Our clients often tell us that we're great at "making sure things make sense."
In other words, we have a knack for ensuring that a sketch is communicating its product concept clearly.
Now, this isn't some innate God-given talent we have. Rather it's a thorough critiquing process we've put into place.
Today we'll be sharing our process with you so that you can review your team's concept sketches with more efficiency, less stress, and better results.
After drafting a concept sketch but before releasing it, we review every page using this checklist of questions (in this order):
1. OBJECTIVE
Does the content and fidelity of this concept sketch satisfy our project's objective?
2. INTENDED AUDIENCE
Will your target audience be able to understand and react to this sketch?
3. THE BIG IDEA
Is the concept's main idea clear?
4. KEY BENEFIT
Is the concept's key benefit being communicated clearly?
5. DESIGN CRITERIA
Does the concept meet the product/project criteria?
6. DISTRACTIONS
Is the concept sketch free of distractions? (such as features that detract from the big idea or gaps/aspects that raise a red flag)
7. CLARITY
Are there sketch views that would more clearly communicate the concept?
8. SCALE
Has the product's scale been properly communicated? (Often a hand/person needs to be added for context to help the viewer understand the scale of the product)
9. STYLING
Is the product's styling appropriate? (whether on-brand or intentionally generic)
10. FOCUS
Is the viewer's eye being guided through the proper elements in the proper order?
11. FORMAT
Are the page's aspect ratio and resolution appropriate for how it'll get used?
12. SQUINT TEST
(Glance at the sketch page with squinted eyes) Are any elements too faint or too bold?
13. CONCEPT NAME
Does the page title name the concept according to the big idea and its key benefit?
14. CONCEPT DESCRIPTION
Does the page description briefly explain the big idea and its key benefit?
15. TYPOS
Are there any spelling, grammar, or graphical mistakes?
16. MILD TO WILD
If you're reviewing a deck, are the concept pages ordered from mild to wild?
If a question is answered favorably, we check it off the list.
For those questions that are not answered favorably, we investigate what is driving the issue and then give our sketcher very specific and actionable feedback on how to correct the issue.
Using this checklist ensures that we critique all important aspects of every concept sketch, leaving us with highly communicative concept sketches that just "make sense."
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Concept generation & illustration is our specialty.
If your innovation team could use some extra bandwidth,
come have a look at the services we offer. They're all aimed at
helping you innovate more and stress less.
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