Designers and information architects haven’t always been concerned with how pages transition from one to another. In fact, for many years we were lucky if we could get a page to load on all browsers, AOL, dial-up, etc. But now that speeds have increased, we can provide more immersive experiences across many media and form-factors. Unfortunately, we continue to restrict ourselves to variations on < PREVIOUS | NEXT > for navigation.

Until recently, there were few opportunities (with the exception of Silverlight and Flash) for designers to incorporate animation and creative transitions into interactive experiences. With new developments in HTML5 and CSS3, though, transitions have become more important—we now contend with content that slides to the left or right, up or down, and which fades,bounces,increases or decreases in size and opacity or hue.

We have a variety of options for transitions to choose from, and we have to decide which is most appropriate. Is it most appropriate to stick to the Left / Right slide, or do we go with a vertical slide that takes the user to content more logically “down” than to the right? Which axis is most logical to use, and how does this affect the end-user?

People have come to expect certain standards of operation on the web. It’s similar to a car: you get in and know you can go forward, back and turn. But what if you could now slide right or up? While we must accommodate our audience when considering UI, breaking from conventions often leads to new, interesting user interfaces.