Art Direction is the process of guiding the visual language, style, and aesthetics of a project to convey a specific message or evoke a desired emotional response. It’s an often overlooked part of web design which should be treated as important as UX, Content, or UI design, as it’s the thing that ties all of these together.
I think one of the most interesting ideas around web Art Direction is how it relates to communication. Websites are first and foremost a method of communication, which is why so much effort is put into the design and writing of content, however, if the Art Direction is overlooked it can often lead to a disconnect between the user and the brand. Without this connection, the brand cannot effectively communicate to the user, so Art Direction is much more integral to the communication of a website. I felt that I already knew that Art Direction was important as it helps make more engaging experiences, but thinking about it in this way has made me reevaluate its importance not just for aesthetics but for the ability to communicate the brand to the user.
How art direction will help you create masterful web interfaces
The Dribbblisation of Design is effect that design social platforms are having on the industry and new designers. When looking at work on sites like Dribbble, you’re seeing mainly the overall visual aspects of a product, rather than the user experience of said product. Due to this, work that is posted to these sites is being created with the visual aspects in mind first rather than the user experience, as this is what gets the most attention. Along with this, the limited ways to respond to work you see except for simply liking it means any feedback from these sites are largely one note and don’t hold much value outside of supporting what the designer wanted to create. While sites like Dribbble can be great sources of inspiration, I think it’s important to remember that the examples on these sites should just be inspiration and not pillars of good design. I think you can get carried away on these sites and be engrossed by the incredible visuals of some of the UI’s without considering whether they would actually function as good user experiences.
What I think is most important to take away from this is that Art Direction alone is not enough, and creating products designed solely around unique or impressive visuals and not considering the UX of a product will lead to failure. I’m glad I’ve considered this as I do feel that in previous project I’ve lent too heavily into the visual side of things, but I think I’ll really strive in this project to find a way to balance great and unique visuals with effective UX.
To explore the idea of Art Direction further I read some of Andy Clarke’s “Art Direction for the Web” and listened to a talk he gave about the book. A really interesting point he brought up was around how designers used to be far more bold with art direction and was based off of what they thought the project needed. Today, almost all aspects of a product can be designed based on user testing and feedback, which doesn’t necessarily create the best user experience for the visuals due to how monotonous web design has become. This isn’t to say user testing isn’t important, but the problem is that users today are so used to convention website visual design that the feedback they’ll give will always support conventional design. I think as designers it’s really important to reclaim the confidence to say what we think will and won’t work in the visual aspects of design, and to challenge conventional design. I’d also say we’re at a point now with Ai that if we don’t push creativity and strive to be confident in our own decisions, it will just make it easier for Ai to eclipse us.
Art Direction for the Web with Andy Clarke
This has been an interesting week as it’s helped me to understand finding a balance between Art Direction and UX. It’s helped me to consider where my visual styles draw influences from and to be more confident in exploring bolder and more unconventional visual styles. Overall I think these are things that will be really useful to think about in this project and are ideas I will continue to think about in the future.