Calibre Interface Redesign Refining the e-book experience
Professor Jason Occihipinti Information and Interface Design Drew Curry M.A. in Interactive Design Lindsey Wilson College
Table of Contents
3 - Project Introduction 4 - User Research 6 - Solution Research 8 - Development 12 - Solution Presentation 16 - Conclusion
Project Introduction Electronic publishing is a market that has experienced explosive growth since its inception. This growth has led to the development of an astounding number of electronic book formats. The lack of a standardized e-book format has caused a lot of frustration within the e-book community. There was a need for a program that could gather all of the different formats in one place and manage them. Calibre was developed to fill this need. However, the user experience is in need of a drastic overhaul. This project strives to create a pleasing and more streamlined user experience.
The image on the right details the steps we take as we move through the user centered design process. In this document, I will lead you through each step of the process listed at the right, with the exception of the final “measure” step. User Research and the following page, Solution Research, represent the vital “plan” and “research” portions of the user centered design process. The picture above is what we call a persona. Personas are used to give our target audience a face and personality that we can design around. These are built mainly through interviews and demographic research.
User Research
Solution Research
Before a solution can be properly developed, one must research to see what other, if any, similar programs or applications are out there, how they function, what works, what doesn’t, and what can we learn from this information. The images seen here represent a cross-section of e-book management programs and applications. All four programs represented here use the same basic user interface, which features book covers displayed prominently on or appearing to sit on the shelf. The fact that this is consistent across almost every platform tells us this is an industry standard and is something we should consider including in our design. This and many other observations went into creating the designs you will find in the following pages.
The development stage of the design process starts with a content audit of the Calibre application. The bottom image above shows how the application looks today, the top left picture features a flowchart of the entire application, and the top right picture presents a sample of the notes taken by our designer. This is a crucial step in the redesign process because it shows us all of the content we are dealing with as well as the good and bad experiences that we have while using the application.
Development
The next step in the process is to start getting design ideas down on paper. The above sketches are basic ideas of what different screens may end up looking like. At this stage in the process we are striving for quantity, as the more ideas we can produce, the more options we will have when moving forward with the developmental process.
The images above are refined sketches of images we saw roughly sketched on the previous page before. Below are the most basic wireframe of what the application may end up like. At this point in the process, ideas are being eliminated, tested, and refined.
The developmental process concludes with final wireframes as well as the implementation of a redesigned logo that is much easier to read and more elegant. This is the final step in the process before the overall graphic design, or skin, is applied to the application.
Solution Presentation
Over the next four pages you will see the final redesign of the Calibre e-book management application. My goal was to take the industary standard for e-book management and make it unique for Calibre while maintaining some of the incredible differentiating features, such as being able to edit metadata and retrieve news, that most other e-book management applications just don’t offer.
Conclusion
Calibre is an extremely useful application that has something unique to offer in the ever-expanding e-book market. However, the current user interface is both dated and complicated, preventing people from fully enjoying it. For this project, I set out to solve this problem and give Calibre users a brand new streamlined, refined experience that kept the application’s unique features but made them more user friendly and accessible. I believe I have achieved that goal in my final design. Welcome to the new Calibre, the one stop solution for all your e-book needs.