Aadesh Mistry

Fluid Friction is inviting artists from all across India to participate in a Character Design Competition. The winning artist and their unique creation will be featured in Fluid Friction’s debut comic book series, DevaShard. Taking inspiration from the description provided by Fluid Friction (details can be found at fluidfriction.com); artists are encouraged to use their imagination in developing a completely fresh and new character. Deadline for all character design submissions is January 31st, 2008.

DevaShard will be distributed in the US, UK, Hong Kong, India and Singapore and the winning artist’s name and institute of study, if applicable, will be listed in the book’s credits. The selected artist will also have their profile included on the Fluid Friction website as well as the chance to display their artwork at theupcoming CGF-X exhibition in Hong Kong (www.cgf-x.com).

The top twenty character designs will be unveiled on the Fluid Friction website and from January 7 -20, 2008, the public will have the opportunity to narrow the selection to the final three by voting for their favourite design. After the voting period, Fluid Friction will select the winning character design to be
included in DevaShard. To find out more about the new comic book series, visit us at www.DevaShard.com.

Yes! Trekking which went horribly wrong few weeks back!

Weekend is the time I normally spend with my family. But past weekend, I decided to go for a trek to Mulshi (some 35 Kms from Pune) with my collegues. On reaching Mulshi, we thought of taking the other route where we had to cross a small waterfall.

We started climbing the rocks, helping each other out on our way up. Just then, I placed my foot on one of the rock which was a bit slippery. I lost my balance and fell straight on my face! The fall was so bad that it created a 1/2 inch cut on my upper lip. I was immediately taken to the hospital where I received 10 stitches on my upper lip.

But now that I am back, sharing with you some of the pictures I took while on our way to Mulshi.

How do you define the term “usability” in the context of Indian IT companies? It has gained several meanings over the years there by clubbing non-usability related stuff like development as part of the UCD groups.

It’s always difficult to gauge the quality of UCD projects other companies get. One feels let down when they start comparing themselves with their counterparts in other companies. But the ground reality might be different!

Following are the questions I’d like to have answers to  to clear the misconception about “User Experience Design” group.

• How do other companies preach usability in their organization?
• What kind of projects to they get?
• Do they get a complete life cycle projects?
• Do a usability group in an Indian IT companies restrict themselves to User Research and Analysis and pass on the prototype development process to some other group within the company.
• Do they hire people having a good knowledge of usability or do they hire the ones with proficiencies in HTML/CSS/Flash, etc… and ask them to do certain usability related tasks
• Do they have a separate web development team that looks into development and is in no way related to the usability aspects of the project?

Answers to these questions would solve many misconceptions people have pertaining to a “Usability Group”