PhotoPerfectApp
Background

Do you have large, washed out sections in your photos? Frustrated with finding and capturing the perfect lighting? Photo Perfect App was conceptualized to employ a technology that combines different levels of lighting exposures to achieve perfectly lit images. Founder Steve Buice wanted the team to create a tool that allows everyday people with no photography experience to be able to take perfectly lit pictures with little to no effort, and without using the device's flash. The app design was a collaborative effort between a team of designers, researchers, and programmers in which they primarily consulted me for design and layout advice. 

Client

Photo Perfect App

Design Team

Tara Farzin
Chirag Lukhi
Steve Buice

Date

May 2020 - Dec. 2020

Tools

Figma
Adobe XD
InDesign

OVERVIEW

Project Overview

Project Goal: PhotoPerfectApp was envisaged so that users could take perfectly lit photos on their iPhones in any kind of indoor or outdoor lighting, without the use of flash or professional manual editing skills. In addition to taking the photos, the application also offered users a place to store and sort the images into albums.

My Role as UX/UI Designer: My main objectives were to create icons, wireframe designs, evaluate the navigation through micro and macro experiences for the primary interfaces of the app, and to assist the creator and design team with making informed design decisions. 

Home Page Design

At this stage of the process, I began to conceptualize the first look at the home page of the app, balancing simplicity, effectiveness, and sophistication, to align with the project manager's vision. During the design process, we considered user engagement, debating whether to prompt account creation upfront or allow exploration before sign-up. Opting for inclusivity, I prioritized user experience, ensuring accessibility and flexibility. This led to a decision: the home page welcomes users without imposing barriers, inviting them to delve into the app's functionalities freely.

Central to the design is the hamburger menu, where users have access to core features. The "Profile Page" function is where I decided users could create accounts at their discretion after already testing and using the app's photography technology. Making the application unrestricted to new users reflects our commitment to user-centric design, providing a fluid experience for all, from initial exploration to full engagement. While originally approved by the project manager, this sequence ended up being reversed with a later decision to implement a 7-day free trial upon downloading the application.

Hamburger Menu Icon

The decision to design the hamburger menu as an overlay feature, rather than opening up a completely different page, was a deliberate choice driven by several key benefits.

Firstly, by maintaining it as an overlay, we ensured seamless navigation, allowing users to access menu options without disrupting their current context. Secondly, the overlay conserves screen real estate, especially crucial on mobile devices, optimizing space for content visibility. Additionally, it offers faster access to menu options, enhancing overall interaction speed. Moreover, by keeping users within the same interface, we maintained continuity of experience, preventing disorientation. Lastly, the overlay reduces cognitive load by eliminating the need for users to mentally track their location across different pages, promoting a more focused user experience. Overall, these considerations guided our decision, resulting in a design that prioritizes usability, efficiency, and user satisfaction.

Video Editing Settings

In addition to taking perfect photos, the application also had the capability of auto-assembling video collages of the photos taken within the application. This settings page is a look at the different preferences users were able to change while editing a video collage. I was asked to keep the page as minimal as possible with only a few key toggles, so as not to overwhelm users with excessive video editing options they might lack the technical knowledge of.

The home button was placed at the bottom of the screen to offer a quick way for users to exit out of the preferences page and navigate easily back to the landing screen that they were editing from. Users could also use the hamburger menu icon to navigate back to other pages as needed.

Support / Contact Us

Because of the presence of monetary subscriptions, and the existence of tutorial videos teaching users how to properly use the application for photography and video editing, there was a need for a page which allowed users to contact for support in the event of any issues. 

In the medium-fidelity version of this page, we originally sought to have the company logo at the top of the screen, but instead went for simplicity in the final version, in order to minimize distraction on the help portal.

Reflection

The biggest thing I took away from completing this internship was learning to work with the needs and desires of a client, and creating designs for the application concept that the project manager was most satisfied with regardless of how it aligned with my personal design style. It taught me a different kind of collaboration style outside of simply a team setting, but rather a more individualized dynamic. This project pushed me outside of my comfort zone as I had to reframe my usual creative approach and see things from different perspectives, and also encouraged me to branch out from the designs I usually produce.

Overall my experience designing and helping bring PhotoPerfectApp to life was a period of immense growth for me as both a designer and a collaborator, and allowed me to expand my scope of creativity to execute something not only I was happy with, but the client as well.

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