A good and reliable deliverable is essential for every web designing and development program. The most important of all deliverable are the WIREFRAMES and MOCKUPS. The biggest advantage of using these deliverable is that these are easily understandable by clients and are action oriented. In addition to this, these help in communicating vision and expectations in the most realistic manner and help in easy collaboration and discussion. The progress being made can be easily tracked by making use of WIREFRAMES and MOCKUPS, thus inspiring change and action.
The difference between a mockup, a wireframe and a prototype?
A lot of people use these terms (Mockup, Wireframe and Prototype) interchangebly, however they are significantly different and have specific application in software requirements stage.
- A wireframes is a skeleton. It doesn’t include colors, typography, pictures or details and NOT a lot of attention is given to the exact layout. It does not convey the brand. Instead it just has description of the content, functionality and the hierarchy within which content is displayed. Wireframes are a good way to do requirements workout sessions, these can be used during requirements discussion with the end users or business analysts of the application.
- A mockup contains colors, typography, pictures and other details. A lot of attention is given to the exact layout and exact proportion of content elements. The common usage of mockup is for UI desgin using rich photo editing software like photoshop or GIMP.
- A prototype is something that demonstrates some functionality of the finished product. These are typically used in large projects to save cost by doing the simple feasibility before real project work is started.
Following is the list of the most awesome Wireframe Mockup Tools for developers:-
- Balsamiq
- Pencil Project
- Protoshare
- Templatr
- Serena
- Mockup Builder
- Mockingbird
Invision- Flairbuilder
- PowerMockup
- HotGloo
- WireframeSketcher
- Cacoo
- MockFlow
- iPlotz
- Gliffy
- Moqups
Templatr is a tool which will help you in creating powerful customized word press templates easily and in the shortest possible time. This tool works in a four step procedure including layout selection, uploading graphics, finalization of the page elements, and then downloading. With Templatr, you can even choose an action to change individual elements along with saving your work in the main server for future reference.
Serena is a prototype composer which helps you in creating a quick and accurate simulation of a particular application. This means that without writing down any actual codes you will be able to visualize the functioning of a given application. This prototype composer can help you build simple and high fidelity prototypes which is an exact replica of the real thing. Depending upon your requirements, you can choose between the two available editions of Serena namely the Professional edition and the Community edition.
Mockingbird is best known as a Wireframe which is always on the fly. It is one of the most effective online tools which saves your money and time by helping you plan fast and effectively and by keeping a track on your progress. You can easily satisfy your clients by presenting your ideas through clear mockups and eliminating expensive back-and-forth. You can even make use of Mockingbird to create an effective brainstorming session for the entire team. This will help you in building better products and delivering as per your client’s expectations.
Invision is an easy and beautiful tool which will help you in creating wireframes and prototypes which are fully interactive. Your clients will have a real experience of how you envision their site and they can leave their comments directly on-screen. With the help of this tool, you can design screens by making use of your favorite graphic programs and can even pull in other designers to work on your project.
Flairbuilder offers you a unique platform through which you can create interactive wireframes for your websites. A cross platform prototyping tool, Flairbuilder helps you work fast, easily and in the most effective manner. Flairbuilder provides you with a list of tools which, until now, only the programmers could use. You will be able to create elegant wireframes and clean layouts by making use of the powerful design features. You can even link with your clients through functional live demonstration of your ideas.
With HotGloo, creating wireframes will be a completely new experience for you. This is easy to use software which is really intuitive and will make you feel comfortable the moment you start using it. The built-in chat functions will help you in collaborating with your entire team so that the work gets done faster. Regardless of the browser or the OS you are using; you can access your account at all times and from all places. This tool even has a built-in application for auto saving and backups so that your work can be stored on secure servers.
WireframeSketcher is a powerful and flexible eclipse plugin to draw mockups. This provides a wiki language support for formatting text based fields. It has a huge set of inbuilt vector graphics icons and you can also include your own custom icons into the wireframes.
Cacoo is a free online digram creation and collaboration service. Its very simple to use and has wide variety of stencils to create Wireframes, UML diagrams, Site maps and network diagrams. One of the coolest feature is chat, this allows team members to interact and discuss things with each other while working on a project.
MockFlow is a special kind of wireframe creation tool. This allows you to create mockups online as well as offline. It comes with a plenty of inbuilt free components and icons along with some premium paid components which can be conveniently purchased from MockStore.
iPlotz, is a flash based wireframe creation tool. This works on windows, mac and Linux with flash supported browsers. iPlotz provides 1 free project with limited page options.
Gliffy is a powerful online digram creation application with collaboration features. This allows you to create a wide variety of diagrams including wireframes and mockups. This can also be used to create Flow Charts, org charts, Venn diagram etc.
This is free HTML5 based prototyping tool that is really intuitive and easy to use.
So, now instead of spending your valuable time and efforts on other deliverable which make little or no impact, make use of Wire-frames and mockups to inspire change and stimulate your imagination.