Iterate. Iterate. Iterate.

We obsess over the details. It’s the Mobiata way. So when we were getting ready to release FlightTrack 4, we wanted to make sure that we had the perfect icon to go with our beautifully updated app. We asked John E., our designer, to redo the existing icon and deliver a much more luxe version.

Here is what we did:

• Added a bunch of borders • Removed a bunch of borders • Moved the map around • Changed the shading around the plane • Made the background darker • Made the background lighter • Changed the plane color. Many times.

After 32 iterations, we had the perfect icon.

Admittedly, the last few iterations were very subtle and are simply color intensity tweaks for shadows, colors, highlights, shading, etc. but being pixel perfect was the goal and so the tweaks had to be made. Some developers view the icon as an afterthought but we see it as a beacon for the brand that sits on the phone’s home screen. We take it seriously.

We asked John about the iterations and he had this to say: “Luxe is a term that I like to use, but I’ve never heard it used other places– you guys are the first company that I’ve seen use it. It sounds like the perfect word when designing for touch UIs and iOS in general, though. It’s a perfect direction to have when creating beautiful products.”

Check out John’s icon iterations in this video he made for us.