Prototype
Prototypes are tangible representations of products or solutions that are being designed, meant to be used for testing in order to further develop the product or solution. As Poggenpohl [1] explains, prototypes are a “material conversation that the designer has with the User”. By seeing them as “a way to learn from the user what familiarity the object has (or lacks), what patterns of behaviour the object fits into, what intuitive responses the user brings to the object and which aspects of the prototype elicit satisfaction or delight”. She distinguishes prototyping from usability testing, “which seeks to verify the design of a product holistically at a rather late point in the development process” [1].
Prototypes can be used at any stage of the development process and can take many forms that “give everyone a real-world representation of ideas that will help engender a response from your team” [2] . Poggenpohl [1] distinguishes between four different kinds of prototypes that often overlap: conceptual (diagram, sketch), behavioural (paper model, computer simulation), procedural (space/time sequence), and appearance (refined model) prototypes.
Prototypes are used to test ideas, and also to explore and create new knowledge. Prototypes can be considered to be filters of a particular aspect which the designer wants to test or explore [3] . For example, by developing specific aspects such as the graphical interface, it is more likely that an evaluation of the prototype will result in feedback on that aspect. Before creating the prototype, it is therefore important to have an idea of what you want to test, in order to determine how best to go about testing it.
Prototypes are often classified in level of fidelity. Different levels are often called low fidelity (lo-fi), mixed fidelity (mixed fi) and high fidelity (hi-fi). McCurdy et al. [4] describe five dimensions along which a prototype can be characterised: visual refinement, breadth and depth of functionality, richness of interactivity, and richness of data model. Depending on how developed a prototype is within these scales, it can be described as lo-, mixed or hi-fi.
Prototyping Tools
Depending on what type of prototype is being created, there are useful tools to help create the prototypes easily and efficiently. The table summarises some popular tools for creating prototypes.
| Tool | Type of prototype | Platform |
|---|---|---|
| InVision Studio | Behavioural, appearance |
Cloud/Windows/MacOS |
| Figma | Behavioural, appearance |
Cloud |
| Adobe XD | Behavioural, appearance |
Windows/MacOS |
| Lego | Conceptual, behavioural, appearance |
None (physical) |
| PowerPoint | Conceptual, behavioural, appearance |
Windows/MacOS |
| Keynote | Conceptual, behavioural, appearance |
MacOS |
| Paper | Conceptual, behavioural |
None (physical) |
| OmniGraffle | Procedural, behavioural, appearance |
MacOS/iOS |
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Poggenpohl, Sharon H. 2002. Design Moves: Approximating a Desired Future with Users. In Jorge Frascara, ed. Design and the Social Sciences. London and New York: Taylor & Francis Books Limited. Pp.: 66-82.
- ↑ Merholz, Peter, Todd Wilkens, Brandon Schauer, and David Verba. 2008. Subject to Change: Creating Great Products and Services for an Uncertain World. Beijing, Cambridge: O’Reilly.
- ↑ Lim, Y. K., Stolterman, E., & Tenenberg, J. (2008). The anatomy of prototypes: Prototypes as filters, prototypes as manifestations of design ideas. ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI), 15(2), 1-27.
- ↑ McCurdy, M., Connors, C., Pyrzak, G., Kanefsky, B., & Vera, A. (2006, April). Breaking the fidelity barrier: an examination of our current characterization of prototypes and an example of a mixed-fidelity success. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human Factors in computing systems (pp. 1233-1242).
