I will design an app designed to encourage people to go outside and explore more, hopefully making them more curious about the world around them and enticing them to go and discover it for themselves. This app will be something that the user takes with them on their adventures to help guide them, but also push them to go further out and explore deeper into the world. It will feature a map of the world that updates as the user moves through the world. This means that the app will need access to the internet, most likely through mobile data. I don’t want to show just a map as this can be found on various other apps, so I will consider including hints or pointers as to where places of interest are located, allowing the user to explore with a slightly clearer idea of where they are going and what they might find on their adventures. I am also considering including a reward or point system whereby the user gains rewards for the things they do, whether it be exploring new places or doing exciting things on their adventures. There will be a social side to my app, and I think that it would be interesting to allow users to post places of interest on the map for other users to find. I will also add the option to share the achievements users gain on various social media, although I do not want this to be a major aspect of the app. I feel that the overall experience should be quite personal, and I want the main focus to be on the physical experience of being outside, with the app working in the background, pushing the user further. This product is going to be aimed at people who like to go out and explore new places, from scouts to older people who still love to adventure outside. It may also be aimed more specifically people who want to do this, but just need the motivation to do so. I think that some people may also be nervous about going into unknown places and so I would like to design the app so that it could act as a reassurance for people, so that they can go out and explore, knowing that the app is there to help and encourage them. I would consider myself as a potential user, as I would definitely use this app if it were a real product. I think this will help me, as I will already have a clearer idea about what to include, and how to go about designing this app. Inspired by a film about teenage boys who run away to explore and live in the woods, it gave me an strong sense of nostalgia and a huge longing to explore the world when I watched it. I want to try and make my app evoke similar emotions in the people that would use.
Design Factory
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Final App Design
After various experimenting and tweaking I came to my final design conclusion. I feel like my design has fulfilled both the brief and my proposal, hitting all the targets that I wanted to. It is without a doubt, an example of interactive design, and I feel that I would definitely make, or at least help to make the user feel something. Ideally, I would want them to feel curious about the unknown, making them want to explore further. I would also want them to feel like they are totally free to explore.
I think I have created a well designed app that is easy to navigate and is simple to use. If I had more time I would’ve wanted to create more screenshots of the app to further show how it would work. I would also want to look further into how the app would actually work and how it could integrate with other apps and services. I also want to develop the map system further, as I am disappointed that I couldn’t get the covered up map to work, and so I would want to experiment with this more to see if I could make it work. Overall, I think I have kept to the themes and ideas that I wanted to, using hand drawn techniques and earthy colours to suggest at wilderness and the outdoors, hopefully encouraging the user to go outside.
App Development
Throughout the design process for my app I experimented with various colours, designs and ideas before refining it down to a finalised design. I did however keep the same basic layout throughout, keeping the menu bar along the bottom and having a small title bar at the top. Some of my original ideas changed slightly through the process as well. I experimented with having the map covered up, although after actually putting it together I didn’t think it worked as well as I had expected. I then experimented with having just an open, uncovered map and I found that this looked a lot better. I think that the idea of my app can still be successful with the open map, where I will still include pointers to interesting, nearby places that still may not show up in the map.
I used various different techniques and tools to create my app. For example, to create equal space between the lines on the nearby page, I used specified steps in the blend tool to equally space them out. I also wanted to include texture to the icons that changed when selected. To do this I used a similar technique to that I used on my app logo. I duplicated the button layer and applied a gradient with a lighter brown to the top layer. I did this with both, and took away the gradient when that page was selected, to give the impression that the button had been pushed in, showing it was selected. Throughout this design I have tried to keep it as simple as I can, whilst still making the user experience and navigation quite straightforward, and I think I have done this successfully.
App Icon
For the icon for the app that would be displayed on the phones home screen, I decided to take my compass drawing and digitalise it. In Illustrator I vectorised the drawing and made it white as I wanted to experiment with using a dark background. Looking at the colour schemes I picked out from Kuler, I experimented with a few different colours until I found that this dark grey/brown fit very well.
I felt however that this seemed quite flat and that it needed something else to give it some texture or depth and so I started to experiment with gradients and shadows. I duplicated the base colour layer and added a radial colour gradient, going from white to transparent. I turned the opacity down to 20% to add a subtle depth to the icon. I think this has made it much more successful and I think it looks very well designed. I think the hand drawn compass enhances the ideas behind my app, and I think the colour also helps to do this as well.
To present my icon and also to test how well the icon fits into an iPhone screen, I took a screenshot of my home screen and I edited in my own icon with the title. I decided to name my app “Adventurist” as I wanted something short and simple. I think it is a great word, and I think it describes perfectly what the app is about, and also the audience that will be using my app. I think that my design fits very well with other icons and I think definitely works as a successful app icon. I also showed this screenshot to various people and my of them could not tell that my design was edited in, which is positive and shows that I have created a successful, seamless design.
Sketches & Ideas
Before jumping onto a computer to start working, I wanted to sketch out some of my ideas and thoughts for the layout and design of my app. For thins like icons I wanted them to have a hand drawn appearance, and so I hand drew some small, simple icons. After deciding on a basic layout for the app, I found I had three page icons at the bottom of the screen, Profile, Nearby Locations and the map. I wanted to use different icons to what would normally be used for apps, and so I chose a backpack for the profile page and a signpost for the nearby one. I also drew some ideas for the map page, including a compass and a globe. Taking inspiration from Brian Steely, and other examples of line drawings, I think these sketches are successful and will look good when placed in the app. I think they fit with the theme of the app and the ideas that I’m working with, and I think they help to emphasise the outdoorsy theme of my idea.
Fashion Women Power
Personally, I have no real interest in fashion and fashion design, but I went into the exhibition with an open mind and I found it to be quite interesting. It was immediately clear how important fashion has been and how it has been used and evolved by women to reflect power. Fashion plays a very large part in peoples self-identification, where people will buy various clothes, not only to make them feel something about themselves, but to also communicate something about themselves to others.
One item from the exhibition that I thought was an excellent example of this was the “I’m Not A Plastic Bag” canvas tote bag. Designed in 2007 by Anya Hindmarch and We Are What We Do, this is an example of eco-friendly fashion. The idea behind this bag is to encourage people to bring reusuable bags, such as this one, shopping with them, in turn reducing waste made by plastic bags.
This is something that may be purchased by the user for various reasons. Firstly this is something that would be bought and used if the user cared for the environment and didnt want to create waste using plastic bags. As small as this may be, the user may feel good about themselves, as they are doing a good thing and helping the environment, creating a positive self-identification.
Another, more superficial reason for using this bag may be to communicate something about the user to other people. By using this bag, it shows that the user is doing their part to help the environment, therefore presenting them as a good person and in a positive light to others. If a person were to buy the product solely for this reason, they would still most likely be helping the environment whether they meant to or not. For this I think it is a very successful product. It is fairly well designed, and desirable for different reasons, whilst also serving quite an important purpose.
Colour Schemes
As my app is all about the theme of the outdoors and exploring, I wanted to use quite an earthy colour scheme, using browns, greens and maybe some deep blues. I think that colours like this will help to show what the app is about, and also I hope that it will remind the user about the outdoors and further encourage them to go out. Another possible benefit of this colour scheme is that when using the app whilst exploring, I don’t want it to stand out and appear as a bright piece of design. I would much rather the app fit in with the colours of the outdoors, allowing to user to stay focused on the places they are exploring, not getting too distracted by the actual app. I want the app to just be a means of motivation, and to be there as some reassurance to the user, rather than the user depending solely on it.
I wanted to get a few selections of colours that would work well together and so I looked at Adobe Kuler and searched tags such as “Earth” and “wilderness”. Many of the colours that came up were browns, greens and some blues. I have chosen some examples that I will work with and take ideas from. I don’t want to over complicate the app with too many colours and so I will only use a very limited scheme, taking ideas from these examples.
Brian Steely
Brian Steely is an American based designer and illustrator. He uses a very simplistic, illustrative style to create mostly unique designs for logos and icons. His use of simple line art looks brilliant, and I love his work. I think this style is really lovely to look at, and also I think fits well with the themes of the wilderness and exploring that I am working with. His work often has a weathered look to it, with rough looking lines and faded colours. Similar to the designs from the Kings of Summer, I want to take inspiration from Steely’s work and create similar, hand drawn icons and symbols for my own app design.
SMITH 