Button design is an important part of product design. According to the experience of JRPanel designers, the design of buttons should take into account two aspects of humanization and personalization. The button design should be based on humanization, and it should also have a personalized design. Without a personalized design, the buttons are all of a piece. Individuation and humanization in button design are the relationship between individuality and commonality. A good button design is indispensable for both.
While enjoying material life, people in an industrialized society pay more attention to the "convenience", "comfort", "reliability", "value", "safety" and "efficiency" of consumer goods. These are the humanized designs that are often mentioned in product design. At the same time, as a modern person, under the current situation of integrated production in large industries, personal use of goods is required to be different. This is the personalized design often mentioned in product design.
In product design, designers usually only consider the overall design of the product. The buttons are often only developed for functions and decorations. But the button often has a vital position and function in the product. No matter how beautiful and comfortable a product is, it is the buttons that people actually use most frequently. Therefore, it is often more difficult to design a button with excellent performance with personality than to design the appearance of a product.
1. Humanization
Humanized design is a design that emphasizes spiritual and emotional needs on the basis of meeting people's material needs. It integrates the safety and sociality of product design, which is to focus on the expansion and deepening of the product's internal environment in the design.
"Humanized design", as the goal pursued by the design community and consumers, has obvious characteristics of the post-industrial era, and is an inevitable product of the development of industrial civilization. From the perspective of industrial design alone, it can range from aerospace systems, urban planning, construction facilities, automated factories, machinery and equipment, and transportation, to furniture, clothing, stationery, and various production and production such as pots, cups, and tableware. The "human factor" must be considered as a primary condition when designing and manufacturing the things connected with life. As the structure and function of products become more and more complex, the requirements of improving the efficiency of operation and the pleasantness of use have become one of the design tasks.
People are the basis for the existence of all product forms, which is the most basic definition of humanized design.
The use of buttons is actually the process of one person controlling the product, and it is the most direct communication between the person and the product. This requires the designer to design every detail of the button with the attitude of a user when designing the button, considering the number, size, shape, color, etc. of the button.
The purpose of button design is to meet the physical and psychological needs of people for product use, and it needs to be the driving force for button design. The hierarchy of needs proposed by the American behavioral scientist Maslow hints at the essence of humanization in design. He divides human needs from low to high into five levels: physiological needs, safety needs, social needs (belonging and love), respect needs and self-realization needs. Maslow believes that the five levels of the above-mentioned needs are gradually increased, and only when the needs of the lower level are relatively satisfied, the needs of the upper level will arise.
The designer of JRPanel once helped a refrigerator manufacturer to design a membrane panel button. The manufacturer's previous refrigerator buttons were relatively dull, and their functionality and practicality were relatively simple. To make a better design, it is necessary to think about the role and function of the button from a human point of view. As a user of a refrigerator, what kind of requirements does he (she) or a child have for the buttons on the refrigerator? Convenience and fast are what a user needs. At this time, we should not consider too much decoration, a button can be used to control the cooling and adjust the cooling temperature.Since the height of the refrigerator exceeds 1.6m, as an ordinary child cannot reach the control panel located above the refrigerator door, as a designer, there is no need for children to consider the buttons.
The design changes from simple and practical to the humanization trend that contains various spiritual and cultural factors in addition to practicality, which is a reflection of the gradual increase in the level of needs.
Designing every detail from such a humanistic perspective, the finally designed buttons are simple, smooth, and compact, which fully meets the most appropriate operating requirements of ergonomics and are highly recognized by our customers.
The increasing number of mobile phone buttons, changes in the size of the button spacing, and changes in the form of the buttons all reflect the renewal of people's consciousness and the deepening of the understanding of the humanized design of the buttons.
2. Personalization
A product should reflect all its individuality.
Personalized design is being valued more and more by people nowadays. The innovation of any product is inseparable from personalized design. To a certain extent, design is a manifestation of self-expression. The process of design is that the designer uses the mentality of a user to realize the role of the product in use, which requires the designer to have a personalized thinking to achieve the function and form of the product.
The designer's advanced way of thinking can also affect people's conventional way of thinking. The personalized design of the button shows the designer's unique understanding of the button. For example: the small red dot (button) on IBM's ThinkPad is a classic case of button personalized design. This button has lost its basic function as a button, and replaced it with a button-type mouse pointing stick. The new personalized creativity makes the little red dot button become the iconic design of IBM ThinkPad.
3. Humanization influences personalization
3.1 The personalization of buttons must be based on humanity
The orientation of the end user of the button determines the attribute of the button as a basic product function. Regardless of the quality of the style and personality, the design result of the button always reflects its meaning and exactness in a deliberate form, rather than full of fancy shapes and repetition of functions.
3.2 The personalization of buttons is ultimately to meet the needs of humanization
The user of the button requires a suitable, fast, and individual design, and the result of a novel design is for use. After all, people are using the buttons, and the buttons are also serving people. No matter how unique the buttons are, they are also part of the man-machine. Similarly, let’s go back to the refrigerator case again. The buttons are also concise and clear. If the buttons are made of a general pure circle, the perfection of the design will be lost. The embodiment of personality can complete this design. The final button design does not follow the conventional round design scheme, but adopts a new button design.
Personalization highlights humanity and is the sublimation of humanity. In this era when industry, agriculture, and even the service industry are increasingly industrialized, products no longer exist in one or two forms. The cookie-cutter buttons on a large number of products give people a dull and rigid feeling. This requires designers to break this pattern and use humanized thinking to drive individual imagination.
More than a decade of membrane switch/panel buttons design experience has given JRPanel a deep understanding of humanization and individualization. JRPanel will always bring excellent design to everyone.
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