Rich Dean, creative designer specialising in digital media

Hello

I'm Rich Dean, a creative designer specialising in digital media with over 12 years of experience. I work as Head of design for London agency Zone, where we produce digital goodness for some of the best brands in the world.

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About

I make things on the internet

I'v been working as a designer for the past thirteen years, and in that time I've worked on some amazing projects with some really talented people. I've learned a lot along the way. Three years ago I joined Zone, a top digital agency based in London, and for the past two years I've held the role of head of design. My job is evenly split between hands-on design and management duties, and it's great to be able to pass on my skills and help shape the way the agency works.

When I'm not designing, I like to keep fit and healthy, either running or working out at the gym. I'm also a big fan of sci-fi and action films, and when I get the time, I like computer games too. I enjoy a spot of DIY, but I'm also quite and outdoors kind of person. Family and friends are probably most important to me, and the best times are always holidays away or quality nights enjoying a drink with friends.

User experience

I'm an advocate of user-centred design, and I believe that simple and intuitive user interaction is just as important as visual layout. Before starting full designs, I use Axure to build sitemaps, wireframes and interactive prototypes.

Visual design

Once the user interaction and wireframes have been created, the visual design stage is where it starts to come to life. This is by far my speciality, and my prefered tool is Photoshop for perfecting the visual style of a project.

Development

While I'm primarily a designer, the inner workings of a website fundamentally affect how we design, and so I beleive its important to keep up to date with technology. I have good experience of hand-coding HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

Responsive design

The way we interact with and consume content on the internet is constantly evolving, and so for the past two years I have been working on a content-led approach that uses a 1000px grid system to design sites that are fully responsive.