Project Brief

Augmenta is a voice-activated AR/VR windshield system designed to reduce driving distractions and anxiety through automated features and emotional support.

Augmenta was created through constant iteration to refine our product and to arrive at a feasible solution as part of the project-based course HCDE 518: User-Centered Design during the Fall 2024 quarter.

This portfolio contains materials that were generated as part of this project. They are in chronological order beginning with defining our design question all the way to our brand style guide at the end of this portfolio.

Thanks for stopping by and checking out our materials!

Design Question(s)

How can we design an in-car system to encourage “good” driving behaviors and reduce distractions to keep drivers' eyes on the road?

Contextualizing the Problem Space

Drivers often struggle with anxiety or confusion on the road and we saw an opportunity to give drivers a sense of security and increased confidence behind the wheel.

*These data points were selected to capture the problems facing drivers in the US. Other countries and nations are out of scope for the purpose of this product.

Our Scope

Our project is focused on conceptualizing an AR/VR windshield display for driver navigation and safety within the US.

It excludes hardware integration, software development, implementation, regulatory compliance testing, and manufacturing.

Research

We employed three research methodologies to explore our design questions. We selected these methods based on their feasibility and due to time constraints posed by this project being allotted a mere 10 weeks from start to completion.

Methods

Survey (24 participants)
Conducted to validate the design problem and identify key user pain points.

1:1 Interview (4 participants)

Performed in-depth interviews with target users to collect qualitative insights and better understand their experiences and challenges.

Literature Review (3 primary articles)

Analyzed published research to establish a foundation for our observations and shape a well-informed perspective on the design issues.

Summary of Findings

Interviews and surveys revealed that users prefer the easiest routes and want the option to avoid challenging ones (e.g., traffic, curvy roads)

Interview revealed that users prioritize clarity and timeliness of instructions when driving.

Literature review and interview data confirm GPS preferences vary based on personal traits and characteristics.

50% of our survey respondents avoid tolls when driving.
60% of survey respondents prefer efficiency when driving.

Primary User Personas

Our research helped define who our users are.

To better understand user needs and to humanize their experiences, we created personas that reflected their values, behaviors, and attitudes.

However, following a significant design pivot that shifted the scope of the project, we revisited and refined these personas to better align with the updated direction.

Initial Iteration

This persona represents an "aggressive, practiced" driver that was generated early in the design process. This persona is not applicable to our current project and its goals.

This persona represents a "nervous, young" driver that was generated early in the design process. This persona is not applicable to our current project and its goals.

Second Iteration

Persona 1 is deriviative of the "aggressive, practiced" driver from early in our project. This updated persona represents a driver who relies on navigation apps to get to their destination in a timely manner.

Persona 2 has been derived from the "nervous, young" driver persona. This updated persona is intended to represent a primary user who relies on navigation because of their inexperience driving in stressful situations.

Link to Personas

Ideate

To understand user needs of our product, each team members sketched ideas.
We iterated on these ideas to find solutions that were the most impactful to generate storyboards.

User Flows

Once we generated our storyboards, we needed to figure the internal architecture of our product.

With the goal of designing a content and navigation system that enables users to move seamlessly from point A to point B with minimal friction or distractions, we developed user flows to illustrate interaction with our product.

Our user flows are intended to capture the experience of using our product to achieve certain achievable goals through the interface.

*user flows displayed were created after the design shift

Usability Testing

As previously mentioned, our team experienced design shifts throughout this project. Below, you will see an early prototype and a later, higher-fidelity prototype.

Each prototype was intended for use in a usability evaluation.

Initial Prototype

Link to Prototype

Usability Evaluations

Our first usability evaluation with our initial prototype highlighted problem areas in our project. This led to a second usability evaluation and additional iterations, a summary of insights from both evaluations is described below.

Outcomes from Usability Evaluations

Usability Evaluation Insights

Mobile Interface
- Participants were confused by the mobile interface as the entry point.
Interaction Barrier
- Participants couldn't tell how to interact with the windshield when their hands were on the wheel.
Preference on Signs
- Participants have various opinions on how to present the alert signs, with some suggesting a red blinking display.
Display of information
- Participants described that the ability to customize the size of items displayed by interface was important.
Emotional Need
- Participants expressed the need to address anxiety and emotions.

Decisions after Usability Evaluations

⭐️ Discarded mobile interface and task flow and integrated all features into the windshield.

⭐️ Provided customization for information display.

⭐️ Added emotional support feature.

⭐️ Refined Prototype ⭐️

Initial prototype was not realistic enough, did not have a clear entry point, and failed to satisfy the requirements of an interactive tool. We incorporated feedback into our higher-fidelity prototype:

Visualized voice commands with prompts
Customized displayed information
Reassessed entry point and integrated mobile features

⭐️Reframed Research⭐️

Initial user research informed our initial design solution. After our pivot, we reworked our data and adapted personas to align with the refined scope:

Additional research on driver anxiety
Revised personas and user flows
A second usability study was conducted for the revised prototype

⭐️ Clearer Objective ⭐️

Our initial objective was to reduce distractions. We later realized the tool could also support users with driving anxiety. Amended objectives to include support for both Anxiety and Distraction.

Anxiety: added a voice-activated feature to guide users to a "safe place" for emotional support.
Distraction: Implemented in-car, voice-controlled capabilities for hands-free use.

Final Prototype

Our final high-fidelity prototype was a product rooted in feedback we received during our usability evaluations, including an emotion-focused feature, visualized voice command contexts, and changes in information display, fostering a better and unique user experience by addressing both driving distractions and anxiety.

Link to Final Solution

Once we incorporated usability evaluation feedback into our design, we refined our primary design requirements to include the following:

01.
Clear, timely directions (e.g., real-time updates)

02.
Option to Avoid Tolls and Traffic

03.
Route customization

04.
Adaptive interface (e.g., ability to change size of displayed items for user preferences and needs)

05.
Multi-modal input to support both voice commands and manual controls.

Final Steps

At this stage, our team has done the following: defined the product space, refined our product scope, iterated on design solutions, generated user flows, storyboards, and other materials that led to the development of our prototypes.

From here, all that was left to do is decide on branding. We wanted our product to be fun, inviting and to welcome users. We decided to use a playful color palette to welcome our users.

You will find our style guide below.

Style Guide

This style guide was generated using Figma.

Augmenta Product Video

*This product video was created before our final round of iteration which resulted in our final prototype. This video does not contain imagery from our final solution. This video was made using CapCut.

Our Team

This image is from our table at our 518 showcase where we were able to illustrate our process to table visitors and describe our vision for Augmenta.

Jessica Applegate

1st year MS-HCDE

Celia Tsao

1st Year MS-HCDE

Emily McCafferty

User-Centered Desgin Certificate Student

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