Project 03: Science Museum

The main objective for this project was to create an app that would enhance a visitors experience at the Science Museum. Additionally provide something that encourages learning and interaction with the subjects at hand. Using a set of UX design methodologies, we a team of four were able to create an app to help a busy mother and her family feel confident about taking a trip abroad. And making the most out of a visit to the London Science Museum.
If you haven’t been to the London, Science Museum let me start by saying it is a wonderful place. There is tons to see, it is said to hold 300,000 items spread through out 5 floors. Experiencing 3.3 million visitors a year as it is open to the general public. You can imagine with so many people and so much to see a visitors can quickly feel lost or even miss out on an exhibition.
So to get right into it we prepared ourselves for a visit to the Science Museum as this would provide the best source for identifying the problem. Being there to observe the user can help uncover areas of opportunity, get a feel for the brand and a chance to meet actual visitors.
We began wirtting out a set of questions that we could ask individuals once there. This was important to keep my team and I alligned with the information we wanted to extract. With the goal of really finding out what it is museum goers find frustrating, fun and worth while. More on as we had ourselves not been at the Science Museum in a while we too wanted to document our own reactions towards the place.

At the site we found there was a vast use of interactive means a person could engage with. Involving projection mapping, forms of virtual reality, touch screens, motion sensors, audio and visual elements. Eliminating the doubt that a well purposed app would not fit within a holistic Science Museum experience.
We also found that routing was not optimal. Nor did the layout of the building help resolve this difficulty as staircases and elevators are hidden to the sides. Leaving the upper floors and far of corners unexplored and empty -victims to a lack of curiosity or physical effort. It may be the reason as to why you are handed a map right when you come in.
Next to the Science museum are the other popular destinations such as the Natual History Museum and the Victoria & Albert Museum within walking distance. Thus with an abundant offer in the area time becomes an issue and visitors are forced to make a decision on where to spend the their time.
Analysing the crowd we recognised school children, tourists and families. It was only after talking to a couple of individuals we met some researchers too. In one instance a tour guide from a neighbouring museum, specialising in Japanese history, was at the Science Museum to learn about robotics and so amplify her knowledge of Japan. To teach others through her job. Proving the Science Museum to be an important resource to her as well.

Finally my team and I drew our conclusions and summarised the problem in three parts. Based on what the findings where from the trip to the site.

These problems were also later validated through surveys we sent out via ‘Google Surveys’ containing a revised set of questions we used during our excursion. This tool proved to be extremely helpful as it also secured interviews with people who were willing to talk more in depth. This data was then further compiled into our four personas. As they were rich in personal view points, feelings, frustrations, and ideas that each visitor had when visiting museums.

We then sorted the information a step further using an Affinity Diagram. To help us harness a solution without bias solely based on the findings we had gathered. All in favour of validating the problem we had established earlier.
Through this excercise we noticed some patterns and took action towards the correlations using another prioritisation technique. Gladly had we had enough time we could have explored the options for augmented reality or features like a queue jumper.

Ultimately we took the most evident traits from what we discovered and crafted these into a persona.

With all the components shaping up into a more tangiable visualisation we could begin devoting our attention to creating a practical a practical solution. In order to generate ideas we held a timed design studio. Wherein under pressure and in the spur of the moment wild concepts are put on paper. We gave ourselves five minutes to produce six ideas each for one problem. Resulting in 24 ideas to work with. We did this another time for another scenario then pinned the two outcomes (48 ideas) against eachother to disscuss what would be of greater value to the client and the user.
To show you what the result of such an excersice turned out to be.

The image above is a collective of the teams ideas that where then brought to life in our app for Margrite.
What you can see is the early stages for a wayfinding screen that incorporates 2D and 3D map views along with distance and time measurements.

With a paper prototype in hand we could start testing with user to see whether what we had ellaborated on made sense and whether it supported our case. We set up a goal our test candidates had to achieve within the app and watched them execute it on their own without assistance. Voicing outlound what they were thinking all along the process. We anotated what we observed and heard to make the next iterations of our higher fidelity prototypes.

Making use of the right software was also something we benefited alot. Hence it was great to use InVision during the digitising phase of the app. As it directly linked with Sketch through a plugin called craft. Helping streamline live changes and modifications we made as a consequence to user testing. Our newest Sketch file would directly update onto InVision. Saving us a good amount of time from having to spend exporting, uploading and allocating screens.

As a final piece we had an app that following our design principles was: Interactive, Educational, and Inclusive. Reflecting the requirements from the brief (The Science Museum) to be met by the user. Leading to an enhanced user experience for Margrite as she and her family walk the halls of the Science Museum in awe.
Take a look at the clickable prototype here.
Scenario: Margrite being a time conscious family mom has just arrived at the Science Museum and wants to go about planning her visit.