In the recently held Copenhagen Design Week 2011, Marko Ahtisaari, Chief Designer of Nokia, talked about the ‘patterns of human interaction’ and how it affects people in their daily lives. Marko, the man behind the design of the Nokia N9, also discussed few things and factors that led to the creation of the N9’s design. The event was held between 1 to 6 September at Bella Sky Hotel, Copenhagen, Denmark.
Marko started with an example of how steering wheel, that we see in the automobiles today, became the dominant user interface of the vehicle controllers. He mentioned that automobiles in their early stages had tillers as the controlling interface. It took around 15 years for the automobile designers to come-up and get convinced with the steering wheel design. The reference he was trying to make is that a perfect design is not something that can be achieved overnight. He says, it’s a slow and steady process. He further points out that the mobile design industry is only through the halfway mark of that period.
In the video, Marko mentions how UI designers can be trapped in a ‘pattern’ and be unable to break free from it in their designs. An example would be the home button present in virtually all smartphones today, and the UI that revolves around it.
A very good point to note from the video is that even at Nokia, they use sketches in their mock-ups. Marko says, at Nokia, they prefer the iterative process of ‘sketching and coding’ and ‘user testing’ of their interface ideas. He says it’s a much better way to determine if the idea was indeed better. So yeah, it feels good that what we are learning are applied even in top companies like Nokia.
Marko talked for almost 36 minutes and its literally not possible for us to translate every bit of it into this post. So better, you watch the video yourself and find it out.
The Video – Marko Ahtisaari’s Speech
Now that you’ve watched the video, we would love to hear a few words from you as well. How do you think the human interaction pattern will affect our lives? Tell us in the comments section below.
