Social Metaverse Application for Hololens 2

Client :

DoubleMe

Deliverable :

UX Design, MRTK Prototype

Role :

Product Designer(MR)

Date :

2020.01~2020.06

Project Brief

DoubleMe is a Seoul-based startup specializing in volumetric capture and spatial computing solutions. One of the biggest challenges facing the company was identifying its primary target industry/user in an uncertain market environment. To address this issue, my team developed a social metaverse application for Hololens2.

The social metaverse application enables users to create and transform their physical space into a bespoke type of personalized AR space by placing virtual assets (i.e. 3D models, videos, and images) onto their XR space, and then sharing it with friends and others.

Our primary goal was to engage users in conversation and study their response to this novel technology while providing an accessible yet compelling XR experience. If you would like to learn more about the nitty-gritty details of this project, please don't hesitate to contact me.

The Problem:

Despite the frequent appearance of terms such as AR, MR, and XR in daily news and social media feeds, many people are still unfamiliar with the actual XR experience. This is especially true when it comes to wearables and smart glasses, as it can be difficult to convince people to even try on the device for the first time.

In fact, many first-time users quickly give up on the technology after struggling to click on a virtual interface by pointing their fingers in the air. Because these awkward attempts often leave users with a negative impression and a perception that the technology is incomplete, easing the biggest frustration of first-time users, which is learning and adapting to the XR device's gestural interactions, has been a pivotal mission for me as an XR product designer.

The Solution:

To successfully accomplish this mission, my team focused on defining, designing, and integrating easy-to-learn interactions (gestures) and a user-friendly interface. We set a hypothesis that if users felt more confident about using the technology, they would be more likely to open up to XR as a useful and accessible technology for daily life rather than treating it as a one-time attraction.

To test this hypothesis, we used design sprints and prototyping with MRTK (mixed reality toolkit) to experiment with different forms of gestural interactions and user engagement.