[Project 3 – Explainer Revisions] Iterate & Improve your Explainer

Objective: To design a search tool for CCA students.

Hampers: Eugina Chun, Hridae Walia, Ruitao Liang

Hamper Search: search tool for CCA animation students.

The team was to come up with a search tool for CCA animation students.

We noticed the struggle animation students in particular had in finding references for their animation. We conducted nine interviews total, three each. The interview script was written together as a team.

Search Tool for CCA Animation Majors_Interview Script

Hi, my name is XXX. Thank you for taking your time to participate in this interview. We are currently designing a search tool for CCA animation students.

Name:

Age:

Gender:

Ethnicity:

Specialization (2D, 3D, storyboard, rigging, etc.):

1. Can you walk me through how you create your animations step by step?

2. What tools do you use to look for inspirations or reference?

3. Do you ever struggle with the tool you use to search currently? If you could fix anything about your search tool, how would you improve it?

4. If this tool you just imagined, was a possibility, what kind of impact would that make in your working process?

5. That’s it for my questions. Is there anything else you’d like to tell me about what we’ve discussed?

A common pattern was that all students were using at least three different platforms for references.

In class, we did a sprint activity with all the collected information to create the beginnings of the Hamper Search.

Persona:

After coming up with a persona, I linked her attributes to the molecule.

Using the molecule, I came up with three different use cases:

I chose the middle scenario where the user can diversify her animation through variety of references. The following is her story:

The team came up with three possible features for the search tool:

This is what the Hamper search tool's main home page looks like.

And this is how Jenny will navigate her way through different pages:

Process Group Work:

https://euginachun.wixsite.com/mysite/blog/project-3-explainer-revisions-user-goals-process-work

Reflection:

The set time limit for each phase was difficult for me to keep up with. I’m used to a slower working pace because I am afraid of messing up or I’m doubtful that I’m not thinking the problem thorough enough. However, it did push me to think fast and to think of the most crucial points. I learned the importance of cohesive story telling through different platforms. If I could do this again, I would try to focus even more on the main user story because I did find myself feeling lost when coming up with wireframes. I would also try making my language more clear and concise. In some parts I felt like I was either repeating myself or wasn’t being clear enough with my language. Having the physical interview notes helped put myself into the user’s shoes every time I started to wander off into what I thought were the users’ needs. The journey map was difficult for me because it was my first time doing it and I felt like my comments were broad and didn’t really add to the core story of the user. I also liked the fact that I was sitting with my group but it still required individual effort - which made it more effective and efficient when we did need to collaborate as a team. Today’s class was fast, intense, and a little bit stressful but it was rewarding to see what I am capable of accomplishing.

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In order to further develop this idea, the group divided roles in telling one of origin, usage, or concept story. I chose to do origin story.

But before jumping straight in, I did some further reading about origin stories and a short storyboard. Click the following link to view details of my process work: https://euginachun.wixsite.com/mysite/blog/project-3-explainers-progress-work

The reason why I chose to do origin story is because I wanted to capture the user's first time encountering Hamper Search. I wanted to clearly identify what there life was like before and after Hamper Search. I also wanted to include the character achieving a step closer to her short term and long term goal by using the tool.

My initial idea was first person narrative because I thought it would be effective in taking the audience inside the user's mind in encountering the product and effecting their life in real time. However, I couldn't find the story as effective because the user never really clearly identifies her struggles and process - if she does, it would read very artificial. I still wanted a through description of the character's situation without making it feel awkward to read. So I decided to do third person narrative through a made up character, Hampy. In doing so, I hope the users get a good read of the character's situation, struggles, and story in an informative yet entertaining way.

Final Deliverable- Comic book

Reflection:

I was pleasantly surprised to see all the work I made in a matter of 3-4 weeks! I learned a lot about the story aspect of a product and I enjoyed that the focus wasn't on the wireframes, function, capabilities of the actual tool. If I was told to design the same search tool without the work I'd done, it would've been a completely different outcome. I learned the importance and power of having a story behind design. It actually made me feel like I was already helping the animation students. I grew more attachment towards this search tool -that's in fact, still a concept than my final project in the past where I was designing wireframes, high fidelity mock-ups, origami for a phone app. I have very little attachment to that project because it was mostly pixel pushing and very little story.

I learned to stick with the tool that I know how to use. I made this comic with iPad Pro with an app called ComicDraw. It was a completely new device and app that I've never made any art work on. I'm glad I learned a new tool but, it took so much more time than it needed it to. I am not fully satisfied with the line work or the color that was caused by my lack of knowledge of the tools. I think I was poking around brushes for half an hour. It was difficult to adjust and adapt to the new tool while trying to execute my ideas at the same time.

Next time, I want to develop a way to tell a story with fewer words. I feel like the description I have is needed but to a certain extent. There could've been more drawings and less words. I'm glad I took the third person POV of Hampy - I hope that this character keeps the audience engaged.