seen + learned

Doodle4 heuristic review and interface consultation

Posted: Monday, November 17, 2014 | Posted by Debby Levinson | Labels: , , , , 0 comments

Doodle4 is a new app for promoting causes through making and sharing doodles. Pitched at teen Facebook users, the app’s powerful doodling tool and easy sharing process make it simple and fun to build awareness of a cause by creating doodling “challenges” for friends to pass around.

Nimble Partners collaborated with the Doodle4 team to first provide a heuristic review of an alpha interface on web and mobile devices. We walked through the app as “Ione,” a lightweight persona we developed of a teen interested in banning styrofoam containers in her community. The walkthrough uncovered opportunities to improve the flow of use, wording, and engagement. We followed up the review with rapid iterations of sketches to provide specific recommendations for improvements. We remained on the team as iterations were made through beta launch.

Services provided:

  • Heuristic review
  • UI sketches
  • User experience consulting

Doodle4 designer Ryen Leung provides a great overview of this fun tool in the first five minutes of this video:

Mind and Life Institute information architecture and UX design

The Mind and Life Institute researches and supports interest in contemplative science, bringing together scientists and scholars from contemplative traditions to investigate topics such as addiction, ethics, and emotions. As part of repositioning itself based on a new set of initiatives (ethics, education, and human development; craving, desire, and addiction; and mapping the mind), MLI wanted to redesign its website to promote deep investigation into the wealth of research the organization has funded and encouraged.

We began by drafting scenarios for the three primary audiences – scientists, scholars, and "interested laymen" – relying on MLI's experience with those groups, as well as our own interviews with interested laymen, to define desired interactions. Based on those scenarios, we developed a site structure and wireframes for a responsive experience that used curated promotions to expose relationships between multiple types of site content, allowing visitors a complete picture of the latest insights in contemplative science. We consulted with the visual designer and the development team through site launch to ensure that our layouts were accurately translated to the final site.

Services provided:

  • User experience conceptualization and design
  • Information architecture
  • User interface design
  • Visual design consultation


MLI home page wireframe


MLI initiative page wireframe with related content links at right


MLI featured editorial page wireframe with related content links and fat navigation dropdown


MLI home page. Visual design by John Hall Design Group; development by pixelslam.


Mobile phone view of home page


Featured editorial page