Connecting with the market
and the end-users
Q: When designing the User Experience (UX), it's obviously very important to look at things from the perspective of the users. How do you go about doing that?
Kakimoto:
I try to ask myself, "What do customers do while in their cars?" or, "What are they thinking about, what do they look at along the way?" In other words, I think about various possible patterns of activity for our users. It may seem simple, but that's ultimately what UX is all about, I think.
Roy:
There are various approaches available in regards to UX development that we consider during each part of the design process. One of those approaches is to define our "target users".
Q: When you envision the ideal customer that the product is for?
Roy:
Yes, and it's an important thing to do because it helps us sort out our motivations for making certain design decisions. Are we doing something out of our own desire to make the kind of product we want? Or, are we doing it to solve a problem that our users are experiencing? It's surprising how often we forget that solving problems is the essence of product design. If we can understand our target users, then we can also understand their sensibilities and preferences, and improve our ability to solve any problems they might want to solve with our products. However, since this target user segment is always shifting, identifying it is easier said than done.
Q: Drawing manga is an opportunity to express yourself creatively. Meanwhile, Mr. Kakimoto and Roy's work involves both creative expression and problem solving. In that regard, the approach for producing manga is a bit different from that of UX/UI design.
Akatsu:
Of course, but I do think manga has the potential to guide the end user. To read a manga, a user has to be active in turning the pages. In order to keep readers intrigued so that they keep repeating that action, stories need to be crafted and paced with very exacting calculations.
Kakimoto:
When we are making a product, we are constantly thinking of a user's persona–an image of the user that is easily identifiable and sympathetic, and we try to capture this image in our design. Do you think of a user's persona when drawing manga?