VEGA
Role
Timeline
Team
Skills
VEGA is a futuristic search engine that allows you to immerse yourself in different topics. Much like how we connect stars to decipher constellations (Vega), exploring this interface allows you to feel connected and closer to your favorite KPOP girl group.
Final Design
Takeaways
1. Being Resourceful for New Software
This experience uses STYLY for Vision Pro to make Vision Pro development more accessible. Projects can be tested fully on a laptop without the use of a Unity Pro License. As there was a limited amount of Vision Pros, we altered our setupto be compatible with the Meta Quest, allowing us to prototype more efficiently.
2. Larger Scale Projects require Excellent Project Management
The duration of this project overlapped with our jobs, important tests, and various events. When one or more members were not able to finish a task, we prioritized other goals more efficiently so that we would still have a working product.
Visions that weave context – Redefining the connection between information and people
This project was a submission for NEWVIEW 2024, an XR Creative competition. They introduced a Brand New Spatial Computing Category, and collaborated with Parsons to generate submissions.
Research
Design Inspiration
Our intial idea was to create a futuristic interface that would make it easier to explore specific websites like Wikipedia. However, a critique that we got was to incorporate a more new story- something that we haven’t seen before. This is how we landed on creating a more fun, 3D interface.
Further Inspiration
We also found the world of KPOP stans (fans) exciting. There’s an urge to collect unique, limited edition merch. Finding this merch involves multiple interfaces- fashion stores, music interfaces, online stores with KPOP merch, and physical shelves to put them on. What does it look like to have all of this in once place?
Process
To communicate ideas and implement them effectively to my teammates, I created mockup storyboards for what the interactions would look like, asked teammates to create assets while I greyboxed them. Once the greybox was successful, assets could then be implemented.
Storyboards used to Plan Different Interactions
Prototypes of Interactions created using STYLY's AVP Plugin
Current Design
Final Thoughts
Thank you to Kyle Li for organizing NEWVIEW at Parsons, and all the students and faculty who user tested our experience along the way. Thank you also to the STYLY community for helping us debug some core issues! We wouldn’t have made it without all your support.