"GramCity" is a photo editing start-up, which wants to branch out to new domains. They want to create a feature to help people find the most Instagram-able locations to take photos in any city.
In this #Springboard exercise, I was given the task to help "GramCity" come up with possible solutions for this feature. I was assigned to perform a modified version of Google Ventures design sprint to accomplish this task. I was given a brief containing the user research performed by "GramCity", from the brief I could learn that: Different users like to travel and capture experiences in different ways. For example "Sara" likes to prepare before a trip and research good photo spots, and "Nick" is not about to go out of his way to find a good spot to take a picture.
Day 1 - Mapping
I started out by mapping the tasks a user would perform in order to complete the experience. I started thinking of how I could accommodate my two use cases, and this Idea of a map with an adjustable search radius came to mind.
Day 2 - Lightning Demo
User wants to find
an Instagram-able place
User marks an area on a map & applies Filters
User chooses a Spot by browsing the Location on the map
User goes to said place
App directs User exactly where to stand and which direction to look
User takes an awesome picture at a great location
To draw inspiration I turned to two apps I am familiar with Fever and Airbnb. Fever shows pins on the map with the highlighted one being the image you see in the drawer. What I didn't like so much, being that "GramCity" is a photo app, was the fact that the photos were very small. I envisioned the drawer being more like Airbnb taking about 50% of the real estate. With a big image. I was also able to find an app designed for photographers called: "Unscripted", that actually did just that, helped you find great locations to shoot throughout the city. Unfortunately, I did not thought the UX was good enough. I thought the existence of a map view is crucial and there was no good direction to the spot, or a place to save locations. I did like the UI and the feel of the App.
Fever
AirBnB
Unscripted
Sketching
For my main screen, I chose to go with an interface similar to the one that can be found on Airbnb due to the large image map ratio.
Crazy 8 Exercise- 8 different Main screen iterations.
Mini Story board: Main screen + before and After Screen
Day 3- Decide & Create
Now it was time to create the flow. As to the question of location, (will a user write down the name of a city and then go to the map or will he land directly on his location?) I decided to allow both, but have the user land on what is nearest to them first. I wanted a feed to draw inspiration from, a map tab, a tab with all your saved location, which will have a call to action- navigateing you to the site. I also added an enlarged map view in order to make positioning more accurate.
Day 4 - Prototype
Day 5 - Validate
I was able to track down five participants to test out my prototype and walked them through the task to see if my prototype made sense. Instagram is a wildly popular app so I had no problem-finding participants who were able to subscribe to the mission. As always interviewing is very enlightening, I always discover new patterns of thinking. Some of my key insights from the interviews were:
Try to solidify the difference between liking a photo and the intention to go to a place and taking that photo.
The feed looked more like a blog
The call to action on the map page is vague
Distance from location should be shown live on the photos tab.
Photo Tab should be renamed to - "Gallery"
Next Steps
Continuing on I will need to address the problems that came up during my testing round. I need to really understand the different between the two types of "Save" and what they mean to people. I would test that issue further. I would say that some of the designs felt off to a native app, I would refine the design to adjust to the mobile real estate. Lastly there were some features I would have liked to see in an app such as this, like- photo tour builder and posing tutorials.
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