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How Can Custom Mobile Development Affect Your Business’s Growth?

Thu, 20 Oct 2022 15:47:29 Z

Firstly, what does custom development mean?

Custom app development is the process of creating applications that are especially suited to a company’s needs. Whether fully or partially personalized, it is designed to meet the demands of a specific target market rather than a large audience.

According to Statista, there are more than six billion smartphone subscriptions worldwide, with this figure anticipated to rise by several hundred million in the next few years. Additionally, an average smartphone user actively goes on 10 apps per day. With the increased number of options and a decreasing attention span of users, it is essential to maintain a competitive advantage and showcase something unique that other apps cannot offer.

There are two ways to go about building a custom mobile application. One is to build a custom application from scratch, or to customize and build on existing software. Either way that you choose for your mobile application, brings a set of advantages that we will discuss in this article.

Core benefits of developing a custom application

1. Scalability

The significant benefit of developing a mobile application for your brand is that it can expand with your business. Pre-built software frequently has a specific objective in mind, whether it is a small company start-up or a large enterprise. It is tough to locate a software that can effortlessly switch between the two.

Custom development is an excellent option if you want to start small and observe how your business grows without constraints. Custom mobile applications will be ready to manage a bigger quantity of data and expand with your business after you've established your market position and begin scaling up.

2. A real representation of your brand’s identity

This is not to imply that mobile websites are unimportant. In fact, for greater flexibility, organizations could provide a compatible set of channels, including a mobile-friendly website and a mobile app, in order to be competitive.

A custom-made application has the advantage of differing from any pre-made software. It may be hard to stay competitive if your application cannot implement unique features, which other businesses cannot offer.

Custom mobile development makes it possible to create ideas and turn them into technologically feasible products. Whether you have a workout app or an on-demand delivery business, your brand’s identity should be truly represented through the application’s features and a seamless interface.

3. Building a connection with your users

The benefit of having a custom application is that there are no boundaries and limits when it comes to creating ways to interact with the app users. You can leverage the data that the user enters when creating an app account, and use it in order to personalize your customer service to the maximum. Implement the newest technology, such as live chatbots or personalized welcome messages, or pairing with external devices.

Custom mobile development allows for a higher level of personalization and interaction with your audience also in a visual way, for example through photos, videos, or voice recognition and real-time tracking of the delivery process. Depending on your industry, the options are limitless when it comes to creating a real, personal experience for your users.

4. Maintenance and control of the development process

Another advantage of custom mobile development is the bird’s eye view of the creation process. Rather than purchasing a ready off-the-shelf application, you can really engage with the development team and be a part of the creation process.

Additionally, since you will know the team and the insights of your app, the maintenance process is going to be a lot more efficient and accessible.

How to create a successful custom mobile app?

Find the right team

The first and most important aspect of custom development, is a creative and competent team, with a personal and open-minded approach. You are going to need a team, which is going to fully understand your creative idea and translate it into technology.

Creating an application is not only about its functionality, but it serves as a medium to represent your brand’s identity. Your team should be able to understand you as a brand and represent that through an excellent UX/UI that goes hand in hand with your brand’s personality.

From a seamless interface to the color scheme, visuals, and features. When choosing a provider, keep in mind their level of adaptability and interest in the concept and identity behind your brand, not only the technical aspects.

Follow the latest trends and customer demand

Research is crucial before starting to develop your custom application in order to determine whether your concept actually satisfies market demands. You can adapt your idea to fit the requirements of your niche, for instance, by incorporating features like connectivity with external devices or chatbots that can offer client support around-the-clock.

Specify the message that you want to convey through your app

Is the application supposed to be the main channel for your business, or more of an extension of your website? Before the development process, it is necessary to list down all the requirements for your application and make sure that you are clear in terms of your vision with the development team. Clear communication will allow them to create a product that truly visualizes the idea that you have in mind and exceeds your expectations.

If you have an excellent idea in mind, but are not an expert in technology, contact one of our team members today and let us help you bring your custom mobile app vision to life.

Creating isometric illustrations made easy. A step by step tutorial for Figma

Fri, 30 Oct 2020 10:06:40 Z

First things first – what is an isometric projection?

Put simply, it is a two-dimensional depiction of a three-dimensional object. What distinguishes isometric projection is that all the axes look equally foreshortened as the angle between any two axes equals 120°.

You're probably familiar with isometric projections from games such as Fallout 2, Planescape: Torment, Diablo or Sim City. Isometry is very useful when it comes to architecture, technical visualizations, engineering drawings, and instructions. Moreover, it’s been successfully used as an illustration technique in web design. Many companies from the IT industry use isometric projection also to create visual assets for their brand, as its technical character corresponds with their image and services.

Image via Flickr

Now let’s get down to business - follow this step by step guide and create your first isometric illustration in Figma!

In order to create the illustration, you’ll need:
1. Figma – you can download it for free here.
2. Isometric grid – you can download it in Figma, in the section Community>Files – or directly from this link.
3. Ease Isometric plugin – you can find it in Figma, in Community>Plugins, or directly here.
4. An idea for the illustration! I’ll show you how to create the Angry Nerds logo - you can choose any other shape, but remember to pick a simple one for a start 😊

Ready? Let's begin!

Step 1: Create your worksheet

Start with creating a new file by clicking + next to Drafts. You can change the file’s name by clicking Untitled or choosing Rename from the dropdown menu.

Now, create a new Frame (F) that will measure 600 x 600 px. You can set the size in the panel on the right, below Frames.

Copy the grid from Isometric grid (Mac: ⌘+C / Win: Ctrl+C). Make sure you selected the whole frame, not a single element!

Paste the grid to your newly created file and drag it to your Frame. On the left panel, you should see Grid_isometric to be under Frame 1. You can set the grid manually on your worksheet or use Align – you will find this option in the panel on the right. I chose Align Left and then Align Top.

Next, in the Layer section in the right panel, set the grid visibility to 30%. Remember that the grid needs to be selected in the left panel anytime you perform actions on it!

The last thing is locking the layer with the grid. To do it, hover over the layer with the grid in the left panel. You should notice an open padlock icon. Click on the padlock and when it turns to a closed one, the layer has been locked.

As a result, you should see this:

Step 2: Let’s start drawing

Now it's time to use your drawing skills! Draw (or copy) the shape you’d like to draw in isometry.

The tools you’ll need when drawing are the following:
• Pen Tool (P) - create paths
• Move Tool (V) - move elements
• Double click on the element – edit points
• Esc – uncheck the point, stop drawing a path
• ⌘+G / Ctrl+G – group elements
• Shift+⌘+G / Shift+Ctrl+G – ungroup elements

I will draw the Angry Nerds logo.

Now it’s time to use the plugin. Open the hamburger menu on the left and choose Plugins>Ease Isometric. Before you start to transform your drawing, remember to group the elements. Create a few copies of your drawing and check which version (4 squares in the top row) suits you best.

I selected the one in the bottom left corner – it’ll be my front wall. In order to create the back one, you need to copy the drawing and move it down the grid. The further you move it – the thicker the final shape will get.

Before we start the next stage of drawing, we can do a few things to make it easier for us:

→ Enlarge the drawing – select both elements and while holding Shift, extend them to a chosen size.
→ Change the visibility of the back wall to 30%.
→ Lock the back wall.

Step 3: Let’s draw a little more

Now it’s time to draw the side walls. It requires some focus and consideration about what should be visible, and what shouldn’t.

At this stage, you can make use of the knowledge on changing the color of the lines or filling the shape. Create a shape and select it. In the right panel, you will see two sections: Fill and Stroke. To fill the shape, click + in the Fill section. You can change the color of the filling by clicking on the gray square. I suggest choosing white. Below, in the Stroke section, I suggest changing the color of the lines to red, so you can see them clearly when drawing.

A few useful shortcuts:
• Copy Properties - Mac: ^+⌘+C / Win: Alt+Ctrl+C
• Paste Properties - Mac: ^+⌘+V / Win: Alt+Ctrl+V
• Move Layers Up - Mac: ^+⌘+↑ / Win: Alt+Ctrl+↑
• Move Layers Down - Mac: ^+⌘+↓ / Win: Alt+Ctrl+↓

The Nerd is almost ready!

Step 4: Coloring, bells and whistles

It’s time for the finishing touches! Start from turning off the grid. Go to the left panel and click on the eye icon next to the grid layer. To change the background color, select Frame and change the color in the Fill section on the right. While changing the colors of the elements, remember to be consistent about the direction of light. Some elements need to be brighter, others – darker.

And here you are – an iso-nerdic illustration! (yeah, I know, terrible pun)

Feel free to experiment with more and more complex shapes – you'll see that with every drawing it gets easier. Let us know if you have any questions or want to share your creations!

Happy creating 😊

About the Author
Klaudyna Hałon is a skilled digital artist and UX/UI designer – and of course, she’s part of our amazing Design Team at Angry Nerds! She creates web and mobile apps, custom illustrations, icons, and all kinds of visual assets. She is also a Figma enthusiast and loves to share her knowledge, so there may be more tutorials from her coming to our blog! In her free time, Klaudyna trains dog sports with her pup, Lotka.

Top 8 plugins for Sketch we can't live without - and neither should you

Thu, 20 Jun 2019 14:18:06 Z

We’re sure that the tools listed below will help you speed up your workflow and allow you to enjoy the creative process more than ever. It’s by no means a comprehensive list, as there are dozens of fantastic plugins for Sketch. We chose to present to you just a few of them — our essential toolbox. Hope you find it useful!

Top plugins for Sketch

Zeplin

A real game-changer when it comes to the relationship between designers and developers. We all know it can be hard sometimes, but with Zeplin the collaboration is much more effective and definitely easier for both sides. Using this plugin, you can export the artboards to a simple link and share it with the development team. They will be able to see all the assets, style sheets, measurements and even export HTML and CSS directly from your designs. And they don’t need to have Sketch to do it all!

Craft

Craft is more than just a plugin. It gives you a set of tools that will really make a change in your everyday work. It helps you quickly sync your designs with Invision (just one click — no more long hours exporting artboards, compressing them and uploading to InVision), build amazing interactive prototypes natively, create and manage design system and more. The collaborative features make working together with fellow designers and the development team easier.

Craft Official (2019) from InVision on Vimeo.

Abstract

Shared folders with dozens of versions of files can be a nightmare. Abstract can help you regain control over it! The plugin works just like Git for developers — it’s a version control tool. It means no more complex file-naming and precious time spent to find just that one file from 2 weeks ago. And again, it’s a great collaborative tool and can be used not only within your design team but also with other stakeholders. As a team, you’ll be able to work on the same files without any risk of losing someone’s work. The fear of overwriting something important is gone!

Stark

Inclusive design is a hot topic right now. And it should always be! We’re supposed to build products that are above all accessible. With Stark plugin, you can check if the contrasts in your visuals and typography are right and simulate how your design will look for people with color-blindness. The creators of the plugin already announced more features coming up and it looks exciting!

Contrast checking with opacity in Stark from Team Stark on Vimeo.

Fontily

We can’t get over the simplicity and the usefulness of this tool! Fontily lists every font you used in the document and lets you quickly change them. Everywhere. With one click. No more browsing through the designs looking for just one word in this particular font — with Fontily you can be sure the right fonts are just where you want them to be.

Via https://github.com/partyka1/Fontily

ImageOptim

Not only designers will find this plugin useful. ImageOptim compresses images in JPG, PNG, and GIF to much smaller files without any quality loss. It works seamlessly with Sketch, running automatically, so all you export from Sketch is already compressed before you even think of sharing it with anyone.

Pixel Perfecter

When your OCD strikes back, here comes the ultimate help — the Pixel Perfecter! It will scan your file to find all pixel imperfect layers and fix them according to your wish — for example rounding the dimensions up. Your designs will be flawless! It’s easy to use and helps you keep all the documents neat and tidy.

Via https://github.com/swiadek/pixel-perfecter-sketch-plugin

AnimateMate

Even simple animations can contribute greatly to the presentation of your designs, especially when it comes to user interfaces. AnimateMate is a great tool to use in this case – it builds and exports animation right of Sketch. No need to transfer your designs from Sketch to any animation creator. AnimateMate plugin will help you do it faster and you’ll be amazed by the results. Try all the features for yourself!