GASTRONOMYA source of inspiration for user experience design

Peter J. BogaardsEuroIA 2010

DdUX.org

informationdesign.org

Jacco NieuwlandInformation architect

User Intelligence

Eric ReissCEO FatDUX

Disclaimer

• This talk contains my ideas, insights and points-of-view and is born out of two passions.

• Gastronomy is no synonym for user experience (design), nor the other way.

• Present 8 similarities, parallels, or analogies.

• It’s not comprehensive at all.

Defining the damned thing

“Gastronomy is the craft, science, art, sociology, and anthropology of food, cooking, serving and eating.”

- Michael Ruhlman 2008

“User experience design is the art of setting the stage for good experiences to happen - creating spaces to find the delightful, useful, and good.”

- Helge Fredheim 2010

Conceptual metaphor

“A conceptual metaphor refers to the understanding of one idea, or conceptual domain, in terms of another.”

- Wikipedia

Prior art

“... (also known as state-of-the-art) in most systems of patent law, constitutes all information that has been made available to the public in any form before a given date that might be relevant to a patent's claims of originality.”

- Wikipedia

Patañjali Venkatacharya

User experience architectOracle

Ronald BaeckerJody AdamsDaniel Schwartz Jason Santos

8 ParallelsAnalogiesSimilarities

#1 ~ The senses

• Sensorium: vision, audition, touch, smell, and taste

• Perception, cognition, emotion, and action

• Design for the senses to allow experiences emerge.

Gastronomy

Mainly smell, taste, and touch

User experience

Mainly vision and audition

#2 ~ Type of field

Gastronomy as a field

•Practice-led field, guild, chefs, and schools

•Methods, techniques, skills, and tools

•Science and technology since 1970(‘Modernist cuisine’)

UXD/IA as a field

“(…) there is no larger coherent body of validated, scientific knowledge to appeal to or apply when designing in commercial or other contexts.”

Jason Hobbs, et al.Journal of Information Architecture

Issue 1 Volume 2

“The field of UXD in general, and IA in particular is a practice-led field in need of scientific research and reflection.”

#3 ~ Homo sapiens

Omnivore

FOOD

Informavore

FEED

#4 ~ Visualization

Jordy Houtman 2010

Louis Rosenfeld 2001

Jordy Houtman 2010

The Elements of User ExperienceA basic duality: The Web was originally conceived as a hypertextual information space;but the development of increasingly sophisticated front- and back-end technologies hasfostered its use as a remote software interface. This dual nature has led to much confusion,as user experience practitioners have attempted to adapt their terminology to cases beyondthe scope of its original application. The goal of this document is to define some of theseterms within their appropriate contexts, and to clarify the underlying relationships amongthese various elements.

Jesse James Garrettjjg@jjg.net

Visual Design: graphic treatment of interfaceelements (the "look" in "look-and-feel")

Information Architecture: structural designof the information space to facilitateintuitive access to content

Interaction Design: development ofapplication flows to facilitate user tasks,defining how the user interacts withsite functionality

Navigation Design: design of interfaceelements to facilitate the user's movementthrough the information architectureInformation Design: in the Tuftean sense:designing the presentation of informationto facilitate understanding

Functional Specifications: "feature set":detailed descriptions of functionality the sitemust include in order to meet user needs

User Needs: externally derived goalsfor the site; identified through user research,ethno/techno/psychographics, etc.Site Objectives: business, creative, or otherinternally derived goals for the site

Content Requirements: definition ofcontent elements required in the sitein order to meet user needs

Interface Design: as in traditional HCI:design of interface elements to facilitateuser interaction with functionalityInformation Design: in the Tuftean sense:designing the presentation of informationto facilitate understanding

Web as software interface Web as hypertext system

Visual Design: visual treatment of text,graphic page elements and navigationalcomponents

Concrete

Abstracttim

eConception

Completion

FunctionalSpecifications

ContentRequirements

InteractionDesign

InformationArchitecture

Visual Design

Information DesignInterface Design Navigation Design

Site ObjectivesUser Needs

User Needs: externally derived goalsfor the site; identified through user research,ethno/techno/psychographics, etc.Site Objectives: business, creative, or otherinternally derived goals for the site

This picture is incomplete: The model outlined here does not account for secondary considerations (such as those arising during technical or content development)that may influence decisions during user experience development. Also, this model does not describe a development process, nor does it define roles within auser experience development team. Rather, it seeks to define the key considerations that go into the development of user experience on the Web today.

task-oriented information-oriented

30 March 2000

© 2000 Jesse James Garrett http://www.jjg.net/ia/

The elements of eating experience

Peter Morville 2004

Facets of the user experience

Facets of the eating experience

Peter Bogaards 2010

#5 ~ Mis en place

“The preparation and assembly of ingredients, pans, utensils, and plates or serving pieces needed for a particular dish or service period.”

- The Culinary Institute of America

UX Design library

• Frameworks

• Design patterns

• Modular components

• Guidelines, grids, and templates

• Standards, reuse, consistency and efficiency

Courtesy of Nathan Curtis

#6 ~ Evaluation

Gastronomy: Taste

•Experience prototyping

•Expert opinion and user feedback

•To make food or cook

User experience: Test

#7 ~ Principles

“Washoku is a practice, it's experiential.”

Washoku: The five principles

• Five colors (‘go shiki’): red, yellow, green, black, and white.

• Five tastes (‘go mi’): a harmonious balance of flavors (salty, sour, sweet, bitter, and spicy)

• Five ways (‘go ho’): prepare food by a variety of methods..

• Five senses (‘go kan’): be mindful of taste, sight, sound, smell, and touch

• Five outlooks (‘go kan mon’): rules concerned with the partaking of food.

5 principles for UX designers

• Understand the underlying problem before attempting to solve it

• Don’t hurt anyone

• Make things simple and intuitive

• Acknowledge that the user is not like you

• Have empathy

- Whitney Hess

#8 ~ Inspiration

Wrapup•Gastronomy as a field is a rich source

of inspiration.

• Just a few examples of parallels, similarities, and analogies. There are many more.

•More attention to the human experience than to the ‘thing’ we design.

FoodUX.org

“All slides will be online. If you can’t find them, you’re in the wrong business.”

- Steven Pemberton, 2010

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