Design Edu Today

Dorelle Rabinowitz, Senior Director of UX for PayPal’s Next Gen Commerce, joins Gary Rozanc for an in-depth discussion about Information Architecture and how it fits into the UX process from the design perspective. Dorelle also discusses different research methods used by Information Architects such as Stakeholder Interviews and A/B Testing, and how that research empowers designers to create better visual design.

Sabella Flagg, an Interaction Designer at Artefact, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss how the D.I.Y. mentality and the early web inspired her to become a designer. Sabella goes in depth about how sketching is different from wireframing, and how sketching can save students a lot of time, which ultimately leads to better design. Finally, Sabella shares her insights on the importance of writing and what type of writing courses will best help designers.

Brad Smith founder of Wayward Wild, a product studio and incubator, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss how the inherent problem solving skills of graphic and interactive designers can apply to more than visual design. Brad also shares insights into why designers have the problem solving ability and how design educators can further foster that ability by having students focus on the end user, not the visual.

Brad Frost joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the ins and outs of working in virtual teams. Brad covers everything from how to remotely handle client meetings, improving designer/developer collaborations, and keeping a project and its team members on task. Brad also gives insights on abstraction is an advanced level skill and Atomic Design.

RuSean Myers, Senior UX/UI Designer at CentreTek Solutions joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the changes in the design industry such as how HTML and CSS is becoming the new handcraft like silkscreening and letterpress, and how grids need to be fluid, not static. RuSean also talks about how we need to adjust strategies when designing branding and identities to include digital media not just stationery sets.

Christina Storm, Director of Design at Microsoft for Cortana Analytics family: including Azure Machine Learning, Data Factory and Stream Analytics, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss what skills are necessary for entry level interactive designers such as being multi-disciplinary and understanding customer development. Christina also shares how important user research and real life scenarios are at the beginning of a project to help students create better designs. Finally, Christina shares what she doesn’t want to see a portfolio!

Christina Storm, Director of Design at Microsoft for Cortana Analytics family: including Azure Machine Learning, Data Factory and Stream Analytics, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss what skills are necessary for entry level interactive designers and how scenarios help create better designs

Demian Borba, Product Manager on the Experience Design CC team at Adobe joins Gary Rozanc to discuss creating Xd CC from the ground up. Demian hares what they learned from interactive designers to help make them more productive through better tools. Finally, Demian discusses the skills, including empathy and collaboration, necessary to be an interactive designer on an Adobe product team.

Demian Borba, Product Manager on the Experience Design CC team at Adobe, formerly Project Comet, joins Gary Rozanc to discuss why Adobe created Xd CC, things they learned from working with interactive designers and what are some of the skills necessary to be an interactive design on an Adobe product.

Tracey Halvorsen President and Chief Visionary Officer at Fastspot joins Gary Rozanc to discuss the night and day differences between the finality of print design and ever evolving nature of interactive design. Tracey also shares her thoughts on what makes a good, and bad student portfolio. Finally the conversation goes into bringing the business side of graphic design back into the classroom.