Hi! Nice to meet you.
I design and develop experiences that make me smile, and help people be their best selves.
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Creativity and
codeMy passion is organising information in a visually striking way, and bringing complex ideas to life with technology. I am naturally curious for the world, and love exploring big ideas while collaborating across disciplines.
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Invisible tools
I love the concept of digital tools: Interfaces that help you create, work, discover, and grow in any way you find important – without being in your way.
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Polish every pixel
Call me a devil, cause I'm up in those details. Interfaces are so much more than just static screens: they have loading states, page transitions, edge cases and more. My favourite thing is enriching interfaces with animations and interactivity.
(Micro) Blog
All posts ->
Some sun on my face 👌🌞
Having a blast on the new @gowalla tbh
I love the Dutch so much sometimes 🥹
Critical Cupcake (@CriticalCupcake@mastodon.lol)
Bought a new domain today 🐣
Playing around with Svelte for a new project idea! It feels so foreign.
But considering its embrace of the platform, I guess that just shows how much React & Next have warped my view of how web apps are “supposed” to be written
How about a website with a single checkbox on it except the checkbox’s state is synced to all visitors
How do you (like to) catch up on your Mastodon timeline?
🐘💻✨
Crafting some ideas at the AI hackathon in Amsterdam this weekend 🤖🪄
Dipping my toes into GPT tonight to test the feasibility of a random idea I had. Some observations:
• This stuff feels scarily complex and trivially easy at the same time
• Datasets are fun to hoard
• Python environments will be the death of meIt’s (a)live!! Congrats on the launch @ivory! Downloaded and subscribed right away 🎉
Seriously impressed with all the cool design happening on here. I’ve felt stuck between wanting to create/post more while simultaneously feeling uninspired and not good enough to share.
Hoping to get out of that creative rut soon (and absolutely sure I will, eventually)..
I think I'd like to get a tattoo. I've been toying with an idea for the past two years now — a reminder to myself that bad times will get better and good times should be enjoyed in the moment.
But I need to find the right font. I've used FF DIN for this temporary try-out and I like it, but I'm not 100% sure it's the perfect match. I've been stuck on this for a while now 😬
Send me your favourite thin sans serif font!
Am I correct in thinking there are no keyboard shortcuts or menu actions in #Figma for constraining left/right/top/bottom? I use the alignment shortcuts a ton, wish I could set constraints in the same way ⌨️
Here’s to a wonderful 2023 🎇
I love the Local timeline. I think it’s the coolest and most differentiating feature Mastodon has. I love how it fosters community and discoverability, especially on small servers where it’s not yet another firehose.
One of those “UI is tough” days
Been a while since I did some #webdev! The blog on my portfolio was looking stale, so I spent Boxing Day playing around with the Mastodon API to add a section for my latest Toots. Check it out: https://zeno.zone
Zeno Kapitein | Portfolio
Highlighted Projects
Riverside.fm
As Design Engineer at online recording platform Riverside, I bridged the gap between the design and development teams.
My work included designing UI, speccing it for developers to implement, and creating prototypes and code examples of animations that would enhance the product further. I also set up and maintained the Riverside Design System, and learned a ton about creating reusable components.
From the moment he joined, Zeno played an important role in shaping Riverside’s UI and UX. He brought structure to our new design team by independently conducting user research, collaborating across teams, and setting up an extensive component library in Figma. He thinks like a developer when he needs to, which has made implementation a breeze and made our product shine.
Invisible
Interface
Carried out in the scope of the MA Digital Experience Design at Hyper Island UK, my graduation thesis examines flow in digital tools, and aims to provide a new model to help digital designers create interfaces that cause (more) flow.
Check out the 15-minute summary video below
Check out the full thesisI tried my hardest to make it anything but dry
This is a very valuable piece of work with a clear deep understanding of the issue in the area and a realistic, understandable model delivered in a very professional and academically robust manner.
The flow funnel is giving me and the team a better understanding and a handle to talk about the difference in skill/experience levels of our users. It was a revelation to see this mapped.
Dutch Coding Company
Dutch Coding Company is a web & app studio based in Eindhoven. I have had the pleasure of working with them on multiple projects, from mobile apps to animation-enriched websites. As part of their website redesign, I got to add animations and page transitions in numerous places.
To accompany the beautiful videos they made, I created a number of 3D device components that would spin- or flip around as you scrolled the page. In places where a handmade video couldn't be made, the device frame could be filled with a screen recording, and it would mirror the 3D transforms made by the device. Another highlight is the website's main menu, which includes staggered animations and a smoothly rippling wave at the bottom.
Zeno works end-user focussed, with a critical, introspective attitude and tremendous work ethic. However, the secret sauce is his attention for detail - the little animations and micro interactions - that elevates everything to a blissful experience.
Eurostory
In 2015 I was approached by a group of authors to collaborate on a special project: a website about the serious side of the Eurovision Song Contest.
Everything about Eurostory is custom-built with attention to detail: a specialised block editor, a rich database of contest info, SEO optimisations, and a sleek design.
To top it off, during the Song Contest itself I get to make short vlogs about my experiences, finding my way as a videographer.
Zeno is the perfect example of a multifaceted designer. He is perfectly able to translate our wishes into a well functioning, beautiful interface, but he also comes up with ideas we didn't know we wanted to incorporate – but we do. It's been a constant joy to work with him.
DebaTable
DebaTable is a technologically enhanced meeting table that mediates discussions and stimulates time-efficient debates.
It works by measuring and then visualising each participant’s speaking time within the past minutes. Additionally, a slowly expanding circle in the middle shows the discussion time left per topic, as voted on by each participant.
In his Final Bachelor Project, Zeno clearly demonstrated his time at the University shaped him into a skilled designer with an eye for detail and one who is never afraid to learn new things. I very much appreciated his 'making approach’ in this project and have always been impressed with his professional attitude and his reflective stance.
Other Projects
Board Year
Wervingsdagen is responsible for organising the largest career events of the Eindhoven University of Technology, helping 160 companies with 3700 students. I learned to collaborate with my fellow board members, work with 9 study associations, and maintain professional attitude towards client companies.
Light Art
Intermedia is an interactive light installation made for light art festival GLOW Eindhoven 2016. I programmed its 3 visualisations using a pretty complex technology stack (Kinect sensors, local networking, beamers, adaptive soundtrack). The result was a wonderful experience, with many strangers connecting with each other through a screen.
LGBTQ+ Volunteering
Leading a team of 15+ graphical designers in creating bimonthly edition of Expreszo, the biggest LGBTQ+ youth magazine of the Netherlands. When Expreszo moved from a paper publication to online, I helped in developing the web platform, creating the theme and modules of the website.
Get in touch
I'm @zenoachtig (It's funny in Dutch) pretty much everywhere.