Setting the Purpose and Identifying Key Factors - Data Visualization: A Successful Design Process - page 41

• Client pressures : Aside from time pressures, you need to anticipate and
reduce the impact of potential unexpected pressures and interruptions
coming from your client or colleagues. This might be changes in
requirements, new demands, interference in the design solution, and
generally annoying things that get in the way of your progress. A further
manifestation of the pressure that can come from clients is the insistence on
observing organizational visual or brand identities, layout rules, editorial
guidelines, and technical frameworks. All of these will shape the scope of
your design choices. You have to be prepared for and capable of managing
this relationship, and the mutual expectations, effectively so always be
open with your client, keep them regularly updated with progress and,
where applicable, involve them in the key decision moments throughout
the process.
• Format : From a design perspective this will be a significant influencing
aspect. Are you creating a static or an interactive design? Maybe it's a
multifaceted project and you are looking to create both. If it is an interactive
design, what platform do you need to achieve compatibility with? Will it be
for the Web, a tablet, and/or smartphones? If it is a static design, will it be a
small graphic in a publication, a full-page spread, or a large poster display?
Maybe it will be a video animation or an ambient display out in the wild, or a
large touch screen installation in a museum. This is a vital consideration that
needs to be cleared up at the earliest possible stage. Another factor to take
into account will be the likely frequency of the project—is it a one-off piece or
will it be something that needs to be replicable and/or scalable? That could
hugely affect what you can or can't deliver.
• Technical capabilities : Aside from your own technical capabilities, what
are the technical resources to which you have access? For example, are you
limited to free tools or can you access more premium software? Do you
have the most appropriate technical infrastructure, such as server speed and
capacity if it is an online project? Depending on your format choices, what
frameworks are you going to deploy, what browsers do you need to have it
working on, what backend database technologies are you going to require?
This is a wide-ranging and very technical set of decisions that will likely
require a specialist technician to determine.