GalleryPal

UX/UI Project

Summary

I designed a feature for GalleryPal’s mobile app that allows visitors at galleries/museums to engage and learn more about the art, overall enhancing the visitors’ experiences and improving visitation numbers.

Information

  • Timeline: 5 days (modified GV design sprint)

  • Platform: Mobile App

  • Tools: Clip Studio Paint, Figma

  • My role: UX/UI Designer

Process

For this project, I implemented a modified GV design sprint into my own process.

The Problem

GalleryPal is a mobile app designed for museums and galleries so that visitors can have an elevated way of enjoying their experience of viewing art by providing information about the art, gallery, and more. Through an interview with Bitesize UX and a GalleryPal designer, I discovered the following issues:

  • Museum-goers would like to learn more about the art, but the current methods of in-person information is overwhelming or non-engaging.

  • Most museum-goers don’t do research beforehand on the art; majority of visitors are interested but not experts in the art.

Problem Statement: GalleryPal needs a feature that allows visitors to learn more about the art in-person that improves the overall experience and usability of their app.

Client’s Needs

GalleryPal’s goals for an engaging feature to improve their app’s usability include:

  • The feature should be easy to understand and accessible within the app

  • Museum-goers wanting to spend more time with an art-piece

  • An increase in the app’s overall usage during visitation

The Solution

The feature I designed is a QR code scanner embedded in the app. Galleries who use GalleryPal can put QR codes on the description tablets of each piece of art that will link to the respective information pages, allowing visitors to quickly learn about the artist, the process, the material, and history of the piece. With a QR code scanner, the app is as quickly accessibly from their phones’ lock screen camera, improving ease-of-use and an increase visitor satisfaction.

Mapping from Start to Finish

It was important to consider the setting for the app’s use because GalleryPal’s goal  is to create a way for visitors to learn more about the art in-person, meaning at the museum or gallery. Because of the in-person setting, I wanted the app to be quickly-accessible. From there, I made two maps of the immediate ideas in my head that would get the visitor to the end-goal of learning more about the art.

Besides the ease-of-access, having the app utilize their phones in active ways, such as using the camera, was important because it wouldn’t take the visitors out of their museum/gallery experience. The first idea that came to my head was using a QR code scan, which is a common way to quickly access information, especially if it is contextualized in its setting.

Sketching the Primary Screen

If I were to use my initial design’s idea of using a QR code scanner as a prominent feature, it was important to make the scanner quick to access and find, creating multiple opportunities to use them. However, I didn’t go immediately to designing around the QR code idea; I tapped into my deeper creativity and drew my Crazy-8 sketches, putting down all the ideas I had while also forcing myself to come up with some on the spot of the exercise.

The first sketch was my initial idea of the QR code scanner as the critical screen in my map, and the last was my solution sketch that would be a result of a successful critical screen. As for the rest of my sketches, some of them were alternative versions of my initial idea. I wasn’t concerned with my sketches being fully-fleshed out because what was more important for me in the Crazy-8 sketches process was finding ideas that I could potentially corporate into my prototype.

Sketches to Storyboard

With my critical and solution sketch screens decided, I began to build the storyboard around them. I asked myself “What would the first screen of the app be?” to find the starting point. Thinking of the importance of location for in-person use, the first step of the app was to select the museum or gallery the user would be at so that they could access multiple resources, such as maps and information, for their location. From there, I thought “Where would the QR code scanner be intuitive to access?” Keeping that in mind, I put the QR code scanner access in the Search tab because they serve the same purpose, and QR code scanners were commonly found near the search bar in other apps.

High Fidelity

With the basis drafted, it was time to devise the prototype. Under the limitations of a modified GV design sprint, I ran with a simple, clean UI design and constructed a linear user flow. An immediate change I made from my storyboard to my prototype was the location of the QR code scanner. The goal for the flow is to require as few screens as necessary for the route, as using the QR code scanner should be an essential function. Even shortening the path by one click, and therefore one screen, improves the user’s journey and satisfaction using the QR code scanner over time.

Testing

I recruited five people to test my prototype. The qualities of these 5 people included:

  • Well-adapted in using a smartphone

  • Various range of interest and knowledge in galleries and museums

  • Did not do prior research before this test

I asked them to complete the user journey through the prototype, with the goal of testing the app’s usability. Besides this direct objective, I asked about their overall experiences using smartphones for situations like these, such as how they normally solve these problems and what their first instincts are.

However, the results I got back from the test revealed a perspective that I hadn’t considered:

“I think I would be chilling, see the QR code, then pull out my phone, and just go to my phone QR scanner.”

-User during testing

Multiple people said during the user tests said that they would more likely access their QR code scanner from their lock-screen or home-screen rather than through the app. While they would use the QR code scanner in the app if the app was open, using the QR scanner immediately from their lock-screen would be much faster and more instinctive than opening the app first.

Making Changes

Seeing the feedback from the testing phase, I decided it was necessary to build a new flow about using the QR code scanner from their lock-screen, which would lead to art information page within the app. This flow would more accurately reflect users’ experiences.

Prototype

Learnings and Retrospects

Being the leader of a one-man GV design sprint, the biggest challenge I faced was to keep myself from tunnel-visioning and consider a perspective that wasn’t my own when designing for GalleryPal. While solo-ing this project was a given limitation and allowed my creative process to move ahead unhindered, I saw the drawbacks that created during the user interviews.

The biggest lesson I learned from this experience is to think more outside the box (or outside the app) when coming up with user flow ideas. My first prototype’s biggest flaw was the given route wasn’t users’ initial choice to be in in the first place. I got too caught up in empathizing from within the app, but empathizing outside of the app and within the user’s space. From now on, I’ll not just think within the app, but I will consider the whole platform when designing.

What’s Next?

With this design, GalleryPal will have an engaging and modern way for visitors to learn more about the art in-person. From these improvements, there will not just be an increase in gallery and museum attendance, but an increase in art enthusiasts as well.