When I moved to California, a farewell gift from my employees from the Lextant design laboratory was a metal lunchbox filled with magnets that had inscriptions and printed images, a personal set of magnetic poetry. Since then I have been looking for an opportunity to introduce these magnetic sheets for printing into the design of interactions.

Problem

Finally, this opportunity presented itself when I noticed myself behind the endless fidgeting in the Creative Suite, in an attempt to build an Aurora-like interface for a mobile device, consisting of many floating pictures and words. Since this was an exercise to improve the interface, the sketches lacked the necessary accuracy and interactivity. On the other hand, I was forced to admit that the computer simply wastes my time.

Decision

Enter magnetic prototyping. I ran off to the nearest OfficeMax to buy a package of Inkjet Magnet Sheets ($ 12) and a portable magnetic board. Returning to the Creative Suite: instead of trying to shape the design of the screens, I simply took all my information elements and widgets and replicated them in large numbers in order to make sheets of interface stickers. I cut everything into pieces and within a few minutes I got a working model of my idea for a user interface with moving parts — no ActionScript needed!


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Benefits

Unlike conventional paper prototypes, I don’t worry that my decisions will crumble while I walk around the office and test the concept on employees. Unlike stickers or sticky windows (or printed nets), parts can slide and move freely both by employees and by participants in testing. Unlike several pre-packaged kits ( http://www.guimags.com/ and http://www.sitepoint.com/kits/usability1/ ), hand-made kits represent exactly the parts you need. If something is missing, I can simply draw it on a magnet or print additional elements if necessary. All I need to document concepts in the process of their appearance is a copier. By printing enlarged color copies of the magnetic board on our giant sheet of cutting paper, I can easily document interactions with stickers.

Restrictions

Naturally, this method has its limitations. Due to the fact that it is based on ready-made parts, it works best when you already have a clear understanding of which parts you will work with. For example, if you are re-designing a site that you know about, it uses small thumbnails, list items, and a sidebar. The use of ready-made parts can also limit if you are trying to develop new interaction paradigms. There are also several practical limitations: it is difficult to make several pages to demonstrate the design due to the fact that the working area is magnetic. The ability to write on boards is good, but thick, dirty markers are not always the best solution for drawing interfaces.

Why use

Applying to the right project, I found that this specialized set for magnetic prototyping speeds up the process of communication between people, creates new ideas, introduces an element of the game and gives people (who often don’t want to participate) the opportunity to quickly express their ideas. If you are looking for ways to make a good design faster or involve clients, users or someone else in the development process, then I advise you to buy a package of magnetic sheets for printing and see how this useful, multi-user development tool can serve you!

In Russia, magnetic paper can be found, for example, in Canudos .