More DETECTr Screens

After a few rounds of user testing in the last couple weeks, I’ve now arrived at that point where my deadline is fast approaching and I need to remind myself to keep moving forward in an agile manner. The promo isn’t going to be near completion, but then again, this project has surprised me in its scope and I like it! I’ll continue to work on DETECTr thru spring break. By the time spring quarter begins, I should have a more cohesive update complete with promo video.

In the meantime enjoy some perspective prototypes:

Voisaurus

For the last week of this sprint I got to focus on not only the look of the app through prototyping, but also the feel through UI animations. Voisaurus should be bright and cheery with a lot of movement across the board to keep things interesting and engaging.

What Voisaurus lacks in dexterity, he makes up for with attitude: Voisaurus Promo

Thesaurus Nex

Jumping right into my next sprint wasn’t an easy task. I’ve been prototyping a lot of apps lately. Some just exercises during my UX class, but regardless I had a little bit of app-block if you will. What corner of the market can I target? What haven’t I explored already? What sounds fun? What can I complete in a two week period on top of everything else I’m working on?

Well, after shooting down every other idea, I decided to stay in the semi-hands-free zone started with the Diane app. This one however is larger-in-scope voice recognition thesaurus.

Say you’re writing a paper and you while revising it you realize you’ve used a word one too many times. You could Google a replacement or type the word into an online thesaurus, but that wastes valuable keystrokes. Instead why don’t you just ask Thesaurus Nex Voisaurus? He’ll scour the web for definitions, uses, examples and of course synonyms, antonyms and all the related words you could ever need. Plus, if you really like any particular words you can save them as a favorite. Just be sure not to fall prey to overuse. That’s what got you into this situation in the first place right?

DETECTr Mock

In the last couple weeks I’ve been getting lost and possibly carried away with the research behind DETECTr. I’m no scientist, but I should’ve known that the concept of ionizing radiation is a complicated one. I’ve poured over article after article, sifted through countless wikipedia entries and gave myself a headache trying to figure out conversion tables for radiation measurement units. I had to take a step back.

It’s not that I’m not interested, on the contrary, I’m actually nerding out here; which knowing me can be a problem in it’s own right. I just want to do this right (or as close to correct as my limited knowledge on the subject can get me).

Anyways, I took a break, drank some wine and made a couple screens. Here’s a little teaser from my app-controlled-geiger counter.

 

Diane? Week 2

Diane lives inside my phone. She listens when I speak and remembers when I forget. She is always on and quick to remind.

Diane Promo

Diane?

 

So things are starting to heat up in quarter 2. For my second app, I decided to do something a little less ambitious. Being the big Twin Peaks fan that I am, I decided to model a simple a voice recording app on the likeness of Agent Cooper’s correspondence device with his mysterious secretary(?) Diane. Yes I know, any user can utilize one of the many voice memo apps available for iOS and Android (or just hack Siri), but what fun is that? At least this way retains a bit of intrigue while you’re playing back your grocery list.

 

Rugis – Digital Swiss Army Knife

Jumping feet first into the App+Device/Wearable Tech category, Alice Wicks and I developed a survival knife for the digital age. I could list all the features/benefits, but that would be redundant. For the complete Rugis experience, check out the product launch page here.

There’s a promo video at the bottom, but I’ll link to it here as well.

Here’s a couple UI screens from the app itself:

 

As well as a launch page mockup.

 

 

DETECTr Moodboard

After much deliberation, I finally decided on a name. Meet DETECTr:

On a side note, I’ve decided to move this one into another class where I can spend more time and energy on it. Don’t worry, I’ll post DETECTr content as it builds in a different section. Next week I’ll be starting a start a new sprint.

 

Sprint One: Geiger Counter App

Since the 2010 earthquake in Japan and subsequent meltdown of the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant, there has been a lot of buzz regarding radiation contamination. In Japan, there is a growing concern over just what is safe and what is  not. With no government agency or corporation gathering the much needed data on hotspots and contaminated zones, the burden falls upon the people. Now there’s already this organization: Safecast. They make diy Geiger Counters, tutorials and operate a crowdsourced accumulation of data on their website. While this provides a much needed service, it relies on the accuracy and tenacity of its users to manually upload all data acquired by their equipment to the safecast website. I wanted to create something simpler, easier to use, understand yet still a robust and reliable tool.

Enter RadApp (tentative title). It’s main screen will consists of an easy to read graphical interface with readouts for not just nearby radiation, but also your accumulated dosage based on how long and how much ionized radiation the user has encountered since they began metering. The app also needs to have a pain free implementation of the data sharing option. Users must be presented with an easy to understand and unobtrusive method for uploading and accessing readings all within the app itself.

There’s a lot of potential here and I’m excited to start this project. I only fear, it may be a bit much to cram into a few weeks.

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