Ryo Lu — For GenDream
Design &
Prototyping
Agenda
Ryo’s life story
What is design & prototyping?
How to make a prototype?
Tools & demo
Ryo’s life story
Age 0–11
Born to engineers in
Northern China
Curious of art, technology,
& computers
Age 0–11
Age 11–22
Moved to Canada
“An American company named
Apple made a computer that
looked like a lamp…”
iMac G4 Window Commercial
Art &
technology
united
Steve Jobs, Apple Founder. 1955–2011
Programmer?
Designer?
Toolmaker.
Age 22–Now
I make tools for humans,
with technology & art.
https://work.ryo.lu
https://work.ryo.lu
Scheduling
Work collaboration
Payments
Tools for thought
Canada
China
United States
Age 22–Now
https://work.ryo.lu
https://www.notion.so
Notion
What is Design
& Prototyping?
👀You’ve found a problem you
genuinely want to solve for…
💡You have a rough idea on how
to solve it…
How do you turn that idea into something
people can use in real life?
🍳🪑
📱 🔊
🚁
🔨
Design
A design is giving form to a conceptual
idea in the physical or digital space.
As a designer, you imagine what people
feel when they use your product, given a
set of goals and constraints.
As a designer, you imagine what people
feel when they use your product, given a
set of goals and constraints.
What can your users see, touch, and feel?
As a designer, you imagine what people
feel when they use your product, given a
set of goals and constraints.
Simple, delightful, accessible, for everyone.
As a designer, you imagine what your
users feel when they use your product,
given a set of goals and constraints.
You fix a problem, and you can get rewarded.
As a designer, you imagine what your
users feel when they use your product,
given a set of goals and constraints.
But nothing can be made in a vacuum.
Then, you communicate your idea
with things people can see and touch.
Seeing is the most universal way to validate your idea.
Development
There’s still a lot work to bring the
design to the hands of users.
Physical Digital Services
Manufacturing
Supply chains
Packaging
Distribution
UI engineering
Backend engineering
Infrastructure
Process development
People
Resourcing
How do you avoid investing in so much
before you know your idea is good?
Prototyping
💡
There are endless ideas to
explore…
💡
💡
💡💡
💡
💡
💡 💡 💡
How do you know which one is
the best one?
💡
You design and (maybe) develop a simpler,
easier version of your idea, so you can test
out if the idea is worth exploring further.
Prototyping is the best way to
develop an idea quickly and cheaply.
Asana “Shared Mission” Prototype
Test out your prototype with people, you
can then decide what to iterate on based
on the feedback you get.
Refine problem & ideas
Design
Prototype
Get feedback
How to make a
prototype?
1. Think about your audience and
questions you want answers to
Testing market interest
Communicating to your peers
Pitching to investors
Gathering user feedback
Getting partnerships and deals
Testing market interest
Communicating to your peers
Pitching to investors
Gathering user feedback
Getting partnerships and deals
Humans
Teammates
Investors
Users
Partners
2. Figure out the right fidelity
How “real” is your prototype?
Napkin sketch
Wireframes
High fidelity
mockups
Fully-built, functional
features
For big companies
with a lot of resources!
Low Mid High
For big companies
with a lot of resources!
Quick & Easy Mostly design Need to fully develop
For big companies
with a lot of resources!
3. Figure out the right tool to
make your prototype.
Figma
Live demo
https://www.figma.com/file/8Ad90MDoAyE7AomFwzBK06/GenDream-Demo?node-id=0%3A1
Some advice
from Ryo
Your first prototype
doesn’t have to be perfect
Get creative with
the tools you use
Getting data
Google Forms
Typeform
腾讯问卷
问卷星
Manipulating data
Google Sheets
Airtable
Notion
Make a website
Squarespace
Wix
Webflow
上线了
Sell stuff online
Shopify
淘宝
Now is the best time to
try & master new tools
(Better, learn to code)
Question time
Glossary
Design
设计
Prototyping
原型设计
Prototype
原型
Development
开发
Fidelity
保真度
Iterate
迭代

Introduction to Design & Prototyping