From user research and other customer
insight I create the primary persona, Siobhan, a fictional portrait of a
customer for a high street retailer I am currently working with. As she slowly comes to life I create a vivid image of this fictional character .
It isn't easy sourcing the right photo to
reflect the age, gender, and other personal traits that describe this fictional
character. Persona's must be believable to be accepted and photos that don't fit
can be the greatest barrier to a persona's adoption. All the good work put in to creating a
persona can be undone if the photo is not an accurate image of this fictional
character. Even the expression must be believable.
I have several golden rules when it comes
to finding a suitable photo. Never use a
photo of a family, friend or anyone you know as this will create a barrier to
adopting the persona. Never reuse a photo for another persona for the same
reason.
So where do I get my photos from?
Flickr, Google Image Search, professional image
libraries and dating sites. I might step
slightly outside copyright laws by using photos from these sources without
permission from the creator but this minor infringement is for the good of user
centric design (ahem...)
I would like to think that someone has used
my portrait as the face of their persona and that my photo has helped
contribute towards the development of an optimised user interface.
Some image libraries offer faceted browsing. This is also common with dating sites which help
lonely soles to find their perfect partner.
But whilst this helps refine my search they still fall somewhat short of
helping me to find that perfect photo match. Getty Images allows me to refine by gender,
ethnicity, age etc But I am unable to refine by personal or physical traits. The limitation is not with
the technologies but the amount of metadata associated with each photo.
Photo composite software is possibly the
way forward. Instead of searching image
libraries to find a match against specific traits, photo composite software
allows me to select facial features and then enhance the photo by changing hair
colouring, adding facial markings, age progression and skin colouring etc
Facial composite software have an enormous database of facial features. But the software I have used only creates
near-photo quality images. The fact that
they are not photo quality hinders adoption. I can't help but feel that every
image I create looks like a candidate for Crime Watch. The good news is that
photo composite software avoids any privacy issues so if anyone can recommend
photo realistic photo composite software then please do.
I always use photo realistic images and
where possible use full-length and not headshots, as they convey so much more
additional information. The clothes, posture and expression tell a lot about
someone such as their career, attitude or socioeconomic status.
The drawback of trawling non-professional
photos is that quality can be a major issue.
I used to create persona's in PowerPoint or Illustrator and deliver a
single-page A4 printout. Lots of words with a small passport-sized photo.
I don't create persona's simply because the
client has paid for this. I create
persona's because they sit at the heart of every design decision. So I need to
do everything possible to get these persona's accepted. Poor image quality limits
how I can use the photo to ensure adoption. There is nothing more frustrating than to
source the perfect image only to be limited by a 50 x 50 pixel image which
isn't suitable for print.
Once a persona is created there are many
ways to improve adoption and bring the persona's to life. I’ll cover different ways to deliver persona's
(persona mood boards, masks, cardboard cut-outs, role playing etc) in a future
post. But if the photograph doesn't fit then persona adoption will be much harder.
If you have any recommendations of image libraries,
sites or software for finding/ creating a matching photo please let me know.
P.S.
Conchango are recruiting! If any of my ramblings interest you and you
are passionate about User Experience then we'd like to hear from you.
Why not contact me and let's have a chat?
Listening to: Harps Old Master by Phelan Sheppard