Transitional Interfaces

In the article, the author discusses the use of animation in regards to transitions. I’ll admit, I’m not a huge fan of animations because I feel it can bog down the user experience with unnecessary loading, and if not handled correctly, can just look busy and even ugly. I do however understand how animation can be useful in interfaces, if used in a helpful manner.

The best example in the article is the first example given with the list. In the first example, the “new item” just jarringly pops up and shifts everything below it down. Now, if I were looking at an app and saw that, I may think that something is either wrong, or that particular button had just finished loading. It looks lazy and cheap (which it might be since that’s the default that the computer would choose). The two examples of using animation I feel work much better because they do indicate to the user that you've added a new item or feature, and it’s intentionally there.

Another part of the animated transitions that I did like, was using the animations to expand a window. The example I preferred was the second “list summary” example where the window expands downwards to provide a bit more information without looking excessive or like overkill (which I think the third example is). If you’re going to use animation as a transition, I think the good examples that I pointed are a good way to do it They don’t interfere with the user experience, and can actually enhance it, while looking cool at the same time.

The author is right, designers can sometimes obsess over the look and aesthetics over functionality. I consider myself a designer who has always been in love with technology, so I feel I’ve always had an appreciation for a functional application, even when does sometimes has to take a back seat. I know I’ve stated this in previous blogs, but I think it’s worth repeating...if you have a strong layout and it works properly, you can build a solid design around that. It’s much harder to take a fancy design, and make it functional.