A project's creative approach — its conceptual and aesthetic elements — defines the visual and experiential metaphors, features, and tone for the system. Use the links below for an overview of how to develop your creative approach. For details about a role, activity, or artifact in the diagram, click on its icon.
More detail: Purpose - How to Staff

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Workflow Detail

The purpose of this workflow detail is to:

• Kick-off the application's creative development
• Develop creative options for the visual design
• Identify the experiences and interactions that set the project's foundation
• Formalize the project's visual guidelines

While it is critical that the business strategy and user analysis typically preceding this activity involve members of the creative team, these activities establish the team's creative direction for the application, including its conceptual and aesthetic elements.

The creative team reviews the business and brand strategies and the identified user needs in order to provide a context within which creative directions can be explored and evaluated. This process of interpreting user needs within the broader context of business and brand strategy is the essence of Activity: Develop Visual System and Activity: Define Key Experiences. Creative options are developed and captured in the Artifact: Creative Concept artifact.

The Creative Concept offers a communicative vision for the application or website, approached from the standpoint of visual design and user experience analysis. The Creative Concept describes the overall idea or metaphor around which the user interface will be developed and typically addresses the following:

• Relevant branding issues (interpretation of the brand and value proposition in the context of the website; appropriate application of the identity within the website; etc.)
• Recommended or appropriate editorial direction and tone, and how to best express this direction visually and creatively
• High-level interpretation of and creative elaboration for potential significant application features

During subsequent iterations, the team performs additional user research and analysis to evolve elements of the Creative Concept into specific guidelines for user interface design. These guidelines, including such topics as use of color, type, interface geometry and the use of imagery, icons, and symbols, will be formalized in the Artifact: Visual Development Guide.

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A single person in the Role: Creative Concept Director leads the effort to establish the project's creative direction and articulate the elements of the Artifact: Creative Concept itself. This individual should be conversant in usability, branding and business strategy, visual design, and should be able to integrate findings from across these disciplines into a set of coherent aesthetic development guidelines. Collaboration both within the creative team and across multiple competencies produces the Creative Concept, so the Creative Concept Director must have excellent communication skills. The Role: Software Architect uses knowledge about new and proven technologies to inform feasibility discussions given the project's constraints.

One or more people in the Role: Graphic Designer, experienced in both the theory and practice of interface and graphic design, support the Creative Concept Director in all activities. The Graphic Designer is responsible for preparing the Artifact: Visual Development Guide, which describes the refinement and application of the Creative Concept. The Role: Usability Evaluator often provides feedback on the emerging visual design guidelines using heuristics early to avoid usability problems later.

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