David Platt's art portfolio (DavidPlattArt.com)

FYI: So tell us a little about what you do.

DP: I am usually hired by agencies to do the layout and concept-side of websites; I don’t really do the coding. I do some Flash animation as well, but recently agencies have been using me more for website designs.

FYI: Speaking of flash, cool Martian animation on your site!

DP: Haha, yea, that is actually based on an algorithm I found in a Flash book.

David's interactive portfolio, MartianDesign.com

FYI: At the early part of your career, what did you find to be the biggest step forward? Also, what was the biggest challenge?

DP: Well, I started off in print. My biggest challenge was learning Flash, actually. In terms of freelancing and working with people, I still find managing people to be quite challenging. (pause) How do I answer that question…

FYI: Haha! It is a tough one.

DP: You know, I think one of the biggest challenges for any young designer is to realize their own vision, and avoid trends. If I’m looking for a junior designer to hire, it seems to me that a lot of junior designers jump on a trend… Like a Wordpress theme that looks like all the other Wordpress themes out there. Branding your own company is the biggest challenge, I’d say. If you can brand your own company, then you can show potential clients that you can brand their company. I developed the Martian site, and that was very challenging. Designing for yourself is taking on the hardest client you’ll ever have.

FYI:Most definitely. Recently, we wrote a post about thinking outside of the box, and how that wasn’t necessarily the best practice. If you approach a project with the goal of thinking outside the box for the sake of it, you are already putting yourself out, because you might abandon good practice.

DP:Yea, totally agree. When I approach a project, I keep in mind that I have to know the rules before I can break them.

FYI: So that when you break them, you have a good reason. Along the same lines, if you use a trend, use it for a reason.

DP: Absolutely. If it doesn’t have a function, I’d just as soon leave it out completely.

FYI: Shifting gears a bit here, what is your most enjoyable project type?

DP: To tell you the truth, the most enjoyable jobs I receive are when the client is a good client. If I, for instance, get a good wireframe up front, then I am freed up to focus on the design rather than the content. There’s some places I go into and the design director is so much better than me, and that’s great. I get a chance to learn so often in my job.

FYI: So when did you get your start with interactive work?

DP: I started interactive stuff before the web existed. I started with CD-Roms with Director and Shockwave, and then when the web came around, I learned basic HTML and Javascript rollovers. And then when Flash came out, I saw the very first couple of sites done with Flash and was totally blown away by them. The first one that really blew me away was for a company called Gabocorp (view the 1997 archived version of Gabocorp’s site here). At that point, I knew that Flash was the future of web design, which was true until recently. People have decided that Flash is too much eye candy, and so they are reverting to XHTML and CSS, and using Flash for banners.

FYI: Yea, we’ve seen a lot of a move towards Javascript libraries and things of that nature that interact with the web elements and DOM directly.

DP: There’s definitely a debate about it. Flash isn’t dead, for sure. In fact, the FWA site is done completely in Flash. I’m kind of on the fence on the issue; I like the quietude of the move towards mostly static sites, but I also think that the eye-candy Flash provides can be a good thing when used correctly.

FYI: Where did you first start with your work? Did you start out as a freelancer, or did you go to college for design?

DP: I went to college for film and television. My dad was a creative director at an agency; I taught myself all of the programs, starting with Quark and then going through Photoshop and Illustrator. I learned my basic design principles from my father though. I don’t know where I would have learned that otherwise.

FYI: It’s a bit different these days, wouldn’t you agree? You can jump online and learn a slew of Photoshop tricks and design principles from blogs and Twitter friends.

DP: Most definitely. I read a lot of design blogs, and I guess a lot of people learn that way today.

FYI: You started to mention a few programs you use. What would you say are your top five programs that you use on a daily basis?

DP: Can I mention Photoshop five times? Haha. Truly, Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash, InDesign for print stuff, Fireworks, Dreamweaver, Acrobat… Those are the top programs I work with these days.

FYI: And how about your top inspirational content online?

DP: I read most of the Fuel blogs, and a few of the blogs on the Envato network. I also hit the main big design blogs, as well as the FWA to check out some of the better Flash sites. A lot of the content on most of these blogs, though, are targeting younger, less experienced readers; at least once a day, I get to read a great article that I can learn from.

FYI: Absolutely. Thank you so much for doing this interview with us! Where can we look at some of your work?

DP: My Martian Design site and my art site both have some of my work content on them.

Again, thanks so much to David for doing this interview with us! We look forward to hearing more from David and the rest of you all in the future.

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- Hello Sarah! We are really excited about today’s interview. You were featured on the site a while back in the “Ten Women” post. Your work with iPhones in particular caught our interest; what do you enjoy working with the most, as of late?

Sarah: iPhone UI is really my thing, I’ve had the chance to work on a couple of really lovely iPhone apps that have turned into really high-end work. I’ve worked on Clarus, which is an app to keep a track of Pets records, and MEY (Middle East Youth) which is a kind of social media app for teens in the Middle East.

- That’s quite interesting. Is it challenging working for a limited format such as the iPhone?

Sarah: It’s limiting in the sense that you have a limited space to work within but that’s actually what I find nice about iPhone UI. You can literally hand craft pixels.

- That is really a cool dynamic. Much less space to work with, but that allows for a lot more concentrated design.

Sarah: Exactly.

- Alright, let’s shift for a moment, we’ll come back to the iPhone stuff in a bit. Where did you get your start? Have you always been interested in UI design, or did you, like many of us, come over from art-based graphic design?

Sarah: I came from good old pen and paper. I went to a private school here in the UK which was lovely but the facilities were suprisingly poor when it came to IT – none of the computers had any capacity to run any graphic design software so we were resigned to pen, inks, paint, in the art shed, and it was literally a large shed. Once I left school, and actually while I was still there, i started to dabble at home with some of the graphic design mediums available on the computer and that’s where I really found my niche.

- Along those same lines, what programs do you find yourself using on a daily basis?

Sarah: Photoshop, Ilustrator, LittleSnapper – they are my staple programmes – I’ve never really got on with Fireworks but it is something I’d like to dabble with when I have time. Trouble is, I never seem to have much spare time on my hands!

- What keeps you busy?

Sarah: Design and Development. I spend much of my days designing websites for developers to then code up but it’s almost equal the amount of time I spend in HTML/CSS

YouKnowWhoDesign.com is where Sarah's Portfolio and Information is located - Check it out!

- As a UI designer, you are always challenged with thinking about usability. What have you found to be the most important concept to keep in mind to make sure you achieve great usability?

Sarah: The most important concept is a cliché, but it really is to get within the mind of the user. An app that is meant for web professionals for example will have a much higher competency for small icons and bits that might otherwise be missed by the general iPhone user, an App for online shopping will have a different set of needs altogther. It’s all about designing for the results rather than designing for yourself or what you think might look nice.

- Needless to say, agreed. Do you find it hard, sometimes, to balance the desire for artistic expression and usability?

Sarah: Not really, there’s always a time and a place for each design that you might want to use, it’s just a case of sitting on it until the time is right. Try not to get yourself too overexcited by the new font you’ve just bought or the new pattern you’ve just made.

- Good advice for sure. Where do you go for inspiration?

Sarah: Twitter – the links that get posted up daily inevitably lead to me finding some great sites that lead to other sites. The new Ember App is a great source of inspiration too.

- What do you do in your spare time? What are your hobbies, other than making awesome UIs?

Sarah: I’m into Musical Theatre, I’m actually in a production in November playing Millie in Thoroughly Modern Millie, it’s a kind of escapism from normal life, and the Mac!

- Awesome! What kind of music do you get into? And do you listen to music while you work?

Sarah: I listen to such a varied amount of music it’s a bit crazy, I’ve recently loved listening to the Andrew Sisters, an old girl group from the 40’s, who are really cute and extremely calming to listen to whilst working.

- Interesting. I’ll have to check them out. :) When is your birthday, so everyone can send you a present?

Sarah: Cute! You just missed it, it’s 9th September – next year it’ll be the day before my wedding!

- That’s exciting!

Sarah: Fingers crossed the weather holds out!

- Any last tips you might have for freelance designers?

Sarah: Yep, I say it a lot across various interviews but specialize in one thing, do it to a professional ability then move on to the next challenge – don’t be mediocore in lots of things, be fantastic in one.

- Great advice! Thank you so much again for the interview.

Sarah: No problem at all, thanks for chatting to me.

Thanks again Sarah for the interview!

Be sure to check out Sarah’s work at her site, and follow her on Twitter, @sazzy.

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How did you get involved with a huge idea like Vimeo?

My business partner Jakob Lodwick is a longtime video enthusiast. In 2004, while I immersed myself in NYC’s photoblogging scene, which was being spurred by the sudden popularity of Flickr and tagging, Jakob tinkered around with a concept of tagging video clips in order to later assemble a movie from a string of keywords. Soon after, we began to pursue the idea together, making it an unofficial project at night after we wrapped up our CollegeHumor work every day. I was responsible for the interface, which in its first iteration was largely inspired by Flickr and the community they built on top of photos.

During the design process, what were your biggest breakthroughs (”Aha!” moments)? How many different ideas did you present and filter through before you arrived at what is on the site currently?

I think the biggest breakthroughs came when I realized the ways that videos are different from photos, which made me confident to steer away from some of Flickr’s layout precedents. Specifically, it was important for me to understand that the flash player is a portable device, and our early data demonstrated that most video plays would take place off-site encouraging me to move functionality from the video page to the player itself. I think the player is still in the early stages of where it could go, as I expect most of our users’ experience should take place inside the player itself allowing us to renovate the video page into a showroom compelling users to take the video home with them, so to speak, to take it to their other habitats like Tumblr, Twitter, etc.

What’s with the somewhat ethereal, earthy illustrations, anyway? (We love them!)

I sometimes fantasize that if I ever could afford it I would buy a substantial number of billboards and replace the typical advertisements with simple, beautiful images. I was thinking about this when I was laying out the Vimeo login page — typically the more boring page on any site — and then emailed my friend Chad Pugh, an extraordinary illustrator whom I’d love to work with in greater capacity some day, and commissioned him to envision the Vimeo world to serve as the background for the page. Since then, the characters and objects in that illustration have become mascots.

As far as the user experience goes, how much of a part did you have in the development side of things?

I only went as deep as CSS, however in 2007 we grew our team from 4 to 16 people comprising a small front-end team to work with me. Justin Ouellette (who’d later go on to found Muxtape) assumed the CSS work, as well as most interaction programming.

What sets Vimeo apart from other video hosting services around the web?

Dedication to quality, community, and originality — without exception.

What’s your favorite thing about Vimeo?

The best part of Vimeo is the back office, the 20 or so people who continue to run Vimeo. They’re incredibly talented and creative, and I’m very thankful for the time I had to work with them. A good idea is worthless without impeccable execution and a commitment to iterate, and this team played a majority’s role in helping Jakob and I hit this one out of the park.

What are you doing these days?

I’ve raised a small pool of money from other entrepreneurs I admire, and I’m working with Patrick Moberg, who also worked at Vimeo, on a startup called Spurd. We’re based in Brooklyn.

Thanks so much again, Zach, for taking some time to answer a few questions.
Make sure you check out Zach’s personal website, and follow him on twitter!

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