design engineering
The design level of a web project, or any project for the computer screen, is a long communication process broken into three phases. These being communication planning, media designing/production and distribution.
communication planning
The purpose at this stage is to collect data and analyze, you can say "Who says what in which channel, to whom, with which effect?". That is to say, what is the desired goal with the product, who is it that wishes to achieve this goal, to whom are they addressing, how are they addressing them and
what is the environment surrounding all of this. All of this data is presented in the form of a communication plan.
media designing/production
Once the communication plan is made the actual design process can start. It is a good idea to break this step into three sub-Ievels. The first is called Information Design, the second Interaction Design and the third Presentation Design. During this it is important to conduct an ongoing series of test to confirm that the project is going as desired.
information design
At this point the idea is to structure the sites information, the sites architecture. The purpose behind this structuring is to ensure that the information is presented in a logical way. This can also be done by making a flowchart.
interaction design
It is here where the decisions are made with regard to how easy the site is to take in and to use. Here the designers decide the navigation principles and the methods to use to reflect them. It is also here that decisions are to be made on how much "control" the user has in navigating the site. It is important that the user should at all times be able to answer these three questions: Where am I? Where can I go? How do I get there? This stage is usually done through the making of a storyboard.
presentation design
The third and final phase is the presentation design. This is where the most important of the site is added. It is here that one begins to think in terms of the visual elements such as style and tone. The choice of fonts, pIacement of photos and graphics, use of video and sound are all handled in this final phase.