For the past few years I have been thinking a lot about my direction as a designer and creator, developing new side projects and ways to challenge myself and change my direction. Also thinking about the nature of the medium I work in and where I see myself going in the future.
This leads me to dissect the current state of the web and developers and designers within that space. I often think of the nature of web design we know today as a progression of a language or form of communication (of course it is called HTML :p) and my duty as a designer is to contribute to this new emerging form of communication, shaping how this modern language is received and interacted with.
Sometimes this experience can be great and rewarding, and of course learning structural tools is always good in terms of process (Think grids, semantics etc). It may seem like I’m stating the obvious here but that leads me to think; what are the other opportunities the web holds as a medium?
So much of my time as a designer is spent either creating something that exists within an already predefined structure, what audiences are familiar with, current trends and best practices.
What about using the internet as a tool and blank canvas for creating projects that are unbound by grids, hierarchy and standards and utilizing the web as a canvas to create projects that engage people and grow our connectivity, something the web surely was created to do.
Creating more artistic experiential environments that breaks the normal UX pattern or customer journey where the “goals” or “tasks” are completely thrown out the window, new ideas and possibilities emerge.
Looking through different lenses we can begin to imagine new journeys into the the probable possible and imagined futures of connectivity, expression and interaction.
Going down this road of exploration and discovery hopefully I will have some pretty cool projects to show you along the way…
Image courtesy of the extrapolation factory
theoneandonlynaoise 