The Challenge
Make a mobile app that complements the desktop experience for the photos app.
Role
Designer, Researcher
Tools
Illustrator, AfterEffects, InVision, Excel, PowerPoint, Testflight
Research
The first thing to do was to find out the features that would be most compelling, including assisted storyboarding, remote microphones, synced cameras, and shot assistant. I wrote up and illustrated six user scenarios that included all of the features, and created short videos to show to over 200 potential users. Users watched the videos and then took a survey gauging the perceived usefulness and excitement level of all the proposed features.
After extensive forecasting and modeling of the potential feature set, we determined that a simple transfer app would be the most valuable and immediate pain-point to address. Further, if the app could launch quickly, it could serve as the base on which to build other features in the future.
Ideation
While waiting for the data to come in, I sketched up some ideas for how you could make a mobile version of the app, and started to build a clickable prototype in Axure.
When the data came in, we had to change course. I sketched some designs of the landing screens which i would later learn to animate in AfterEffects.
Design
I wanted the app to be as easy as possible, with as few steps as possible. Something that could be used without a Microsoft account, or a cable, akin to Apple’s AirDrop. Unlike Airdrop, it would have to accommodate many different kinds of phones and a range of PC specs. With the dev team in Finland, we decided to use a QR code to create a P2P network.
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This setup allowed transfer in three steps: Connect, select, and send. The overall experience is quick, and easy
Impact
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Photos Companion was universally available for free download in the App Store and Google Play in January of 2018.
While Photos Companion was available on the app store for a short amount of time, many of the findings were influences in the current Phone Companion App. It was clearly an important enough feature to overcome the huge barrier to entry by making it easier to import photos. |
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Final Thoughts
This project taught me not to overthink things. In the beginning we were so caught up in the big ideas that were possible that we nearly overlooked the simple obvious quick win that was staring us in the face.