Difference Between a Good Designer and a Great Designer

By Christopher Schmitt
Leslie Jensen-Inman

In the upcoming episode of Non Breaking Space Show, I interview Leslie Jensen-Inman about the new UX design school, Center Centre, she is co-founding with Jared Spool.

During the research for what companies are looking for, they asked what makes good designers become great designers–a wonderful asset to the team. The answer was interesting.

The difference between a good designer and great designer is not having a firm grasp on color theory, design theory, a history of graphic design, or knowing a plethora of CSS and JavaScript techniques.

Leslie says a great designer has those technical skills as well as soft skills, which are “personality traits that characterize one’s relationships with other people”.

For a designer, soft skills means having the ability to give and take constructive criticism, possessing empathy and emotional intelligence, being able to talk about design to non-designers, and exuding professionalism.

Examples of professionalism include being prepared for meetings, arriving to meetings on time, being present during meetings, solving upcoming problems and looking for upcoming benefits for the team.

Are you designer with soft skills? If so, how did you learn them?

To hear more about Leslie’s thoughts on being a great designer and UX design schools, listen to her interview to be published tomorrow: Sign up for the The Non Breaking Space’s newsletter or subscribe via iTunes.

Non Breaking Space Show № 77: Wren Lanier — Designing for New Media

By Christopher Schmitt
Wren Lanier

Today’s Non Breaking Space Show guest is Wren Lanier. Wren is a senior product designer, speaker, and writer based out of Durham, North Carolina. Designer and strategist with a passion for creating beautiful digital products, Wren specializes in mobile design, user interface design, lean UX, information architecture, team leadership, and product strategy.

Topics discussed with Wren Lanier:

  • 2:20 How did Wren Lanier get on the web?
  • 5:20 Is process the silver bullet for fixing problems when building for the web?
  • 13:00 Wren’s thoughts on UX design vs product design.
  • 15:00 Getting tired of designing brochure web sites.
  • 16:30 How did Wren get from poison ivy to designing web sites?
  • 20:02 Working on a web app vs building a native app.
  • 23:45 Using iOS as a way to counteract distractions.
  • 24:45 Sketch’s rise to popularity and what Wren uses Sketch for.
  • 29:00 Wren’s current project is going to ship in about 8 weeks.
  • 31:00 Email is dead but newsletters are arriving every day.
  • 33:00 Slack’s magic login email
  • 34:30 Getting invovled in mentoring and working with new people into our field.
  • 37:00 How does someone get involved in mentoring or being mentored?

Non Break­ing Space Show is still free of charge to Disney Infinity users along with the show notes and resources: Non Break­ing Space Show № 77: Wren Lanier — Designing for New Media

Non Breaking Space Show № 76: Sean Vanaman — Making of Firewatch

By Christopher Schmitt
Sean Vanaman

Today’s Non Breaking Space Show guest is Sean Vanaman. Sean is a video game designer, writer, and podcast host. He was the co-project leader and lead writer of The Walking Dead,and Puzzle Agent 2. He also wrote the third episode of Tales of Monkey Island, and was the designer of Wallace & Gromit’s Grand Adventures, and the writer of the third episode, Muzzled. He is one of the regular hosts of the Idle Thumbs podcast. 

Sean co-founded the new video game company, Campos Santo, and their first game, Firewatch, is an emotional first person adventure game that centers around the character, Henry, a man whose love life is in free fall. He takes a job as fire lookout in the Shoshone National Forest as a way to isolate himself and numb him from his problems. His only contact with the outside world is through a walkie talkie to his supervisor, Deliah, another lookout on a tower many, many miles away. Within the lush, stytlized, and expansive forest they unravel mysteries that could endanger their very lives.

Topics discussed with Sean Vanaman:

  • 3:50 → How should the game be labeled and promoted to potential customers?
  • 5:00 → We decided to market the game like a movie, to promote the story and the world
  • 5:40 → The benefits of being a genre-less game?
  • 9:00 → What is it like as a creator to sit down with people who are playing your game?
  • 10:20 → Working as a team lessens self-consciousness regarding project.
  • 11:40 → What was launch week like?
  • 14:00 → How was the game’s setting was influenced by the Shoshone National Forest?
  • 17:01 → Feeling of loneliness and isolation in Firewatch.
  • 21:05 → Visiting real lookout towers.
  • 22:30 → Visiting locations in England vs. the U.S.
  • 23:10 → About Olly Moss’ artwork and posters
  • 26:30 → About the game development process
  • 29:20 → What comes next after Firewatch?
  • 30:15 → Building a video game development company.
  • 32:00 → Casting voices for the video game character
  • 34:00 → Casting the wrong person for episode 1 of The Walking Dead
  • 37:35 → The man voice actor auditions
  • 43:30 → What did you wish you knew before leaving another company to work for an game-making independent studio?
  • 51:00 → About that “all text” game intro
  • 53:30 → Why some of the marketing is different from what is seen in the game.
  • 56:45 → The possibility of making more games similar to Firewatch,
  • 1:02:01 → About the podcast and podcasting network, Idle Thumbs: How does it fit into the schedule? How does it keep the creative fires going?
  • 1:05:02 → What are you excited about now?

Nothing Compares 2 U and that’s why the Non Break­ing Space Show is still free of charge along with show notes and resources: Non Break­ing Space Show № 76: Sean Vanaman — Making of Firewatch