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PHOP

The Photo Opportunity app

GA - Phop.png

Project Overview

 

Summary

This project was the creation of an app to cater to photographers who require models for photoshoots at short notice. 

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My role

This was a solo concept project for which I followed the British Design Council’s Double Diamond process with its four phases: Discover, Define, Develop, Deliver.​

double_diamond.png

Source: The Design Council

Key deliverables

A number of deliverables were required for the project, including:

  • User research, User Journey,  Experience Map, Flow, Problem Statement

  • Prototypes - low, mid and high fidelity

  • Outcomes and presentation to the client

There were also a number of personal learnings I took away from this project. â€‹

Discovery

The first diamond helps people understand, rather than simply assume, what the problem is. It involves speaking to and spending time with people who are affected by the issues.

Erika is a semi-professional photographer and, after agreeing with the owners, will conduct photoshoots at various indoor locations around London. The trouble is that, even if she manages to secure a location, she often cannot get the models at short notice. 

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“It’s very frustrating to be all set for a shoot and no model is available in my area!”

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In order to delve into her problems and discover more about her, I conducted a couple of user interviews with her.

The insight gathered from the discovery phase can help you to define the challenge in a different way.

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The Problem Storyboard

To visualise the overall problem for Erika, I created a storyboard:

Storyboard 1.png

User Journey

Erika's user journey begins when she scouts out potential shoot locations and ends with a successful shoot. The potential solution would come in when she needs to find and secure a model for the shoot. 

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An experience map shows the emotions that she might go through on this journey.

Experience Map.png

Flow & Hierarchy of Information

In order to break down what functionality I was taking forward into the solution, I created a flow to demonstrate not only the logic but also the order of events. The was complimented with a hierarchy of functions to construct the information architecture. 

Definition
Development
Prototyping

The second diamond encourages people to give different answers to the clearly defined problem, seeking inspiration from elsewhere and co-designing with a range of different people.  

Prototyping​

This stage involved developing many iterations of the prototype. Going from low to mid fidelity, I conducted user testing after the next 'draft' was complete. 

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Paper Prototyping.png

In order to understand whether my prototypes were functioning correctly, I needed to conduct user testing. This was not just done at the ‘end’, where end is defined as my creating my final prototype, but continually testing after each iteration. After testing, each significant change was implemented into the next design.

 

The test script asked the user to complete the following tasks:

 

  1. View Job List

  2. Add New Job

  3. View Job Detail

  4. View Notification

  5. Add Model to Shortlist

  6. Choose model

  7. View past jobs

Branding ​

To get an idea of what kind of brand and the values that this would have, I conducted a number of activities, including re-interviewing Erika and then working on  the brand positioning, mood-boarding and typeface research. 

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Imaginative but not cooky
Confident but not arrogant
Opportunistic but not manipulative
Creative but not offensive
Real but not obnoxious

I really wanted to capture a vibrant rawness in the imagery and branding to align with Erika's photography style. This can be seen applied throughout the app, especially in the logo. 

Delivery

Delivery involves testing out different solutions at small-scale, rejecting those that will not work and improving the ones that will.

Hi-Fidelity Delivery​

At this point, having conducted all of the user research, low/mid-fi prototype testing and brand development, I created the branding guidelines and the final prototype. 

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Link to final prototype:

Outcomes

The outcome of delivering this project was very positive and the client was quoted to say "this could really turn into a real app - you should develop it". 

 

This phase also included:

  • a client presentation

  • future considerations​

    • Model profiles

    • Messaging within app

    • Models in the area

Personal Learnings

 

The fact that this was a project that was born from nothing is a testament to how far creativity and collaboration can go. â€‹It was amazing to work so closely with Erika to give her a product that met her requirements. 

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For me it was great to start developing my skills in UX techniques and putting theory into practice, particularly:

  • User Research

  • Prototype Iteration

  • User Testing

  • User Interface development

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Phop is one of my pet projects that I plan to continue working on to develop it further.

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Personal Learnings
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