Polishing an user interface

Question

Looking for examples of some "final touches" to enhance an existing (raw) user interface.

I.e nothing related to the core functionalities of the application, but rather examples of all these little details which give an application a "polished" look (new fonts, change in layout, more descriptive labels...others ?)

The target platform will be a mobile platform (android/iphone).

Note that I'm severly graphically impaired regarding colour and shape combinations, so anything too sophisticated will probably pass me by completely ;)

Answer 1

Check links below

Android

http://phandroid.com/2010/05/13/android-developers-blog-ui-best-practices/

http://www.androidjunkies.com/index.php/2010/05/13/android-developers-blog-ui-best-practices/

iPhone

Here's a book on this subject

http://apress.com/book/view/1430223596

articles

http://iphonedevelopmentbits.com/best-practices-for-developing-an-iphone-ipod-touch-application

http://surgeworksmobile.com/iphone/how-to-build-an-iphone-user-interface-prototype-that-follows-apple-guidelines

I'd recommend you to watch some popular application's design.

Answer 2

With respect to Android, there was a really good blog post that dove into the UI design behind Twitter's official Android app and broke it down into patterns and best practices:

http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2010/05/twitter-for-android-closer-look-at.html