final clip on avi

well The only solution I could come up with was an avi file, however im not very impressed with the quality of the clip, it's much better in the r drive, but here it is anyway

The concept was simple and although I looked at advertisements for nike and such, I didn't think it was necessary  to make the clip too energetic,but I think the jump cuts help emphasize the action of walking and how that links with navigation and burning calories.

youtube trouble!

I've been experiencing difficulties with youtube, it keeps stopping it's upload suddenly so I'm hoping to get this sorted asap!

Title screens

I have made some title screens on photoshop to introduce my video and end it better!
here are the images I made...

I thought this would be a good way to start the video and end the video, and by keeping the style the same it achieves continuity and shows the app in a phone screen, giving the user an idea of what it would look like as an app in their phone

transferring to after effects

I transferred my video to after effect, which took aaaaaages to figure out, but I managed to put it together and render it, but it came out slow at different parts, and I think I need to change the frames per second units and then I just need to add the numbers and the screen on the phone.

unfortunately youtube will upload my video in ten hours, so hopefully you can just take my word for it, as I cannot wait that long. I'll keep working on it!
plus I've decided the song I chose is ridiculously cheesy and cliche, so I'll try to find a different track to play.

video editing

I filmed my video, and i cut the shots using imovie, where I also added in music. I found the  background music from soundjay.com which is a really great place for free royalty free music. I used the track called iron man because it's fast paced and energetic, so it complements the jump cuts and montage editing which are also fast paced. It's not too cheesy either. Next stem is to take it to after effects and complete the video with some extra effects

video precedents

I looked at some atheletic based commercials, and I thought that this video had jump cut editing, not really much to do with running, but shows different kinds of paces I could use

and this one Kind of relates to my idea. It's really energetic too and the montage scenes arent too fast.

project 3! usability testing

I asked 4 different people to try out my app and answer simple questions to help me figure out how user friendly my app is
I asked the following questions:

1)how userfirendly was the interface?
2)what were the weaknesses/strengths?
3)did the app meet any of your expectations?
4)what were improvements that could've been made?

the general feedback was...

1) most people said that although it was simple and easy to use, the beginning of the app was confusing as the individuals didn't know when to use the buttons on the top bar, such as the address bar, so I think that I could've used some kind of highlight around the next button, or maybe a help button etc, etc...

2) weaknesses: text is too thin to read from a small screen, may be annoying to hold on to the phone infront of you as you walk
   strengths: no need to figure it out through a map, icons are obvious, everything that is necessary is visible and easy to understand

3)most people had no initial expectations, but one person said that they expected the app to be more on the weight loss side- as in maybe it tracks what you ate as well, or takes down your pace etc...

4) one person said that they would make all the buttons function at the top bar, another person said that a more simple colour scheme makes it less dramatic looking

flash problems

As I put together my flash file, it suddenly messed up the code, even though the flash file didn't say that there were any errors! So I tried to figure it out myself and couldn't find where the fault was. I got many fellow students to check it out and two tutors, yet no one could find what the cause of the problem was. The problem was that one of the frames went against the code, and instead moving to the assigned frame, it went a frame back and thne forward two frames and did that repeatedly. The closest thing that I could work out was to delete a part of my animation and then it made it a little better, except the last few frames did the same thing.
So basically I have until monday to correct this, so I'm thinking i'll just start over again.
fingers crossed

200 word outline

The idea of my navigation interface is that it functions as a phone app that uses the smartphone’s camera as a medium to view the directions that lead the user to their destinations. This allows the viewer to get accurate information from exactly where they stand, and it is an alternative to complicated and misleading maps with outdated information.

 What makes this app unique is that it is a pedometer and navigator in one, so the app can calculate how much calories the user has burned off based on how long and how far the user travelled. The user will be timed and has the ability to pause and resume the stopwatch.

 Another function the user can make use of, is the pedometer mode, where if the user wont need to use the navigator, they can simply use the pedometer mode to calculate how much calories they have burned off.

 Extra functions include; search tool, where if the user is unfamiliar with the area, they can search (for example, nearest café) and it will list some possible options. Address book where you can save and look up previous locations already searched, a journal to track how much calories you’ve burned in total with using the app, music player to motivate the user to further enjoy their navigating experience. The music player just sends you to your music player on your phone, but then resumes back to the app. Also, the users have the option to take a snapshot of anything they see that they like whilst the camera is activated and the arrows wont show up on the picture.

final screen shots

Here are some screenshots of my app with the developed layout and style...

search menu. On the top bar you can search nearest location, look up address book, return back a page and the foot symbol is a button to turn the app into a pedometer soley if you chose

as the routes load, the walking images appear one by one and the last image to appear on the left side is the brightest.

Route options are written in yellow, while the expected time is written smaller in white. User selects which route they wish to use.

once the camera is activated, a start button appears so that the stopwatch will start to time the user. Arrow heads mark the directions, and the arrow furtherst away is bolder so that it exxagerates movement to that direction. Buttons for music player, and camera snapshot and pause/play button to pause and resume journey

Above you can see that the timer is activated as the user walks. This is so that the app will accurately calculate how many calories the user has burned off, since it already knows how far the user has to walk

Indoors, the view point doesn't change, which I think is an advantage because it's the most simple way to view interior spaces. The timer turns yellow when it knows you've reached your destination, but it give the user the option to stop it with the finish button, just because it cant be sure that the user isn'w walking around in the location

When the user has had their results tallied, they have the option to put their results in a journal to track how much calories they burned off in total, and can log the results in with the date. The quit button allows the user to stop using the app.

development!

some pages a pulled out. My main colours are grey, black and red, with notes of yellow (only a little). These colours aren't gender specific and my aim was to create a sporty theme! The main precedents were the apps for 100 days of exercise and nike, which use atleast two matching colours, and one bright colour such as flourescent green or bright orange, so I decided to also follow along these styles. Yellow is also thrown in there or else using the same colours repeatedly will look annoyingly overdone. Initially I wanted a park atmosphere in the background, but since this is a navigation app that would be mostly used in urban areas I thought a cityscape would be more relevant.

New style

I kept on developing my layout but I came out with worse results and i realized that I didn't want my target audience to be a specific group, i like how most exercise apps try to envolve all kinds of groups, so my aesthetic has now completely changed to one that works for all audiences.

previous developments...

As you can see I still want the silhouettes, but much more toned down, or else it's too much detail, especially for a small phone screen

To get my own silhoutte, I originally trace it on illustrater, but thought it was waaaaaay easier if I got a picture of a person running from the internet

and then traced it myself with paper and felt

and then took it to photoshop to get a crisp silhoutte.

I found that this was the best way to get a silhoutte that didn't look pixelated and took up less time. It was a really easy solution, why did I not think of that earlier??

continiued development

This exercise app has a different background where it shows an animated sunrise, with fat sun rays that fades at the centre. The screen shot on the right however has the sunrise emerging from behind a mountain. That is another thing that I could incorporate.

In this app, the background also has a natural landscape atmosphere, where shadows of trees and buildings in the distance accompany the bright green figures. I also like how the buttons arent really matching but still suit. This could be a solution for my design, as I feel there is too much of the same thing going on.

I decuded to go into this app a little more, just to see how the images and backgrounds would merge or transform when the next page is selected

The background with the tree atmosphere is consistant, but the foreground images have disappeared, althogh the bright green colour remains continued throughout the pages. This could be something to consider.
more trials:

These are some trials, But I think I will go into other concepts from my research, because this may look too busy and unprofessional, especially on a small screen.

Research for layout

Nike app...

This background is from the app for nike run, and since the app encourages the user to push their limits and run more, it makes sense to have a a figure that shows a person running and a wave to show movement, or maybe to mirror the pattern of a heart monitor.
The buttons are shaded in a way that makes them appear shiny and more 3D. I think it would look really effective if I made the buttons in my app as glossy.

My attempt at superimposing a similar image:

trial 1

this isn't successful, but it could be because of a) the photograph,
b) the opacity makes it look less strange, because it blends too much.














trial 2
I liked this aesthetic, so I thought I could try to do my own version, so that I'm not just copy + pasting an image from online, plus I can customize it to match the app better

I found some images of people running and turned them into sihlouettes so that I can pu them in the background.

I repeated the sihlouette and faded them out to emphasize movement, however, now it looks bland because the colours are just repeating and it looks too simple. Also I think that the boxes need to have rounded corners so that it looks less harsh. My attempt at making the boxes 3D meant that I added and effect and gradient, which kind of worked, but I think that rounded corners will add to it.

I tried introducing a third colour- grey, but no way in hell will I use this certain concept, it looks wierd with the gradient of the boxed, and against the blue, the grey looks brownish.

developing layout

So I decided that the existing layout/aesthetics is too harsh and needs some serious attention because it looks basic and boring..

 For starters I think that the contrast is too strong and the font definately looks like it's a photoshop default font. Instead of dark blue, I thought of using two shades of lighter blue so that It's not tacky against the white font. Also, I've gone for a more handwritten style of font so that it corresponds with the whole journal theme. Also it's aimed towards a female target audience so this is a more theamatic approach...

However this still looks boring and plain, so I decided to add a background, but first look at existing apps and see how I can take inspiration from my findings.

interum

I started off with this basic layout for the interum. I stuck with the idea of using blue and white theme with notes of orange and yellow for a contrast of colour. So far I have 8 images, but as I develop my idea further, I'd like to add more features and functions.

research

I want to make my app layout and graphics relevant to the purpose of the navigator, so I want to look up certain apps that help encourage fitness and health.

Weight watchers app

This is a screen shot of the weight watchers app, as I expected there is blue and white, which are the company logo colours, but also motivational colours, aswell as green to give it an emphasis of 'freshness'. Even though it's an app for tracking what you eat, it's still to do with health, so I think I would definately take som e inspiration from this app. In terms of Layout, the layout is simple and easy to follow. There is heirarchy so that the user finds it easy to follow, and the numbers are bold so that it catches your attention.

Nike running app

 

 The colours are unisex (black, white and red) and the red is energetic so it encourages the user tobe active. The layout is basic aswell but I think that it will be close to what I would do because it also keeps track of your progress by showing how many miles you've traveled with the date above. Also includes weather predictions, which is an awesome ideas!! and the symbols are userfriendly because they're easy to understand. This is actually really similar to my idea:(

wire frame and concept

My concept is to design a smartphone app, which acts as a navigator and calorie counter at the same time. The target audience will most likely be aimed towards a female audience, but not strictly. The idea is that as you are trying to find your way to your destination, the navigator will calculate how many calores the user has burned off, based on the time and distance travelled. What make this app innovative in terms of navigation, is that your camer on your smartphone is activated, thus, the user will be following bold arrows from the view of their camera. This way the user will be able to navigate from exactly where they are facing from and wont have to constantly look around to try and figure out whether they're on the matching street, like you wod on street view.

Wire frame

sugar skull Pattern

I had absolutely no time to do this, but I did it anyway!
I love mexican sugar skulls so I found a black and white picture online and coloured it on photoshop!

and then I put it on repeat:

at one point I put in roses to make it look more traditional, but then it started to just look reaaly wack, so I just left it simple like this. I'd love to have this pattern on a button up shirt :D

interior navigation systems

In today's class, my tutor brought up the fact that we will be dealing with how we can use navigation systems in interioir spaces, so we were advised to look up existing navigation systems since there will need to be a user friendly way to allow the user to navigate the inside of a building, which is especially useful for when finding the room.

Link:
http://www.fraunhofer.de/en/press/research-news/2012/may/navigating-the-shopping-center.html
This website link talks about an interior navigation system that works by calculating how fast and how far a person in walking and can detect the direction that the individual is walking towards.

http://yuieo.blogspot.co.nz/2012/02/mapping-data-helps-users-navigate.html
This link directs you to a website that introduces the NAVTEQ, which is a navigation system that can navigate interior spaces, and can detect floor levels, and can detect if you are approaching stair cases and escalators

more research!!

iDrive navigation systems for BMW
http://www.bmwusa.com/Standard/Content/Owner/iDrive/Overview/AdvantagesofOnBoardNav.aspx 
This link leads to a website that informs us on the features of the idrive. One feature that is important but never came accross to me before is the traffic notifications. This made me think of whether I could do something that informs the user of any traffic or obstacles such as road works etc and estimates any time delays or how much time it would hold up.

Phone Apps
Here is a website link that lists all the best smart phone/ i phone navigation apps
http://gizmodo.com/5656790/the-best-navigation-apps

From what I saw on the list, the best app according to this website is 'MotionXdrive'.
I looked it up and found some really interesting features and different editions have more or different features. Some that caught my attention were;

- Speed limit display that warns you how fast you are going (cars)
- can log in with facebook so that you can 'check in' to your final destination via facebook
-option to reverse the order of directions
-option to access the directions list from the map view.
-voice announcement etc

(information gathered from: http://news.motionx.com/category/motionx-gps-drive/)

The layout is very userfriendly, there are zoom in and zoom out options, arrows that point out the directions, a dial that uses symbols, such as hospital, airports, cafes and restraunts etc etc so that the user can just press one of the options and the navigation system will figure out which is the closest.

                                              Navigon phone application

I saw the layout for the navigon application. and I liked how you can choose between a map option, or a view like this ^ where it is the drivers point of view and large arrows show the direction.

Research for project 2

Google maps navigation

The navigation system for google maps comes with many options, such as the street view, walking navigation, satellite view etc. I like how there is also a speak option, which means that you dont have to type in the destination. This is more user friendly if the user cant be bothered tyipng out the destination, or dont like to type and walk at the same time, and so on...

A mix of maps, pictures and written directions are available so that the user get the most accurate directions as possible. It also tells you the distance in measurements, coloured arrows for clear directions, alternative options, how much traffic there is etc.

E map

This website allows the user to navigate through different layers (in picture above) so that the user uses what they think works best for them. This is user friendly because it caters to more groups of people

Yellow pages maps

This mapping interface is quite useful as it does what most other navigation systems do, where you type in your destinatiom and it creates a path using a map or street view. It also has suggestions of accomidation and business places so that It is a more specific search. You can zoom in and out so the map can be as detailed as you like.

Swarovski designs

Anyone who knows me knows Im a die hard lover of lighting design, so when I stumbled upon this page on the Bornrich website as I was researching for a class, I was sure that I just saw one of the most stunning designs I'd seen in a very long time.
Although I like traditional crystal chandeliers, I usually sway toward more modern or innovative styles, but seriously, Swarovski took this shit to the next level. 2 words - mind blown.

 

Imagine standing under this thing, it looks like a jelly fish glowing in the depth of an ocean. preeety.

Seriously, who came up with these designs? Im not entirely sure when these were created, I have a feeling around 2010, so not too new but still deserves more recognition. I'm sure other legit designers have already seen or heard about this collection but the link for the page is right here if you want to read more.
http://www.bornrich.com/gallery/swarovski-crystal-palace-collection/#

Can I also mention the amazing atmosphere that is created, even in the darkness. The designers really thought this through and considered the emotional effects of the entire design and installation.
f rich people who can afford this.