New trend in mobile UX: Windows Phone
- Different approach to UI design (source: http://www.appleinsider.com)
What’s the trend of UI design? Many will think Apple is the god. Simple and usable, but still with well crafted graphics. We’ve seen all these high-resolution icons originated from Apple, and everywhere nowadays. They look pleasing and beautiful, and unlike fancy animation or artistic graphs, do no damage to usability side. Actually there’s a lot of work behind these graphics. One of my friends said, a graphic designer can spend 6 hours making an icon, just in pursuit of the ultimate details!
But still, they use the traditional UI model: buttons, navigation, application interface, etc. The UI is a layer on top of the content, there’s a clear distinction from them. Android, being a major competitor, uses a similar notion. Could there be something different?
The designers of windows phone seem to be out of the cage already. If you haven’t seen windows phone, have a look at this page. In this totally new interface, navigation is embedded into the content itself, so you wouldn’t see the traditional buttons. And, instead of making highly sophisticated graphics, they applied a simplistic design approach, described by JOHNNY HOLLAND, “The ‘IxD Bauhaus’ – what happens next?” as a new trend in IxD.
Whether successful or not, this is a good question for UI developers, what’s next after the “Apple UI”?
See also:
Ideas from big minds: http://www.ixda.org/node/30006#comment-81855
