At Google Design, we spend most of our time thinking about what, why, and how to Design. We reach out to designers inside and outside the company to see what they’ve learned, and we ask a lot of questions as we get into the details, and we’re nerds, but we don’t care. 2017 was an exciting year for many of Google’s design teams. As we begin the New Year, we’ll look back at some of our most important projects for the community: from launching new Material Design tools, to bringing our SPAN Design and technology conferences to more cities, to redesigning several popular Google products, and more. I hope you enjoy our efforts as well.
Super selfie memes
Who invented the selfie? Now you can turn yourself into a cartoon, or at least there are some apps that will do it for you. Allo has unveiled one of their funniest emojis to date (the Allo team really releases a lot of fun stuff), which uses a combination of neural networks and artist work to turn your selfies into personalized cartoon memes. Simply take a selfie and it returns an automatically generated version of the illustration, with customization options to help you personalize it further. How it feels: Endless fun, with little need for filters or unnatural photoshop.
Reliable tool for making Material
Almost every year, designers get caught up in color anxiety. But in either case, this year we have released the Material Design Color Tool (https://material.io/color) will let you out of the Color, and easy to create, share, and in your program application Material palette. Guess what the best part is? You can also use the tool to test the readability of text and color combinations, which means more people can participate in your work to make the design better. If you no longer pay attention to color, please put attention to the Material Components (https://material.io/components/) — for Android, iOS, and a set of the latest web page creation, accurate to the pixels of the component. These open source tools, which are as simple as building blocks, provide form and color frameworks for sites like Google Design and speed up the development process.
Wonderful SPAN event
Our annual design and technology conference always brings us something new. This year we are highlighting “Cities Redefining the Intersection of the Arts Industry” and bringing SPAN to Pittsburgh, Newcastle-Gateshead and Mexico City. Through a variety of crossover ideas with robotics, data visualization, and even waffles, we meet people who are shaping the future of design every day. We also learned the secret history of AI and learned quite a bit of local slang. I have to say, it’s really energizing to be around these idea-makers.
Nominations for the Material Design Awards are open to the public
For the first time, nominations for the third Material Design Awards are open to the public in order to find the best Design examples. Award-winning app teams NPR One, Blinkist, Momondo and Eventbrite gathered at Google Design’s annual SPAN conference in Pittsburgh to accept the grand prize (by the way, Ladies & Gentlemen Studio) and recorded a Design Notes podcast where they talked about how Material Design helped their apps, It will also explain how they understand and interpret Material Design in their products.
Five refreshingly new designs
Everyone loves (or hates) a revamp of their favorite product, but the five Google products we’ve mentioned here all have notable updates that you’ll be pleasantly surprised to open one day instead of using them every day.
Google Calendar
Meetings aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but the new Google Calendar is designed to help you get things done more easily. The new features update the more modern color palette and responsive layout so you can get details in the conference room, add documents or spreadsheets to calendar invitations (no more excuses to skip meeting prep), and coordinate the time of multiple team members with a new left and right view. The Verge praised The redesigned app as “infinitely more beautiful” than The original. And we think the reason is simple: it’s now “Material”.
Google Maps
A clean new color scheme and icon set enhance the visual hierarchy of Google Maps. The refresh feature also puts the most relevant on-screen information first, such as information about gas stations when driving or railway stations when mapping routes in transit mode.
Google News
With this update, Google News for desktop brings a new user interface and a clean look and feel. While today’s fast-paced news cycle is increasingly confusing, our new layout makes it easier to read headlines and find different perspectives on the same story thanks to our card-like design. We also have a special section where you can customize updates to suit your interests. Your press center, of course, should be in charge.
YouTube
This year, YouTube got a new logo! It is designed for multi-screen worlds and can be whittled down to simple red ICONS on smaller screens. The latest desktop version uses Material Design principles and has a clear and intuitive interface, including a dark movie-theater theme. The YouTube mobile app is also starting to offer new gestures, including double-clicking to fast-forward or rewind a video so that if you’re distracted, you can quickly and slightly rewind.
Google Design
Our base camp website has also been redesigned! It adds a whole new news section, and handy bookmarks that can be used to place specific topics or product areas of interest, such as “fonts” or “design for the next billion.” In particular, we want to say that the new site gives readers an easy look at what designers are doing on Google.
Pixel-perfect hardware
Our hardware got smart in 2017. The second generation of Google devices are already powered by ARTIFICIAL intelligence (from the Pixel 2’s camera to the Pixel Buds) and are capable of translating 40 different languages wirelessly in real time. (Who would have thought hardware could do that back in the day!) The new Mini and Max versions of Google Home offer even more ways to summon a voice assistant. The Mini is even smaller than a doughnut! You can also use “OK Google” on the new Pixelbook. We also want to say that Daydream View is probably the best and most comfortable mobile VR headset on the market. It is soft and light, and offers a choice of grey, charcoal and coral textures. Have you ever seen Google Clips? As the last in our series of “Pixel-perfect hardware,” it uses AI to automatically record silent motion photos that last a few seconds. Much like the giFs that spread all over the Internet, but the lead actor becomes your family member or pet.
The Google Doodle is off the charts
Before you know it, the Doodle tradition has continued all the way from 1998. Now it’s a lovely day to celebrate important people, places and events on Google’s home page. In 2017, many of the most popular doodles were music-centric, including nods to iconic performer Selena Quintanilla and the 44th anniversary of Hip Hop. We were particularly inspired by the music visualization machine built in honor of the artist Oskar Fischinger. In design, notable Doodle “winners” include Pritzker Prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid, groundbreaking designer Eiko Ishioka, the “Little Man on a Traffic Light” sign, and the 131st anniversary of the punch.
New faces. Lots of new faces
Choose a favorite emoticon is a bit like choose a favorite child, based on the expression of Unicode in the past year had brought on to the Internet with “in which” expression, this kind of universal expression boom makes us feel is of great significance in the design expression (think we draw the expression of how many people use every day, must stress). While it may be too early to tell which real-life emojis will ultimately be our next “dark horse,” here are some of our favorite new Android 8.0 emojis:
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Burgers: Cheeseburgers, to be exact! However, the years-long debate over the inability to display the “correct” hamburger in Google products has been put to an end with the 8.1 update. The cheese is now in its proper place — on top of the Patty. I’m really sorry about the missing spot.
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Afro: Let’s just say this new little thing has quickly become our official mascot for 2017.
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Puke face: Is your friend advertising on Instagram again? Is your gut rebelling against someone’s vacation photo? Or did you actually drink the tainted milk? The “vomit Face” emoji is just what you need.
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A beer-and-mug clink: Just like burgers, the “beer-and-mug” Android emojis have had their fair share of influence in recent years. Our previous version of the beer emoji actually… It’s not physically realistic. Maybe this “pragmatic” way of drawing it will make you feel more involved.
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Dharma Master: If your friend or colleague does something as magical as magic, share the dharma master emoji with him. This new Old Sage emoji is sure to be the perfect choice for our daily Dungeons and Dragons jokes.
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Sauna owner: We’ve dubbed this emoji # selfCare. Yes, we all need more care. Whether or not you actually reach for a wooden spoon to scoop water in a sauna, the emoji focuses on the person who deserves to be treated the most — you.
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SHH: One of our favorite pastimes at Google Design is talking to each other in shared chat. It’s interesting because this person can read everything we’re writing. In such a candid atmosphere, “meanness and cruelty” have no place. This little character captures that spirit with a sincere “SHH!” after all, sometimes a look can say a word, can’t it?
Beautiful Android Wallpapers (Made from real paper)
The Pixel phone’s features are already dazzling enough, and now it comes with an exclusive set of wallpapers created by artists and designers. Art photographer Nicholas Alan Cope adheres to Material Design as a source of inspiration to create his photographic works. Let’s go behind the scenes and look at his obsession with origami:
What we learned
Recommended reading:
Here’s what you need to know about the CPU speculative execution vulnerability
Android developers | application compatibility considerations
Android UI and API Optimization Guide | Android Developer FAQ Vol.10
Color knowledge Android developers and designers must know
Chinese official | Google AI center was established
