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Back when I used to build model aircraft dioramas, a veteran told me "When you arrange vehicles in a diorama setting, always have them facing towards the left s
by cyberferret 8y ago
Back when I used to build model aircraft dioramas, a veteran told me "When you arrange vehicles in a diorama setting, always have them facing towards the left side of the board for maximum impact.".
His reasoning was that most people's eyes move left to right when examining something - which mimics their eye movement when reading text (at least in Western societies. In R-L countries I guess the opposite would be true).
He said that by position the nose/cockpit of the aircraft on the left side, people's eyes would always go to where the 'little humans' would sit first, then move away towards the right. Similarly if you had scale model humans in a diorama setting - place them on the left hand side.
Placing the vehicles going against their eye movement would also make their attention 'catch' and stop at details of the object 'moving' in the opposite way (something about how people who drive cars are just more instinctually aware of something that is moving against their direction of travel). Whereas if they had to scan in the same direction the vehicle was moving, their attention would just slip past interesting points.
I've used those lessons in most of my UX design nowadays. Placing buttons and important items towards the right of a page, with lesser items further right. The only exception is if it is a destructive action call (deleting a record etc.), then I usually place the button all the way to the right so it isn't in visual way and too tempting.
- dingaling 8y agoThe same left-bias 'advice' is given to amateur photographers, which results in a wall full of what a friend calls 'camera club copycat' photos. Until your eye alights on one that doesn't follow the guidelines and stands out as a result. I'd follow the reading-direction paradigm for something like a UI or arranging books on a shelf, but not for art.
- Izkata 8y ago> His reasoning was that most people's eyes move left to right when examining something - which mimics their eye movement when reading text (at least in Western societies. In R-L countries I guess the opposite would be true). Back in 2010, a Youtuber named Derek Lieu created a supercut called "Every Anime Opening Ever Made" [0]. One of the notes: > Interesting thing I learned, if a character is running it's overwhelmingly to the left of the screen. (Watching the video, "running" may as well also include "standing" and "flying") Characters moving is a bit different than a diorama, but there may be something to it. I think I remember something similar someone else had found about western animation, that it's biased towards having characters move to the right rather than the left. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibPCLMH1NM4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibPCLMH1NM4
- kwhitefoot 8y ago> which mimics their eye movement when reading text (at least in Western societies. In R-L countries I guess the opposite would be true). So how would this work in Ancient Greece where they wrote boustrophedon (alternately left to right and right to left)? And how does it work for illiterate people or peoples without a written language?
- Erikun 8y agoWell as to the second question, in the Chauvet cave paintings the animals face both left and right. A bit of a small sample though.
- fnord123 8y agoToy cars in shops have the cars and trucks all facing right in the packaging. Maybe they've done some ab-testing to get this way. Maybe not. Maybe putting his airplanes facing left made your veteran's models pop because they were inconsistent with other models. Anyway, if you want to make people read the options on buttons, randomize the order each time the popup appears but always destructive buttons like "delete" red colours.
- laythea 8y agoPlease don't randomise the location of UI components. I don't want to have to find the button I want. Your users will thank you.
- tehlike 8y agoAgreed, but I would still do it on a small traffic/user to see its impact. This kind of data is invaluable.
- cyberferret 8y agoBack in the 80's or 90's, I used a popular editor (can't remember the name, but it might have been by Borland), that randomised the 'Yes/No/Cancel' buttons if you tried to quit without saving. Whilst I initially thought it was cool, it quickly wore me out. Often times, if I was in the 'flow' of editing, that tiny fraction of time that it took me to stop and have to actually read the screen (instead of habitually clicking on a position without even reading) was enough to interrupt my thought processes and impact my productivity. I think it would be like randomly rearranging the clutch/brake/throttle pedals on a manual car every day. Sometimes you just want your tools to stay out of the way and not interrupt you when you are busy. It is far better to have your feet (oh, ok - mouse cursor) fall to the right places without having to think too much, especially if your mind is busy on more important stuff happening.
- Uristqwerty 8y agoIs that packaging style the same for all English-speaking countries? Standing on the side of the road and facing traffic, you'd expect all of the near vehicles to be facing right in North America, so perhaps that carried, consciously or otherwise, into packaging decisions.
- kiriakasis 8y agoJust a quick note on Right-to-Left countries, IIRC Nintendo said that they tested both R-L and L-R for Mario games and found and found R-L more natural in Japan
- detaro 8y agoDid they make any games that way in the japanese versions?
- nicoburns 8y ago> important items towards the right of a page, with lesser items further right I think one of these may have been meant to say left!
- cyberferret 8y agoAh yes, whoops - thanks for picking up the typo!