OPPORTUNITY FINDING
While emerging technologies, such as IoT & AR, are becoming increasingly accessible, certain fields continue to struggle to implement or even find specific products designed for very unique needs. This challenge is a self-directed first step in collaboratively defining the obstacles, and finding & test a unique solution.
I connected with three small businesses in Maui, HI to design an IoT experience that would benefit their growing services. By designing for teams that worked profoundly with the physical world (preservation of natural environments), we aimed to design a digital tool that helps better understand and interact with the physical world.
DESIGN SPRINT CHALLENGE
Challenge: Envision, design, and prototype an experience which helps to engage Environmental Preservation small-businesses with emerging technologies while demonstrating both immediate and long-term usefulness of IoT services.
Timeline: 5 days
Deliverable: Video Proposal (4 Minutes Max.)
COLLABORATIVE APPROACH
Through collaborating with a team of Hawaiian forestry preservationists, reef protection instructors, AR developers, drone videographers, and users we conceptualized a series of interactions that would enhance their activities in natural and remote environments. One-on-one interviews, informational field tours, and instructional activities were fundamental in developing a prototype Aerial Mixed Reality interface. The application views IoT data in real-time through aerial mixed-reality embedded by the network of users.
PROCESS
As the author of the Design Sprint, I needed to first define the parameters of the challenge, and assemble a transdisciplinary team to collaborate with on further mapping out an approach and proposing a solution.
Through a series of interviews, brainstorming exercises, field tours, and instructional activities we found that, given their deep involvement with physical environments, it would be exceptionally useful to be able to capture, log, view, and share information of their environment in real-time.
My role as an interaction designer and creative lead then became to formulate potential ways to do this. After sketching and discussing various approaches, it was evident that a mixed-reality platform through aerial view could be ideal. The IoT capabilities of the system, would allow each user to in part customize their own platform. They could each tie to different smart "things" and be able to access an increasing amount of relevant and valuable information.
After a series of low fidelity user flows, wireframes, and interaction sketches, I collaborated with Eduardo Lopez of ELE Videography, our drone videographer, on composing a demo video that illustrates the interactions and capabilities of Project Aerial.
While the primary goal of this exercise was to design for small businesses, I was curious as to whether this tool could additionally help involve, inform, and engage other users with the services provided by these two businesses. To explore this, I worked in two additional Personas; Ashley the avid hiker, and Eduardo the photographer.
The question then becomes: how do you connect these users with very unique needs to a larger network of connected devices and research databases?
EXPERIENCE & DESIGN SOLUTION
Project Aerial is an IoT application that allows users to view & interact with data in real-time in mixed reality through connected drones. The data can be user-created, generated by IoT devices, or accessed through databases.
Connecting to IoT
By connecting to robust cloud computing services in the market, such as Amazon Web Services, Project Aerial is able to connect with smart devices, store large amounts of information, stream at with very low latency, and run diagnostic & machine learning algorithms to vizualize information in real-time through mixed reality.
Project Roles:
Design Challenge Author & Interaction Designer
• Defined challenges & opportunities of "IoT Design Challenge"
• Market research: Usefulness of IoT in environmental professions
• User & business needs research: How can IoT help their business?
• Envisioned approach of using mixed reality drones to interact with IoT network
• Designed "Aerial" application interface & user experience
• Research existing tools, available in market, to utilize to create the architecture of system
Project Credits:
Team:
• Ricardo Jnani Gonzalez. Masters of Science in Design
• Kainoa Marchello. Forestry Preservationist
• Joshua Choi. Computation & Development
• Robert Twitchell. Reef Protection & Deep Diving Instructor
• Eduardo Lopez. Drone Videographer
Special Thanks to:
• Terry Knight. Professor of Design & Computation, MIT
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