, but "What’s this look like" is still guided by people’s experience of the app.

In its current form, the app is a to-do list with a special emphasis on collaborative (task/intent) based messaging.

The screenshots are a little old, I give you that and they’re being changed in the next update. Here’s a sneak peek at what they’ll look like:

http://cl.ly/image/3u22311g2q3E

Thank you for your responses. I’d love to know how you use Slack/Email for collaboration in more detail if you have the time. Specifically, how easy it is for you to follow-up on someone - that’s something we’re trying to solve in a world with ephemeral messaging and flooded inboxes.

Thanks again, and happy to chat offline too:

Email · Personal Twitter

App Link Fail:

Download on the App Store

Feedback appreciated via:

DoNext’s New Twitter Account · Email · Personal Twitter

I’m often concerned when we, as designers make blanket statements like "I stopped interviewing with that company immediately after that call".

We must be the change we want to see, and it’s our job, if anything, to educate people about newer methodologies, ideas and ways of thinking.

Also, it’s important to note that "Pixel Perfect" can also mean attention to detail. If your primary candidate for design is a specific platform or device, you do need to be accurate (and I dare say perfectly accurate) to that: other platforms will then be the best equivalence to this "perfect vision".