Designing ease of use

Overview:

I was asked to work on a few projects working with Dynamic Augmented Solutions and one of them was to create an AR exeprience for a large client in the digital/physical print industry. Final design elements on buttons and icon where designed/created by client themselves. (The thoughts in this case study are my own and does not necessarily reflect the views of Bizbash or Dynamic Augmented Solutions.)

Problem/Challenge: 

Client wanst to provide rich, engaging content their readers and provide them with supplementary information via augmented reality that will enrich their reading experience. There are three types of article design the client uses and they would like to use all three in augmented reality. 

Approach: 

As all in all my projects, I began this project with research. I download several applications to test, read users reviews on the apps, read through Apples Human Interface Guidliness on AR along with Goolge AR core, Microsoft Hololens interface guidelines and pages from a Book on Human Computer Interaction information from a friends Masters course an HCI. I also had multiple people use these apps. I took note of them using the apps and followed up with a set of questions after they completed a specific task to uncover any usability issues or wins.

Paper Prototype:

I began to sketch out some ideas out on paper and in my research I recalled designers and developers mentioning the challange of getting users to walk around and immerse themselves in the AR experience. I took inspiration from human interaction and the physical world. My hypothesis was that if users are trying to view an item and part of the item is covered, they will either move around to see the item or move the obstacle out of the way. I then began to create a paper prototype to and use the iphones camera to get a feel of how users would interact with the 3D images. In the test, users would either move the camera around to see the images then tap on it or simply drag the object up into view expecting it to hover above.

2D Design Interaction Design

When designing the interaction, I considered how the images would behave and align the behavior to the clients objectives. User could tap or drag an image up to bring it to center. Once the image is centered and scaled, the carousel arrows would appear unveiling more interactivity. The user would only be able to see one image at a time so to not add cognitive load and encourage focus. After the design, we moved on to animation in Adobe After Effects in which a colleague took over and created the annimations for the team.

3D Modeling 

To get a better feel and understanding of the interaction, I used Sketchup by Google and Sketchfab to create and launch the 3D models. Creating the 3D model helped me tell the story better to stake holders and others. 

In my original design, I was looking to push the boundaries of the 3D objects and their interaction. These are the examples.

Testing 

We tested the experience with different age groups. Some people had little experience with AR and others have never seen it. What we found is the interaction, or scanning aspect seem to be very intuitive. One thing we did noticed is some users, depending on their level of visual acuity would struggle with reading the font. This was a learning experience for me and would do things a bit differently regarding visual acuity.

In production today 

So far we have over 50 installs and 5 star reviews. Learn more about BizBash AR on prenewswire.com or download the app yourself today.

Learnings

In this project I learned a few things and built some new skills along the way. The original design concept changed to fit some of the technical & time limitations but in the process, I learned to 3D model using Sketchup, prototype in Keynote and in Sketchfab. I was able to do all this while traveling the continental United States, 100% remote.

Note

Final design elements on buttons and icon where designed/created by client themselves.

App Store