Do you like neumorphism?

What do you think, do you like this? I think I do.

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I love it!
It looks like it’s inspired by Dieter Rams’ minimalist designs for Braun, as are most of Apple’s products.

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Frankly, I didn’t mind the skeuomorphic design of the previous iOS devices. Is it so bad that the calendar looks like a quote-of-the-day desk calendar? I particularly enjoyed the leather bound note pad. I agree that the current design is way too flat and boring. And can anyone tell me why the current Notes app uses a textured paper when everything else is flat?

I do like the looks of the Neumorphic design. As intended, I find it realistic without being over the top. But it’s a big jump from where we are today…

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The article made a good point about space being wasted, something I hadn’t thought of.

The worst example I ever saw was software for veterinary clinics. The software presented a picture of a computer on the screen. Text was displayed on the computer on the computer’s screen. This was back when people were just getting 17” monitors too, so no space to waste. To top things off, it was written in assembly language, which must have been a nightmare to maintain.

I really do like it. Almost every post I’ve seen on Dribbble has looked really good. I prefer it to the current look of iOS. While the flat style looks clean, it can sometimes look overly simplistic to the point of being boring.

Not sure, need to see the overall effect in an app. I think it may quickly become “too much”

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Reminds me of Motif – the Unix look of the late 90s. In fact, the design to me looks like a cross between Motif and OpenLook.

I guess UI designs are also like fashion – they tend to repeat itself.

Skeuomorphic designs are beneficial when the metaphors used in help guide the user’s interactions. Skeuomorphic aesthetics are lazy. Given a new medium, the designer simply reiterates the previous paradigm. As in @JohnAtl’s example of a computer display within a computer display, this often results in waste and/or confusion.

Skeuomorphic aesthetics will always eventually be usurped by projects willing to leverage whatever is special about the new medium. Skeuomorphic interactions will always be necessary to help users learn new metaphors for interaction.

This design language seems to be more skeuomorphic interaction than aesthetic. I hope they can keep that tension perfectly balanced.

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It reminds me of a keyboard with silicon blisters covering the key actuation mechanism. I’m imagining a “squishy” haptic response when touching one of the buttons in the image :slight_smile:

I don’t think there’s “too much space” – it’s a demo sample, after all, of various controls.

Not sure. Design in general is wasted on me.

What I care about is whether I can read the text and that there isn’t any wasted space. Just on first glance I don’t mind the shaded buttons. They do give a clear indication that this is something to move or press. But the text is way to light and tiny and that’s on a big iMac screen. Put that on a portable device and I bet I won’t be able to read it at all. No real contrast between the grey of the button and the grey of the text. If the text part was nearly as wide as the buttons and bolder and in dark black then maybe. The shading is too wide/large, will force a lot of wasted space to prevent overlaps.

This is closer but text still needs to be thicker

test button

I wish UI designers would interview and test all UI designs with folks who are older and need multiple glasses (I’ve got bifocal contacts plus reading glasses in 2 different strengths, 1 for books and one for computer distances). Half the junk I see is difficult for me to read and no amount of adjusting the accessibility features will help.

Elegant is functional. Pretty is as pretty does.

Make it WORK first and be READABLE second all else is fluff and can be ignored.

PS I made my version the exact same size as the on in the message above. Now which is more readable to you? I should have done bold face font though. :grin:

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That looks horrible to me. All that wasted space! Move the labels down right above the knobs or even better on top in a decent size font that is thick and black and maybe but otherwise ick!

But I’m not the typical user.

The space isn’t wasted if nothing else needs to go on the panel.
There is extra space all around, and it contributes to good design. For example, having 8’ ceilings in houses. The majority of people would be fine with 7’ ceilings. Having lived in places with 7’ ceilings in the past (I’m 6’ 2"), I can attest to their claustrophobic nature. The atria in buildings are another example. You don’t need a 30’ atrium, but I think you’ll agree it’s completely different from walking into a dollar store in a strip mall with low ceilings and packed with goods.

Anyway, I haven’t read about the design of this radio, but it looks well balanced to me. The speaker grill and labels at the top form a nice block that sits over the block formed by the smaller grill, logo, and knobs at the bottom. There’s also a vertical division of blocks. However, it could be related to usability. If the labels were just above the knobs, your fingers could cover them while using the control. The labels could also be rubbed off with continued use. The gray of the labels defines them as being unlike the Braun label. I think it’s a nice design.

Having said that, Apple (and their copycats’) use of pale gray text on white paper in their instructions is ridiculous.

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I don’t think you can compare physical space with computer display space at all. They are totally different to me.

We’ll have to agree to disagree. This sort of difference is exactly why I hate most new apps, they all go for this extra space stuff with unreadable text and to me that is hard to use.

Unused space is like the blanking plates in cars for features you didn’t buy.

Here’s an interesting take on the accessibility issues of neumorphism:

I tend to agree.

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Interesting article. Thanks.

Very important points and yes I tend to agree as well.

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I looked for a screen shot of LambTracker online, but couldn’t find one. I thought it might help me see things from your perspective.

Yeah, 100% agree. Looks cool but it’s unfortunately not practical for mainstream adoption. There’s always going to be people with eyesight issues in virtually every demographic– why would an app/site developer choose to alienate them?

I don’t have any, it’s an Android app. I’ll see what I can create in the next few days. It’s the opposite of pretty. But it does work. Although I have to admit that I am currently updating the fonts and sizes to make it more readable in case my glasses break during lambing.