Beginning the project, I wanted to focus on a webpage that was not too large as to be too much work, but to have a fun design system already in place, with an event that I was interested in. For this, I chose Boardmasters, a festival in Cornwall based around surfing and music. Whilst the webpage was developed by a design team from Project Simply, it felt like it lacked basic design principle thought, and there was an inability for simple principles such as the ability for Error Tolerance and Ease of Navigation.
Heuristic Markup
Based on a sitemap and Jakob Neilson’s 10 Heuristics, I noted points of development, positives, negatives, and just general thoughts on the images of flows. These all could then be linked back to the 10 principles, which can be found in my further research (link). Markups are simply short ideas and notes, and so I was not too worried about lengths of explanation but just getting the issues pointed out on the web flow.
I also looked at the selling of a physical product, and where that webpage provided different things that the Boardmasters site could not, be this due tot he nature of it being an experience and not a product being bought, or simply lack of thought in the design of the flow. the physical product webpage, Martha Jackson Jewellery, was beautifully laid out, and provided a steady and easy to follow flow, inclusive of affordances, signifiers, and strong mapping.
Miro Board Link : https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVNfSA41M=/?moveToWidget=3458764566228654072&cot=14
The Seven Design Principles
This provided me with the ability to then pull apart both of the websites and look at where they meet and failed to meet the Seven Design Principles as created by Don Norman (link).
The Boardmasters website notably had less of the principles within it’s components, however, this did not mean it lacked all of them, as some of the principles, such as Discoverability and Signifiers, were followed precisely, and made the website easier to navigate.
Miro Board Link : https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVNfSA41M=/?moveToWidget=3458764566229830754&cot=14