Lumyros is a smartphone app connecting all aurora hunters.
It helps tourists and professionals spot aurora, learn about it and connect with fellow hunters. Together with a chief designer I worked on transforming the business idea and research insights into an app through Interaction design.
internship at Pixelfield
Jul - Aug 2020 (2 months)
with chief designer I created
user stories, user flows, UX architecture, wireframes, onboarding, UI moodboard,
high-fidelity screens…
The client used to be a waiter in Iceland, and part of his job was to notify guests when the aurora was visible. After many years of serving them, he got to know what tourists want and need, and decided to ask Pixelfield to help create an aurora-focused app. The opportunity for a new app was in focus on amateurs, not only professionals, and in providing forecast information from more reliable sources than competition apps.
My internship started right after the research and business analysis were done.
I went through their outcomes and learned about future users, and client’s ideas, which were plentiful.
We started designing by creating user stories, to confirm which of the client's suggestions were desirable. Afterwards we did wireframes of the user flows. This left in the game only the functionalities needed to achieve users’ goals. We quickly moved to low-fidelity designs and with each iteration improved functionality and increased design fidelity.
My internship ended right before the final design iteration of the MVP app, which was developed. (I had to leave the company as I had another internship planned.) Although it was very limited, and not all the functions were working properly yet, Lumyros was released in the application stores. The strategy was to release the app ASAP, get feedback and iterate.
These are the MVP features most useful for our main target- amateurs:
Easy to understand prediction
- A brief assessment of today's chance to spot aurora in your location
- Tap on cards to learn how different parameters affect aurora visibility
Aurora Reports
- Report aurora to let others know where they can see it NOW
- Add parameters to let professional hunters know if it's the type they are looking for
Find
the best spot
- Discover spots where you will take the most aesthetic photo of aurora
- Find accommodation and other useful places for your aurora hunting journey
As this was my first work experience, I’ve learned many design basics such as what the design handover is, 8pt grid system, or that elements need to be aligned and have consistent size.
The most useful learnings were about business, how to analyze market and form a business idea that will be viable. I found out that in order to validate ideas it’s good to iterate rapidly and that it’s okay if the first iteration does not have the perfect design.
