Over Thinking Designer

Currently overthinking design. Constantly studying behavior, nudging choice and sweating pixels that make moments.

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@geniegetsme @fleeting_land @Apple This is pure magic

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@lexrus @rudrank Looks like solid glass 🤷‍♂️

[Jip @jipvandervelde]

grug is probably the first Apple Design Award winner built by two designers using Codex to write the code.

We didn't prompt "build me an award-winning app, make no mistakes.” It did not wake up one morning and decide the world needed grug. We did. We wanted to build it and AI was the tool that helped us take it all the way there.

Ever since we started building with AI a few years ago, we got bolder. You stop killing ideas just because they sound too hard to build. You get weirder when trying things becomes cheap enough to be silly again. You start following the strange little thought further than you normally would.

That is how grug happened.

AI can write your code. It can help you move fast. It can make impossible things feel possible.

But it cannot care. It cannot make your app memorable. It cannot make your app feel like it has a soul.

You have to bring the taste. You have to stay incredibly close. You have to take small steps, make thousands of tiny decisions, throw away good-enough work to get to your best work, and protect the thing that made the idea worth building in the first place.

grug would not have been this memorable if we didn't have Codex to go all-in on all the crazy ideas we had. If we had not decided to make the whole thing hand-drawn. If we had not spent days and nights obsessing over every detail, every animation, every interaction, every tiny bit of weirdness.

That is the difference between slop and something with a soul.

And I think that is why this award means so much to us. Not because what we were able to do using AI to build grug, but because Apple recognized the care we put inside all the weirdness.

For the past 15 years, so many of our ideas stopped at the mockup. They were too weird, too small, too hard to explain, too expensive to build, too unlikely to survive a meeting. Now designers like us can build the fun little things. Designers like us can ship the crazy ideas. Designers like us can make unreasonable little things and see if the world cares.

There are plenty of people who do not get grug. That is totally fine.

We do not try to build for everyone, because when you do you end up building for no-one. The people who get grug really get it. And if it makes their morning feel a little lighter, that is all that matters to us.

Make the weird thing. The right people will find it.

grug no wait for permission.

grug back sun rise.

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

Duh! 🙄

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@mymind What if there’s an app icon which is ai generated based on your taste profile of what you’ve in my mind?

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@olegcoada @simplebits should have kept it

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@Manu_Sisti @PreneursCircle Claude

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@bandiaditya @noondesign Get Noon

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@YaelBienenstock @Shopify @Jaytel 🫡

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@kevinclark @Shopify My Designer brain: 😍
My PM brain: 💸

This is gorgeous.. but internal tools usually prioritize speed > aesthetics.

Genuine question: does the polish actually increase output, or is this just a recruiting billboard?

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@hedra_labs Hedra Ambassador

[Anderson Mancini @Andersonmancini]

Using #threejs with WebGPU and TSL to build a light painting tool. It's not like watercolor, but I like how the paint dries over time. It's quite relaxing.

Next, I'll enable "mesh painting" mode. Let's see how it looks.

#creativecoding

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@hugomercierooo Twin

[Hugo Mercier @hugomercierooo]

𝗜𝗻𝘁𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗧𝘄𝗶𝗻 — 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗔𝗜 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗻𝘆 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗲𝗿.
No setup. Secure. Infinitely scalable.

We just raised a $𝟭𝟬𝗠 𝘀𝗲𝗲𝗱.
After a beta with 𝟭𝟬𝟬,𝟬𝟬𝟬+ 𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗱𝗲𝗽𝗹𝗼𝘆𝗲𝗱, we’re now opening to everyone.

RT and comment “Twin” — first agents on us. 👇

[Clay Hebert @clayhebert]

Now that anyone can build an app, everyone finally realizes that building the app wasn't the hard part.

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@azhassan_ Skeuomorphism isn't dead. It’s evolving from fake leather to real physics.

Masterful work on the shader. ✨

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

@kotecinho Hardware is the new counter-culture. We are tired of touching smooth glass. Give me the click. Give me the clunk. Give me the resistance.

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

We spent 10 years optimizing the "Reply" button. AI just removed the need to click it.

We are shifting from reactive design (User clicks > App works) to Anticipatory Design (App works > User approves).

If your product forces the user to manage things, you are already legacy.

[Google @Google]

Today we’re bringing @Gmail into the Gemini era, making it a personal, proactive inbox assistant to help you manage your life, not just your messages. Explore the new features launching today, many of which are made possible by Gemini 3 🧵⬇️

[Over Thinking Designer @OTDesigner]

Design is just Math with better PR. 10/10 visual explanation.

[Dan Hollick @DanHollick]

Do you just click different blending modes until it sort of looks right?

Well, that probably won't change after you read this but at least you probably won't use Lighten or Darken again.

(you should bookmark this thread and use it as a reference)