Prototyping in practice

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Prototyping in practice

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User-centred design
Analysis of users, tasks and context Identificatio
n of requirements Design Prototyping Testing and
evaluation with users
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Overview

• Gathering data analysis Cultural probes,
  Observation and Interviews, Personas
• Generating design ideas Extreme Characters
• Different views of prototyping Mock ups,
  Scenarios
• Evaluating design Placebo project

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Cultural probes

• Part of an EU-funded research project looking at
  novel interaction techniques to increase the
  presence of the elderly in three local
  communities
• a district of Oslo
• a large planned community near Amsterdam
• a small village outside Pisa

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What are they?

• A kind of gift
• Packages of maps, postcards, cameras, booklets
  etc (all designed to give a personal and informal
  feeling)
• a way for us to get to know you better, and for
  you to get to know us

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What do they do?

• Designed to provoke inspirational responses from
  (the elderly) people
• Like astronomic or surgical probes, we left them
  behind when we had gone and waited for them to
  return fragmentary data over time
• The probes helped the designers understand the
  unfamiliar groups/local cultures
• Provide a more playful way of collecting data
  (useful when traditional ways might restrain
  rather than stimulate the generation of ideas)

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Postcards

• 8-10 postcards (pre-addressed to Bill Gaver, with
  stamps) with questions concerning the elders
  attitudes towards their lives, cultural
  environments and technology
• Please tell us a piece of advice or insight that
  has been important to you
• What do you dislike about Peccioli?
• What place does art have in your life?
• Tell us about your favourite device

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Maps ( dot stickers)

• Exploring the elders attitudes toward their
  environment
• From straightforward to poetic
• Participants were asked to mark zones on local
  maps, showing where
• They would go to meet people
• They would go to be alone
• They liked to daydream
• They would like to go but cant
• if Peccioli were New York

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More

• Disposable camera with instructions
• E.g. Your home, What you will wear today,
  Something boring
• Photo Album
• use 6-10 pictures to tell us your story
• Media Diary
• Record television and radio use including what
  they watched, with whom and when incoming and
  outgoing calls

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Design as research

• Artist-design approach to new technologies
  instead of science-engineering based
• Aesthetic control and an openness towards new
  spaces for design instead of precise analyses
• Other unscientific sources of inspiration
  informal analyses, chance observations, the
  popular press etc
• Instead of designing solutions for user needs,
  we work to provide opportunities to discover new
  pleasures, new forms of sociability, and new
  cultural forms

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Inspiration, not information

• The artist-designer approach is openly subjective
• The goal was inspirational data that could
  stimulate imaginations
• Provoke ideas

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The returns
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User-Centred inspiration

• The cultural probes were successful for the
  designers in trying to familiarise themselves
  with the sites
• The probes were the designers personal
  communication to the elders, and prompted the
  elders to communication personally in return

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A more traditional way of gathering data

• Starting point for us a new technology
  PinPlay
• Our aim to explore the use of the technology and
  find application areas
• Draw design implications (requirements) for a
  prototype
• Build a prototype using the design implications
  test with real users

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PinPlay

• A conductive surface serves as a network and
  power source for
• Interactive pushpins that communicate through the
  surface
• Supports large-scale networks, e.g. entire walls
• Combines physical and digital information on
  large surfaces

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Göteborg Film Festival

• Annual event showing 500-700 films
• Collaborative scheduling
• Scheduling is done by using the surface of two
  rooms as a large notice board
• Large matrixes display the entire programme on
  coloured paper notes

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Observations

• We conducted observations during intense
  scheduling hours interviewed team members
• The scheduling process was documented with photos
  and field notes
• We wanted to get an insight into the festival
  teams interaction with large work surfaces and
  paper notes in order to see what works well and
  what does not

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Implications for design

• Drawing design implications for a prototype from
  the observations
• Identifying needs and challenges for both the
  prototype to be built and for the technology

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Personas

• User archetype that can guide decisions about
  product features, navigation, instructions,
  visual design
• Its goals and behavior patterns can be well
  understood.
• Synthesized from ethnographic interviews with
  real people
• Sould be a narrative that describe skills,
  attitude environment, etc

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A different approach on how to use personas in
design

• Context-Aware Photography
• Mobile media
• Presented at the Dux03 Conference

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Context-Aware Photography How can sensors be
used in combination with digital cameras to
create a new user experience? Maria
Håkansson, Sara Ljungblad Lars Erik
Holmquist Future Applications Lab, Viktoria
Institute, Sweden
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A brief insight into the history of the
camera - Camera obscura - Late 19th
century George Eastman (box camera flexible
film) - Mid 1990s digital cameras on the market
(Apple Quick Take 100, Kodak DC 40)
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Right now Megapixel, digital photo albums,
sharing, copying, publishing, editing, after the
picture is taken However, using the digital
camera is still much like using the analog
counterpart We believe the digital technology
has a great potential of adding new exciting
features and dimensions to photography
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• The process
• finding alternative ways of looking at, using
  and relating oneself to photography
• finding sources of inspiration
• working closely with focus groups
• quickly developing a working prototype
• testing

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What delights a traditional photographer? -
Interest in traditional process rather than new
digital possibilities - Taking the perfect
picture
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Lomographers amateur photographers with a Dont
think, just shoot mentality Explorative,
spontaneous, open-minded Special cameras Focus
group of three Lomographers
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• The approach
• how can similar thrilling experiences be
  achieved with digital cameras?
• capturing the invisible can other parameters
  than light, speed focus influence the image?
• solutioncontext awareness using sensors
• focusing on the moment of capturing an image,
  rather than after

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• Context-Aware Photography
• create real-time visual effects based on sensor
  input (contextual information)
• digital filters
• things that can be sensed
• movements, sound, temperature, pollution, smell,
  location, electromagnetic fields and more
• different visual output alternatives
• interpretable vs merely visual

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• The current prototype
• handheld computer digital camera
• simulated sensors for rapid testing
• real-time digital filters hue, saturation
  value (correlated)

Basic interface for testing
The effects of the sensor input can be seen in
real-time
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The visual effects Hue, saturation value (e.g.
affected by temperature, pollution and sound)
Traditional camera vs prototype
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A scenario Following Lady in red Different
context gives different effects
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Future work Letting Lomographers and others test
the prototype Developing the prototype further -
adding real sensors Exploring new interaction
possibilities Getting away from the analog style
of pressing a button
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www.viktoria.se/fal
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Generating ideas

• Interaction Relabelling/ Extreme Characters,
• Encyclopedia
• Constraints as a trigger
• Technology
• User (e.g. Personas)
• More
• Body storming (IDEO)

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Parallell thinking Thinking Hats

• The White Hat calls for information known or
  needed. "The facts, just the facts."
• The Yellow Hat symbolizes brightness and
  optimism. Under this hat you explore the
  positives and probe for value and benefit
• The Black Hat is judgment - the devil's advocate
  or why something may not work. Spot the
  difficulties and dangers where things might go
  wrong. Probably the most powerful and useful of
  the Hats but a problem if overused.
• The Red Hat signifies feelings, hunches and
  intuition. When using this hat you can express
  emotions and feelings and share fears, likes,
  dislikes, loves, and hates.
• The Green Hat focuses on creativity the
  possibilities, alternatives, and new ideas. It's
  an opportunity to express new concepts and new
  perceptions.
• The Blue Hat is used to manage the thinking
  process. It's the control mechanism that ensures
  the Six Thinking Hats guidelines are observed

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Now Hands on

• with Extreme Characters

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Prototyping

• Conceptual design
• Physical design
• Starting from scratch or modifying the existing
• (J. Preece)

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• "A leading architect once built a cluster of
  office buildings set in a central green. The
  landscape crew asked him where he wanted the
  sidewalks between the buildings. His reply 'Just
  plant grass between the buildings.' By late
  summer the new lawn was laced with pathways of
  trodden grass. The paths followed the most
  efficient line between the points of connection,
  turned in easy curves rather than at right angles
  and were sized according to traffic flow. In the
  fall the architect simply paved in the pathways.
  Not only did the paths have a design beauty, but
  they responded directly to user needs."
• Christopher
  Williams, "Origins of Form

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What is a prototype?

• Etymology from Greek prototypon archetype
  prototypos original, primitive
• an original model on which something is
  patterned archetype, pattern
• an individual that exhibits the essential
  features of a later individual or species
  precursor
• a standard or typical example of the essential
  features of a group or type exemplar

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Prototyping

• Building a scaled-down version of an
  interactive system to collect information to
  guide its construction (C. Pomm)
• Limited representation of a design that allows
  users to interact with it and explore its
  suitability (J. Preece)

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Last time Maria went through

• Low-fidelty prototyping
• Mock ups
• Storyboarding
• Sketching
• Wizard of Oz
• High-fidelity prototyping

Mixers, Ramia Maze
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Early design
Late design
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Why prototype?

• Prototyping as a method to involve the user in
  the design process (identify user needs)
• Software design in multi-competence teams
• Prototypes as artifacts for communication between
  HCI designers and
• Users
• Clients
• Software design team, Electric engineering,
  mechanical engineering
• Graphic design team
• Management
• Other HCI designers

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One does not fit all

• Central role of prototypes in communication and
  coordination
• Different team members ? different roles ?
  different activities ? focus on different aspects
  of a prototype
• Appropriate prototype representation for
• Audience
• Design phase (C. Pomm)

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What do prototypes prototype?
Look and Feel

• A different view

Role
Implementation
(S. Houde, C. Hill, 1997)
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Scenarios

• Describes in detail how a user is intended to
  interact with the system
• Richer than step-by-step descriptions of tasks
• Can be used for both existing and konceptual
  product

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Scenarios

• Informal
• Narrative
• Simple
• Natural
• Personal
• Not general

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Scenarios

• Can serve as a base for
• Identifying criterias on interaction
• Design of interaction
• Discussion with users
• Evaluation of a product

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Scenario examples

• Lalyas Sonic City
• Mixers, Ramia Maze Video Scenarios
• Wendy Mackay Video Scenarios
• Acting out

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Use Case/ Task description

• A use case specifies a sequence of actions,
  including alternatives of the sequence that the
  system can perform, interacting with actors of
  the system
• Jacobson, Booch, Rumbaugh, 1999

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Use Case

• Focus on the interaction, not the users goals.
• Description from the users point of view
• A case has an actor in a specific situation.

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Time for more hands on
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Evaluating design

• The Placebo project
• Conceptual design into everyday life
• Eight prototypes adopted by different homes

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