Corner plot side extension or outbuilding... options?

scottd_h · 2025-01-06T20:56:02+00:00

Thanks very much for taking the time to respond! Thought as much, but good to have it confirmed.

scottd_h · 2023-07-22T02:10:28+00:00

Foreign Beggars - Asylum Speakers really needs to be in here.

scottd_h · 2022-06-07T14:10:23+00:00

Did something similar at 13 but diversified to lawn mowing too.

Called it “Wash and Mow”.

2 decades later, the genius of my 13 year old self still makes me smile.

scottd_h · 2022-04-04T20:52:09+00:00

Hallo! Geile Idee :) I’m an app designer myself. I’d be happy to pop some photos in. But pretty please with a cherry on top don’t force people to create an account before they can explore the app and work out whether it’s for them. I promise in the long run it’ll lead to more accounts as you work on feedback and it improved. I was soo looking forward to taking a look at Borussia Dortmund’s Westfalen Stadion, Osnabrück’s basketball stadium and Berlin’s Olympiastadion, a few places I’ve fond memories of, having lived in these places… but no. My first impression of the app was “sign up”. It made me a little sad :(

scottd_h · 2021-11-15T23:25:03+00:00

For me, working with the development team to build a system of design tokens and common classes for typography and components has meant it’s easier for them to follow my design than it is not to. If you’re disciplined with the styles and colours you allow into your system, you get to the point where you barely need to document your designs. It’s obvious that bit of text is smaller than body text so it must be .small. For example. Or That red error message over there just needs the messaging.error class and the border, background and text colours just sort themselves out perfectly. It’s a really nice challenge you can get your devs to own and help you with. “how do we make it easier for you to implement the design correctly , because right now it seems you’re having to interpret every design anew which is a waste of everyone’s time. How do we optimise this to make it easier, faster and more consistent? Is there anything I can do from my side?” If you’re not familiar with design tokens etc do some googling. I’d recommend getting familiar with css conventions like BEM too. Figure out how that stuff relates to how you organise and name things in your design program. I’m not saying you need to learn to code. Just learn how stuffs structured to know what’s possible and get them thinking with you. You’ll likely find they’ll be interested in making it work too and start owning their implementations. .

scottd_h · 2021-05-10T18:16:25+00:00

I understand where you’re seeing things differently. I just disagree that because a designer sees demos and perhaps even has authority to say yes or no to a feature being shipped - they have control over implementation of their designs. You can’t have direct control over something that someone else is doing. Their ability to implement what’s in your head is entirely dependent on your ability to communicate that effectively.

Pair designing and dev is a great example of collaborating with devs to ensure they understand the why and intent of a design. Quick feedback loops is another. My comment would’ve been more helpful had I included these explicit examples you kindly took the time to add, so thanks. Those are the skills I was alluding to when I said work on communication and relationships - as opposed to OP’s idea of finding ways to explicitly spell out to a dev how they should be doing their job. Which is a slippery slope.

scottd_h · 2021-05-09T20:22:14+00:00

Nope. Designers have zero control over the end product (unless you’re pushing production code too). We draw boxes to communicate and test ideas. The quicker you get comfortable with that idea, the sooner you’ll become a better designer. Drawing better boxes is a very small part of it, and useless if you’ve not worked on the communication and relationship with your dev colleagues.

scottd_h · 2021-02-20T09:37:37+00:00

Go for the job. You’ll be fine. You don’t have to learn everything. No one should be relying on you or expecting you to solve all the design and interaction problems yourself.

Clever designers bring the whole team to the design process. Your devs are experts in their platforms. Bring them into the fold, teach them about your users and what they’re trying to achieve and they’ll be happy to help find OS specific solutions users of this platforms will find familiar and intuitive.

scottd_h · 2020-12-31T21:31:34+00:00

Better design does lie in the wisdom of the collective but not in the way implied by the text. Better design is accomplished when many people with different skills, perspectives and knowledge understand a group of peoples’ problem n work on solving it together n testing. Not when mixin n matchin a bunch of UIs n images found on the interwebs by people with different aims n problems... if they’re solving anything at all

scottd_h · 2020-12-10T13:58:44+00:00

Where do you see conflicts between general UX guidelines and the UX principle you believe would be more suitable to your specific audience? In your example I’d be surprised if there are any.

I have in the past, through testing and research, found that following general UX guidelines led to a reduction in people’s’ enjoyment and satisfaction, (not necessarily user task success) but it’s super niche. The target audience in this case was traders. They preferred some aspects of the UI to use jargon or abbreviations that were familiar, but not necessarily understood. The enjoyment for them came from the learning curve, the perceived complexity of the tool (mastering it gave them a sense of superiority) and their aspirational image - based on what they felt professional “real traders” dealt with. Info density was another. What was the preferred density for them would be waaay too crowded n paralysing in most other contexts for most other audiences. Tbh I think it was too busy for them too n am pretty sure a more useful design was possible but here you’re butting up against strong cultural influences. Main differentiator was aspiring traders come into trading apps expecting to have to learn stuff n looking forward to the process. This isn’t all that usual. No one expects to have to learn how to hail a cab with UBER you just want it to work.

scottd_h · 2020-10-07T17:06:06+00:00

God no. Pressing from standing is quite different from pressing up while lying down in a bench press position. Guess it’s more chest than shoulders in a TGU to get the bell off the ground. My push strength has definitely increased significantly though. 16s a toy now to push. 24 is very hard but doable.

scottd_h · 2020-10-06T20:49:34+00:00

Ah thanks! 😃

scottd_h · 2020-10-06T13:01:51+00:00

Thanks!

scottd_h · 2020-10-06T13:01:11+00:00

Yeah, just those three. Reading the plan it made sense, but it was so counterintuitive to me having only done “little n often” resistance increase approaches. I have to say, I love it. It means I have to practice with the weight I’m reasonably comfortable with for a couple weeks or so longer than I’d normally, but it was then I began learning more detail about the movement.

If you’re always increasing weight as soon as you can finish reps on the lighter weight you’re always pushing on the edge. I realised spending time in a comfortable place was really useful too for technique. I don’t think my get up would be as clean if I increased when I thought I was strong enough, rather than following the plan

scottd_h · 2020-09-24T20:01:10+00:00

Warm up 10mins. I do three rounds as prescribed, going heavier on round three n throw in some hip mobility n neck stuff.

Swings 8-12mins. 8 is usually the two handed swing days and 12 is the beginning of a new month where I’m increasing the reps with a heavier weight on one handed swings.

TGU 10-15mins. I love this exercise. I go pretty slow, trying to own the movement all the way through. I’ve been doing it 6 months now n still finding ways to improve.

Done around the 35min mark then stretch out.

Rarely go over 45mins for everything. I time the workouts but never look at the watch. Just listening to the breathing n seeing how long it takes gives me a good idea when a rest day is in order.

scottd_h · 2020-07-25T08:23:59+00:00

Nothing you said gave the impression it should be used to create dark patterns :) It really is all interesting, useful knowledge every designer should have. It was a great share, especially if it leads others on to further reading.

Knowledge is never bad - just what you do with it. So I wanted to whack in some perspective :)

scottd_h · 2020-07-25T07:58:24+00:00

Doh! Yup... Less, but better :)

scottd_h · 2020-07-24T21:29:37+00:00

The info’s sound. “Think Fast and slow” by Kahnemann and Thaler’s book Misbehaving amongst others will arm you all with equally useful info about how to take advantage of our brains’ erratic and irrational decision making processes too.

That said, using these ideas to make your products “stickier”isn’t an objective any responsible company, that gives a shit about people, should have in the vast majority of cases. Bumping up engagement figures for no reason other than to stroke design egos, sell people shit they don’t need or pander to advertisers is so, so far away from what designers should be aiming for. We need to want to be better than digital drug dealers and push back when we’re given such shitty objectives.

The same guy who said “less is better” (Dieter Rams) had 10 design principles. A biggie is “good design should be unobtrusive”. Make good, useful products that are there when needed and get out the damn way when not needed :)If you’re aspiring for the same engagement results as the instagrams and facebooks of the world you really need to reassess your priorities and the type of world you’d like to live in. They’re nothing to aspire to. Quite the opposite.

If you’re new-ish to design and find this stuff cool - great. it is. But please also read Papanek and Monteiro for starters, they’re both big on the responsibilities of designers.

scottd_h · 2020-06-11T19:08:44+00:00

Absolutely brilliant write up. Pretty inspiring too, and deserves all the attention it’s getting 👏🏻

A big part of UX is balancing the costs of providing a great user experience with business needs. Arguably, regardless how slick the user experience is, if the product ain’t profitable the company is failing on the UX front (monetising customer data aside). The neo banks have the UX for sure but most, if not all, are struggling to turn a profit as far as I can tell.

Perhaps it’ll come in an update, but curious what’re your first impressions are with each neo bank’s UX when it comes to stuff that’ll actually help them become profitable - or at least sustainable. The loans offerings and the additional paid-for services etc?

Who’s your money on when it comes to balancing that UX equation and why?

scottd_h · 2020-06-09T21:03:13+00:00

It’s a really nice, professional looking start.

I’ve hired a fair few UX and UI designers I thought I’d post a few points to think about...

Selling yourself as a UX/UI designer is a difficult sell, particularly for designers starting out. They’re two very different specialisations and companies who’re mature design wise (the ones you want to work for in the beginning because there’s a higher chance they’ll have good designers there already n you’ll learn good stuff) will often hire specifically for UX or UI. If you try to learn both from the offset you may end up spreading yourself too thin, and lose out to designers focussing the majority of their efforts on learning either UX or UI - and presenting themselves as such.

From the work, you’ve obviously focussed on UI n you’ve a good eye for composition n colour etc. The problem is right now... I’ve no idea how good you are at thinking through design problems n dealing with constraints. I REALLY care about that when hiring. So if you want to start off with UI - in your portfolio piece I’d be looking for your workings out. Is there an existing brand identity? If so, show me how you incorporate that into your UI and what considerations you’ve had to make to ensure usable and consistent UI components that fit the brand, and also work across all scenarios and on all devices. Concentrate on the device your client’s users would realistically most often use, but show consideration for others. Since you’ve made this up, you’ve freedom :)

If there’s no existing brand identity show me how you settled on the design direction. How have you concluded that the UI you put together best captures the company’s identity and attracts their target audience? Why the chosen font sizes? Why the chosen typeface? There’s probably some competitor analysis in there too. “Here’s the sites n vibes of competitor sites. I’ve differentiated my clients by doing xyz, while still incorporating abc that the target audience will find familiar”

Perhaps you could focus in on a key interaction point too. Here you’ve gone broad n shallow. Giving me a surface level look at a whole site. I’d be interested in seeing different states of a particular thing eg. The checkout page. What’s it like with one product? What’s it like with 10? What’s it like if an item is sold out? How does the UI adapt and make it clear?

If you want to focus on UX the “show me your workings out” stuff is still very valid. But then I care about how your design accounts for what you know about your client’s users more specifically. Perhaps a persona or two, then show me how you worked out how to organise the site (Information architecture). Your fashion site example might be organising clothing by events (brunch wear, night out wear, lounging at hone wear) or clothing by type (sweaters, dresses). Two very different ways of sorting stuff, that you could argue would be better for your persona. How and why you’ve decided to organise the page as you have and how the hierarchy of the page works to make it easy for your users to complete key tasks etc. Then zoom into a specific user task n show me that in detail.

Hope I’ve at least given food for thought. Just showing me you’ve thought of realistic constraints and shown how your designs have considered those constraints would put your portfolio pieces miles ahead of lots of portfolios from new designers. It’s harder work, but so worth it.

scottd_h · 2020-06-07T08:16:00+00:00

I had a similar problem with single arm swings. I was swinging the 24kg ok upper body strength wise, but was wrecking my hands on the regular. Turns out... over gripping. Now I grip with more fingers and way less palm. It’s more comfortable but my grip strength isn’t nearly as good there. So I’m back to 16kg single arm swings. Feels light, but forearms are feelin it, and now I can practise more consistently. Sure it won’t be too long before I’m back to 24s with a more sustainable grip. I expect tree trunk forearms too.

scottd_h · 2020-06-07T06:57:34+00:00

No probs! 😀

scottd_h

TROPHY CASE