This post was written by Shona from Bump's design team.

Bump is simple. Right? You bump, and data is transferred from one phone to another. It can be anything from your contact info to photos to apps, but the premise is basic and totally functional. This was what I figured back when I started working on the visual redesign of the app.

Three months later, my opinion has changed (kind of a lot). Bump is an incredibly complex, nuanced app that calls for a whole lot of visual interplay between screens, between elements on those screens, and across the whole application. It’s got hundreds of permutations and possibilities in what can be on the screen at any time. Fortunately I had the help of Abby, our UX designer here at Bump, when I undertook the work of giving Bump a visual “refresh.”

Our choice was to make Bump more tactile. The app is based on the physical bumping of two phones, and there’s something really magical about highlighting a physical interaction in a world where you can talk with someone without ever seeing them, and show them photos without standing next to them. We love the fact that people get a kick out of making real contact when bumping. To carry that further, I decided to explore textures, shadows, and layering in the new design. These are things we see in real life and that make the app look touchable.

Our homescreen background is paper-like; the buttons & graphics are tending toward a letter-pressed style; both of these are enormously tactile in appearance. Subtle dropshadows and glows give buttons, notes and bars the impression of popping up and out of the screen. This is all stuff we see everyday (just look at the pages of a book or the buttons on a TV). These details come from things we interact with and that we know how to use.

At Bump we’re trying to capitalize on the intuitive understanding that people have of objects, buttons,  and icons, and use them in the app to help our users get where they want to go. In the end it’s all about making Bump easy, and a pleasure, to use.

As with any large undertaking this project takes time. We’re only part-way finished with the redesign and we’re already looking ahead to a larger overhaul. But in the meantime I’m enjoying the new look we’ve injected into the app. It’s a huge step forward in making Bump even more a pleasure to use.

Want to work with Shona and the rest of the Bump team? We are hiring: http://bu.mp/jobs.