Gallery 360
My Role:
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Tools:
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Description:
UX Designer designing the Gallery 360 app from conception to delivery.
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Figma
Gallery 360 is a virtual curation of artwork. Gallery 360 strives to provide educators and art enthusiasts with easy, equitable access to important works of art and information about each piece.
Problem and Goal
Users wanted opportunities to learn about art and discuss art but did not have time to visit exhibits in person because of their busy work schedule. My goal was to design an app that allows users to easily access, share and learn about artwork.
Users
Reena
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Age:​ 45
Education: Bachelor's
Occupation: Teacher
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Reena is a busy educator who needs to easily access and share relevant curricular materials because they do not have enough planning time.
Yaling
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Age:​ 31
Education: MD
Occupation: Medical Researcher
Yaling is an art enthusiast with visual impairments who needs access to galleries because they like learning about art and discussing with others during their free time.
Pain Points
Time:
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Accessibility:
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IA:
Working adults are too busy to search through extensive art databases.
Platforms with curated artwork are not equipped with assistive technology.
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Virtual art apps with no pre-curated categories are often overwhelming to search through.
Competitive Analysis
I evaluated other apps that allowed users to view and learn about art. The competitors ranged from having large databases of art to carefully curated categories. They also ranged from large amounts of information to carefully selected facts to no details about each work of art. The best features of the apps were easy searchability and well organized curation of art pieces, which Gallery 360 incorporated. The main differences are that Gallery 360 incorporated alt text and both audio and written information about each piece to make visual art more accessible.
Paper Wireframes
Taking the time to draft iterations of each screen of the app on paper ensured that the elements that made it to digital wireframes would be well-suited to address user pain points. For the home screen, I prioritized a quick, easy and organized search process to help users save time.
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*Stars were used to mark the elements of each sketch that would be used in the initial digital wireframes.
Digital Wireframes
As the initial design phase continued, I made sure to base screen designs on user needs.
Low Fidelity Prototype
Using the completed set of digital wireframes on Figma, I created a low-fidelity prototype. The primary user flow I connected was searching for, favoriting and sharing a piece of art to meet user's main needs.
Mockups
Early designs allowed users to easily navigate and select pieces of art. However, it was difficult to scroll right through multiple pages in each category. I revised the design so users could see all the main categories on one page. I also streamlined the navigation options to reflect commonly used call to action buttons easily accessible in one menu at the bottom of the screen.
High Fidelity Prototype
The final high-fidelity prototype presented cleaner user flows to search for, favorite and share pieces of art.
Accessibility Considerations
1
Provided access
to users who are vision impaired through adding alt text to images for screen readers.
2
Used common icons and assistive text search to
help make
navigation easier.
3
Provide access to audio and transcripts for user’s diverse needs.
What I learned
While designing the Gallery 360 app, I learned that collaboration is the key to creating a visually appealing and easy to use app. Usability studies and peer feedback influenced each iteration of the design, and the Figma community provided me inspiration for visual elements.
