project description

Spark is collaborating with Rewyndr, a Pittsburgh startup, to develop a social, photo-based experience for the web as a part of the MHCI Professional Capstone Program. Spark is using human-centered design methods to create an intuitive and enjoyable user experience for Rewyndr.

The goal of this project is to gain an understanding of how people discover and provide meaning to visual content, and to develop solutions that connect individuals and communities through images and narratives.

capstone program

This collaboration between Spark and Rewyndr is a part of the Master of Human-Computer Interaction program Capstone Project at Carnegie Mellon University.

The Capstone Project course curriculum is structured to cover the end-to-end process of a research and development product cycle, while working closely with an industry sponsor on new ideas that may work with their existing human-to-machine technology. The goal of this 32-week course is to give each student the opportunity for a 'real-life' industry project, similar to an actual experience in a research/design/development setting.

human-centered design

Spark's flavor of human-centered design is the process of designing a product from the perspective of how it will be understood and used by a human. Its primary goal is to empathize with potential users' motivations, values, preferences, and experiences.

Human-centered design can be divided into three main parts:

Needfinding: Understanding human needs through user research techniques and design methodologies, then synthesizing research data to draw out key insights and design opportunities.

Formgiving: Using research data to generate design visions, then prototyping, testing, and improving them over multiple iterations.

Communication: Sharing and implementing the user experience.

needfinding research

Our needfinding process spanned two streams of research: domain research and field research.

We conducted domain research to guide our field research. We reviewed academic papers to learn how photographs influence people's actions and how online communities start and thrive. We also evaluated 50 potential competitors in social networking and photo management to identify Rewyndr's areas of opportunity.

Field research formed the bulk of our needfinding phase. We identified 'extreme users' of photos, including historians, archivists, photographers, and social good organizations, and interviewed them using directed storytelling methods to understand how their needs map to the needs of more 'everyday' users. We also created our own hands-on research methods to expose the ways in which people search, explore, organize, and share photos in a tangible way.

synthesis

To make sense of all of our research data and draw out key insights, we created used all of our notes to create a number of affinity diagrams, in which we grouped common observations to uncover themes in user needs. We also constructed sequence and cultural models to better understand the tasks that users performed and the cultural environments in which they were operating.

formgiving & testing

In order to transition from the concrete and data-driven world of research to the more generative process of design and formgiving, we engaged in 'grounded brainstorming,' or visioning. We generated over 200 design ideas and prioritized them according to impact, feasibility, and competitiveness to choose a final product direction.

We then prototyped solutions at varying fidelities, using such methods as paper prototypes, clickable prototypes made in Axure, and high-fidelity prototypes made with HTML and Javascript.

With each round of prototyping we used different testing methodologies to solicit feedback from potential users, including thinkaloud sessions, parallel prototyping (A/B testing), card sorting, and desirability testing.

communication & deliverables

At the conclusion of the needfinding research phase, we created a 148-page report for our client detailing our research methodologies and findings, as well as recommendations for product direction.

We will create a similar deliverable following the design phase of our project, describing our methodologies, testing results, and rationale behind each of our design decisions along the way. We will also provide a working prototype and a user interface specification that can be used by development teams to understand and implement the user interface.

profiles

Puja Agarwal, User Research Lead

Puja is an undergraduate at Carnegie Mellon University pursuing Information Systems and Human-Computer Interaction. She is an Accelerated Master's student of Human-Computer Interaction. She loves to dance and looks forward to learning new styles.

Gina Assaf, Project Lead

Gina is a software product user experience researcher and designer. She has a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science with several years of experience in the software industry as a software engineer. Before joining the Master of HCI program at CMU, she worked in San Diego at Intuit on a mobile app for filing taxes.

Jonathan Chan, Interaction Design Lead

Jonathan is a designer, researcher, and software engineer. After graduating from the University of California, Berkeley with a dual degree in Computer Science and Economics, he worked as software engineer in San Francisco.

Philip Legros, Documentation Lead

Philip graduated from Juniata College in 2012 with a Bachelors of Science in User- Centered Informatics, a major of his own creation. During his time at Juniata, Philip took part in an IT internship at a local high school. In his spare time, he writes, records, mixes, and masters his own music.

Michelle Lew, User Experience Lead

Michelle is a designer, researcher, and web developer. Before she discovered the field of UX Design, she worked as an analyst in the renewable energy and finance industries. Michelle graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 2009 with dual degrees in Industrial Engineering & Operations Research and Economics.

advisors

Faculty Advisors

Jenna Date, Human-Computer Interaction Institute
Skip Shelly, Summa Technologies

Client Advisors

David Palmer
Craig Waller

human-computer interaction institute (hcii)

The Carnegie Mellon Human-Computer Interaction Institute is an interdisciplinary community of students and faculty dedicated to research and education in topics related to computer technology in support of human activity and society.

Human-Computer Interaction Institute
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA