Designers who can code are in demand. Learn the basics of programming and add a valuable tool to your skill set. Many experienced UX and UI designers feel limited by traditional tools, such as Photoshop, Illustrator, or Sketch. Learning even a little bit of programming can eliminate a lot of the rote work involved in creating mock-ups and interface concepts, and those skills can help you communicate better with developers on your team. This course will help designers work more efficiently and effectively by learning to express their ideas in code, opening up a whole new realm of creative possibilities.

What you'll learn-and how you can apply it Over two days, in three-hour interactive sessions blending lectures, hands-on exercises, and Q&A—plus a little bit of homework—you’ll get an introduction to the fundamentals of programming using p5.js. This free and open source JavaScript-based language was created for artists and designers; p5 eschews jargon in favor of language you already know—like fill, stroke, hue, saturation, and brightness—making it friendly and accessible for designers learning about programming for the first time. Since p5 is all JavaScript, you’ll be learning the language of the web. In addition, the core programming concepts you’ll learn are applicable to nearly all other languages, which will help you communicate with other coders and developers, or branch out to other programming tools on your own. By the end of this hands-on course, you’ll: Learn how to write code to create visual systems; you’ll be able to draw lines and shapes, change fill and stroke colors, and define logical rules for simple interactivity

Gain basic knowledge of the possibilities and challenges of coding, making you a better member of collaborative, multidisciplinary teams

Add a skill that brings you closer to being a full-stack designer. As O’Reilly’s 2016 Design Salary Survey has shown, knowing even a little bit of code can have a big positive impact on your salary

This training course is for you because... You’re a skilled designer, well-versed in design principles and practice, who wants to understand the basics of coding so you can automate repetitive tasks, explore more complex visual forms, and prototype interactive works

You’re working in collaborative, multidisciplinary teams and want to better understand the work and language of coders and developers

About your instructor

Scott Murray is a designer, creative coder, and artist who writes software to create data visualizations and other interactive phenomena. His work incorporates elements of interaction design, systems design, and generative art. Scott is the author of Interactive Data Visualization for the Web and the forthcoming book Creative Coding and Data Visualization with p5.js: Drawing on the Web with JavaScript (working title; to be published by O’Reilly in 2017). He has presented two video courses on D3. Scott is affiliated with the Visualization and Graphics Lab at the University of San Francisco, where he has taught data visualization and interaction design. He is a Senior Developer for Processing and teaches workshops on creative coding. Scott earned an A.B. from Vassar College and an M.F.A. from the Dynamic Media Institute at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. He recently joined O’Reilly Media’s Learning Group. Scott’s work can be seen at alignedleft.com.



Schedule

The timeframes are only estimates and may vary according to how the class is progressing