- A common prototype is typically a usable product
or testable experiment.
Prototypes are a great way to communicate
an idea as a working concept that people can react to.
But to facilitate this, an idea must be generated,
and a fully-formed concept must be created.
So, usable or testable kinds always follow
ideation and concept generation
through activities like lateral thinking,
line mapping, and concepting exercises.
Those ideation and concepting activities
are frequently solo efforts,
after which you share your output with each other.
Obviously some collaboration occurs
during that sharing, as you see each other's ideas
and ask questions, but innovation often
comes from many ideas that are a shared effort.
So, how do you generate ideas collaboratively,
and enjoy the sensory impact prototyping provides?
At frog, we use a combination of idea generating worksheets
and paper prototypes, like this one,
to allow us to see what it would be like
if someone had options to scroll through
on a mobile app.
I made this one in 10 minutes,
so we do this all the time when we want
to move quickly and not get bogged down by the details.
While valuable, even creating paper prototypes
can make it challenging to generate ideas laterally.
It's easy to slip into creating
a fully-functioning widget rather than
generating several ideas, but it's possible,
if you keep your concepts abstract,
and your methods extremely lightweight.
So to prototype with paper instead of sketching
only in one dimension, you can fold the paper
to create depth, or create a strip
with several scenes to show how things change
as someone interacts with it.
You can even paper prototype in three dimensions
by simply using transparent and semi-transparent Mylar,
with some clear tape and markers
to illustrate changes in state.
We found this is a great way to reframe ideas,
because using paper is much faster
and keeps you from getting lost in the details.
Starting with activity worksheets
provides a great balance of ideation and planning
to inform paper prototypes.
It enables you to play with ideas quickly
and still collaborate as you work through those ideas,
and building a foundation of ideas with paper prototyping
enables you to collaborate and work with others.
Also, you'll find that any type of collaborative
idea generation will lead you to more innovative solutions.