About the System

EightShapes Unify is a collection of templates, libraries, and other assets that enable user experience designers to create more consistent, effective deliverables faster. The system utilizes the Adobe Creative Suite of products; primarily, Adobe InDesign is the key authoring tool.

The system is often used by designers – and larger user experience teams – to rapidly produce artifacts like design strategy, wireframes, style guides, specs, and more. The system has many parts, but the basic templates and symbol libraries are pretty straightforward:

• Document templates (such as an 8.5×11 letter landscape format) that includes text variables for titles, print-friendly versions, varied grids, and a deep reservoir of type, object, and table styles
• Page layouts for approximately 100 common page layouts, such as a chunked wireframe, color palette for a style guide, component specs, mental models, personas, and competitive two-by-two plots
• Symbol libraries for flows, maps, markers (little numbered circles), callouts, frames (like a box with jagged bottom into which you place a wireframe), project plans, reviews, and more
• Scriptable document starting points for when you create standard documents (like a competitive analysis) or need to automate the starting point for a larger document (like a style guide)

The download also includes wireframe templates, libraries, and component samples, although you can also place artwork into deliverables no matter what tool you use to design screens and other visualizations (Fireworks, OmniGraffle, Visio, and especially Illustrator and Photoshop since they play so well with InDesign).