Material Design

Material Design - the design of software and applications for Android operating systems. First introduced at the Google I/O conference on June 25, 2014.

Initially, within the company, it was invented under the codename "quantum paper.” The main metaphor of material design is flat paper, located in three-dimensional space.

The idea of this design can be seen in applications that open and collapse like cards, using the effects of shadows. According to the idea of Google's designers, apps should not have sharp corners; cards should switch smoothly and almost imperceptibly.

Material design in applications

The material design is used fully in the operating systems Android Lollipop, Android Marshmallow, Android Nougat, Android Oreo and also in some apps of previous versions.

Why apps need a material design

It serves two purposes:

• the standardisation of numerous products of the company;
• the unification of app user interfaces for Android.

After the dominance of “skeuomorphism,” the web and the interfaces tilted toward a radical flattening, but it turned out to be just one more extreme. In order to be understandable and international, the objects of the interface should have an analogue, a metaphor in the real world. Such a metaphor was paper. Thin, flat, but located in three-dimensional space and having shadows, speed of movement, and acceleration.

4 principles of Material Design

Material Design is based on four basic principles:

1. Tactile surfaces: The interface is composed of tangible layers of so-called "digital paper". These layers are located at different heights and cast shadows on each other, which helps users to better understand the anatomy of the interface and the principle of interaction with it.
2. Polygraphic design: If we count the layers as pieces of "digital paper", then, as regards "digital ink" (all that is depicted on "digital paper"), an approach is taken from traditional graphic design: for example, magazine and poster.
3. Meaningful animation: In the real world, objects do not arise from nowhere and do not disappear into anywhere. Therefore, in Material Design, we always think about how to use the animation in layers and in "digital ink" to give users hints about the interface.
4. Adaptive design: It's about how we apply the previous three concepts on different devices with different resolutions and screen sizes.

The material design is one of the modern trends in the visualisation of mobile applications whose popularity is growing day by day.