This week we started to develop our first user-tests. We created these tests to get a better idea of whether our concept suits the end-users’ needs and expectations. Via the user tests we can find out what the users really think and how they act when working with our prototype.
Paper Prototype
A paper prototype is a quick and easy way to experiment with different elements and functions. You can easily cut out parts of the prototype and replace them with a different piece. It is fast, easy and efficient prototyping. We started with converting the functional concept into sketches. We got our inspiration from already existing apps like Voxer, WhatsApp and DigiSocial. We used this as an input for our prototype to understand how each feature relates to another. We then ran through the whole prototype a few times, took pictures of each image and put them into Protosketch.
Protosketch
With protosketch it’s possible to bring your sketches to life and make them interactive. For example you can make a button drawn on paper clickable and link this to another sketch. The idea is that we are using a real smartphone with our sketches on it for the user-test.
Our toys
When conducting the user-tests we are going to use very interesting and fun gadgets. We have a webcam that can be mounted on your smart phone. It films whatever you do on your app and can even see the finger movements capturing the ease and difficulties faced by the user when navigating. The second is a pair of glasses with an inbuilt camera. We can use these to test our app on site.
Schedule
Next Monday we are going to do a pre-test with some colleagues from the MediaLAB. On Wednesday we will visit Haarlem where we are going to conduct our real user test with two contractors. Also part of this user test is card sorting. Card sorting is a technique in which users without design experience make a category tree. They structure data in logical clusters and categories which we can use as an input for our information structure.