Don Norman, The Design of Everyday Things
Don Norman, Emotion and Design: Attractive Things Work Better
Much of Norman’s writing discusses techniques for designing tools* (things) to be understood, effective and usable. Through an explanation of affordances and signifiers, he advocates that tools should indicate what actions are possible and where and how these actions should be done.
*I’ve chosen to use the word “tool” rather than “thing”. In the context of Norman’s arguments, the things are used and are not solely aesthetic creations (although they can also be aesthetically pleasing!)
Fundamentally the tools we use shape the output we produce. The resulting product—whether explicitly or not—has traces of the process by which it was created. Physical objects can have physical evidence of their process, such as seeing the layers of filament from a 3D print. However, a digital process may be less visually apparent in its final product. Where was the mouse clicked? Was the cursor movement controlled by a single finger on a trackpad, multiple fingers, a mouse, a joystick?
In his book “Software Takes Command”, Lev Manovich writes about how artistic software such as Photoshop, Final Cut, and Illustrator have shaped the visual aesthetic of current media and design. He explores how these visual language “tools” within a software platform often recreate the effect achieved by physical tools, such as brushes in Photoshop, and debates what this means to the “medium”.
Interestingly, there is an abundance of tool recommendations on the Internet. The Setup is an interview blog in which people purely talk about the tools they use to complete their work. Yet the answers are brand-based, not generic descriptions. One interviewee states she uses Google Drive rather than describing a cloud-based file storage platform as part of her workflow. In naming brands rather than devices, we are not discussing how a tool achieves a particular outcome but rather associating our identity with the identity of a company. I would be interesting in reading someone’s tool recommendations described through its affordances and signifiers. (Future blog post!) By taking the recommendation of someone else, are we uncritically removing ourselves from part of the design process? Should conceptualizing an idea be consciously coupled with the selection of tools, the means by which an idea is manifested?
When we make things—physically or digitally—it is important to be critical of the tools we are using to do so. Do we need to make new tools to accomplish our goals? Are we (adversely or positively) modifying a design in order to be achieved a tool’s capability? What exploratory opportunities are enabled by a tool? Being cognizant of the degree to which tools inhibit or prescribe an outcome is fundamental to a critical tool selection process. Bethany Nowviskie, Research Associate Professor of Digital Humanities at the University of Virginia, reinterprets William Morris’ common refrain—“You can’t have art without resistance in the material”—to be understood as a resistance within a tool, or perhaps “process”.
Morris’s final, throwaway complaint is not about that positive, inherent resistance—the friction that makes art—which we happily seek within the humanities material we practice upon. It’s about resistance unhealthily and inaccessibly located in a toolset. 20th century pop psychology would see this as a disturbance in “flow.” 21st century interaction design seeks to avoid or repair such UX (or user experience) flaws…Evidence of friction in the means, rather than the materials, of digital humanities inquiry is everywhere evident in the program of this MLA convention.
While this resistance can be frustrating and unintentionally affect the product, it also provides opportunity to exploit the intended operation of tools. This remixing of how a tool operates can be eye-opening and engages a new form of knowledge. For example, it took Destin Sandlin eight months to learn how to ride a bicycle that steers in the opposite way as expected (left turns right and right turns left). *Sidenote: it only took his son a few weeks! Perhaps the thing to do is keep learning, using and manipulating new tools in an attempt to prevent them becoming so ingrained in the creative process.
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Further References
Lev Manovich, Software Takes Command
Bethany Nowviskie, Resistance in the Materials
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