The Nothing team reveals how it designed the look of the Phone (3a) Pro

Nothing will launch the (3a) series on March 4, but the company has started to reveal some details about the upcoming models. The latest video introduces the designers of the phones who discuss the design process at length.

There are two key spec decisions that need to be made before the designers can get to work – the display and the camera have a major impact on the final product. And on that subject, the Nothing Phone (3a) Pro will have an exciting feature – a 3x periscope.

A closeup of the Nothing Phone (3a) Pro camera island

The design process starts with sketching things on paper, then proceeds to computer designs and even includes playing around with the components. There are three goals. First, the design has to look good. Second, it has to be practical. Third (and most important), the components actually have to fit. This is where the new periscope module presented a challenge as it is larger than a typical camera module.

In the video, you will see dozens and dozens of iterations of different camera island layouts. Above you can see the one that Nothing settled on. In the video you will hear why this is the one that was picked.

The Nothing Phone (3a) Pro

That’s not all – Nothing is introducing a camera button. The team considered adding a red dot to it, something that ties into the Nothing design language, but decided against it as it won’t work well with all colorways. Instead, the team settled on a different finish (glossy) for the button – this way, it stands out but can be color-coordinated with any colorway.

The Glyph interface has been reworked. It still has three main segments, but each segment offers more control than before.

Anyway, Nothing also has a vanilla Phone (3a) incoming, it will launch alongside the Pro. And there is a flagship Nothing Phone (3) design in the works too – it’s in the video, technically, but completely blurred out, so no spoilers.

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