Designing for emotional highs & lows, landing pages, design inspiration and more
Sketching for UX Newsletter Issue #16 (Nov-Dec, 2023) - my favorite design & visual thinking resources I discovered in the last 2 months
Hey dear subscriber,
I skipped one issue of the newsletter in the beginning of December due to a tragic event in my private life, so my focus has been elsewhere. You know me, content creation is a huge passion of mine, and I value consistency, but in the last couple of weeks I had to learn to allow myself to not function properly. Now I'm ready to slowly ease back into the design world and to content creation. Thanks for being here, I really appreciate each and every one of you!
✏️ My work
Before sharing my newest sketch and my favorite resources, here are some news concerning my work:
#1 My course, “How to train your designer eye & develop your design skills” has become the TOP 1 highest rated course on Udemy in the UI design category!
If you take my course, you'll learn how to train your designer eye, how to collect, analyze and practice designing user flows, layouts and UI elements.
The course is currently on launch sale, get it for only 12.99 EUR.
#2 My favorite UX design workbooks: develop your skills by solving exercises - my newest article
Learning design theory is a good step towards becoming a better designer, but it is also important to put the things you’ve learnt into practice. Workbooks are great since they allow you to directly apply your knowledge. Check out my favorite design workbooks here.
#3 Teaching and workshop facilitation
I facilitated a 4-hour long remote ideation workshop for 20+ participants (as part of a UX bootcamp), I always enjoy these challenging and high-energy events.
Also, I talked about usability testing (and other testing methods like card sorting and tree testing) at UI Academy. (And thanks to
’s invitation, I was supposed to have a session about sketching in the design process at the University of Waterloo, but it was too close to the already mentioned tragic event, so we postponed it, hopefully it’ll happen this year!)#4 10x Designers Conference
I' have been lucky enough to contribute a little bit to organizing the first ever 10x Designers Conference (the 2-day pass is $59, it is free for 10x members, you get a 3-month membership for $99). Check out the lineup here, these are some of the speakers: Erik D. Kennedy, Bonnie Kate Wolf, Femke van Schoonhoven,
, Ioana Teleanu, and
✏️ My newest UX Knowledge Piece Sketch: Designing for emotional highs & lows
My newest sketch is about identifying key moments inside the user journey, and about understanding the emotional context of those moments, and design form them. In case of high points, you can amplify the good, in case of low points, you should try to make those less painful or show the user that you care.
Check out my sketch & detailed article here soon. (As a newsletter subscriber, you not only get my newest UX Knowledge Piece Sketch directly to your inbox each month: you get early access to it, too.)
✏️ Favorite resources
Here are my favorite discoveries of November-December, 2023:
#1 Roast My Landing Page & Landing Pages Explained
Oliver Meakings teaches you how to create effective landing pages, he writes blog posts and creates “roast” videos. Check out Olly’s other project, too: Landing Pages Explained.
#2 The UI Design Demo Videos Vault
The UI Design Demo Videos Vault course by Supercharge Design is such a brilliant idea (executed really well): have you ever wanted to peek behind a great designer’s shoulder to catch a glimpse of their design process? If yes, this course is for you! Read my detailed review of the course here.
Get the course for a discounted launch price.
#3 Fountn
Fountn is
#4 Spotify Wrapped
If you are a long time subscriber, you know that I really appreciate the work of the Growth.design team. In their new case study, they explain the 6 psychological principles behind the success of Spotify Wrapped (e.g. variable rewards and the bandwagon effect)
#5 The science behind inspiration and how to design more of it into your life
My new Udemy course, How to train your designer eye contains many lessons about how to get inspired by the offline & the digital world around you, how to collect design inspiration and what you should collect. This article is about finding and applying design inspiration, e.g.: “Creative momentum simply means taking something that sparks inspiration (such as an image, a song, a conversation, or a thought) and reserving just a few minutes to translate it into something tangible. Choose a format that works for you […]”
#6 User Interface Typography
This book is about how to do good user interface typography, from basic things and principles to building layout and various design elements. And you can read it online for free! Written by Alex Baranov.
#7 Design System Surf
A collection of inspirational design systems created by Ilya Greben.
#8 Risk tolerance: why some countries prefer more complex UIs
I first heard about cross-cultural design from Senongo Akpem, since then, I have been very interested in this subject. Bas Wallet’s article discovers the topic of why collectivist countries might prefer more complex UIs.
#9 A Manifesto by Christoph Niemann — 10 rules for drawing from the acclaimed illustrator
A beautifully illustrated list of Niemann’s rules for drawing - an inspirational piece for any designers! E.g.: "The only relevant artistic talent is the ability to deal with frustration"
#10 An over-analytical analysis of style
Okay, this one is a bit nerdy, but my assumption is that there are many nerds among my subscribers :)
If you only read a small piece of the article, this should be it:
”Inspiration alone lacks understanding behind the reaction. Inspiration requires examination. Developing a point of view on design is essential to fostering one’s own style. The things that inspire you should be broken into a million pieces to see what makes it tick. That lack of understanding keeps you at the mercy of basic mimicry.”
✏️ Favorite posts [LinkedIn & Twitter (X)]
1.
’s series on growing an audience to 1M followers and earning six figuresTommy’s 7-part series contain these topics:
Day 7: Monetization (coming soon)
2. Designing for children
A collection of great design resources by
3. Original Pac-Man concept sketches by Japanese designer Toru Iwatani
Sketches shared by
4. Please beat Minesweeper to cancel your subscription
Congrats to
5. Understanding Vertical Trim in Figma
Tomasz Osowski did a great analysis of Figma’s vertical trim feature, and its current limitations. (LinkedIn post; article)
✏️ Coupon codes for my Udemy courses & other deals
Udemy courses
My NEW course: How to train your designer eye - €12.99 (launch sale)
Sketching for UX Designers course - €13.99
Be a better designer by understanding development aspects course - €12.99
My (pay-what-you-want) books
Other deals
Being part of the 10x Designers Community has been one of the best experience in my professional life as a designer. Join me on this learning journey, let’s grow together! (Sale: $99 instead of $129 for 3 months)
As you know, I find collecting and analyzing design inspiration a very important skill, and I became an advocate of Mobbin, join with my link to support me with a couple of dollars, I’d really appreciate it!
The Ultimate UI Design Mastery Bundle is an epic starting point if you want to become a UI designer, I believe that the designers at Supercharge are among the best, and they consistently share great knowledge. I attended their Advanced Figma course, so I experienced their teaching style myself. The best thing about the bundle is that you are getting all their current courses (30 hours+) for a reduced price and you are going to get 3 upcoming UI courses for free. Again, if you join via my link, you’ll support my work!
Thanks for reading my newsletter, I hope you enjoyed it! 💙
Krisztina
P.S.: Have you written or found an interesting design / visual thinking article or other resource lately? Please send me a DM on Twitter (X) ! I might feature your resource in the next issue!