This week I was able to do several rounds of testing with my current prototype and got some useful feedback and ideas about next steps to take refining the design.

On Wednesday I met with a group of students in the feedback collective and I had them try to use the app on their own for about 5 minutes and then have a discussion in which as a group they discussed what they thought was going on and what was confusing.

Feedback

Some of the feedback that I got from this included the following key comments/suggestions:

  • I was trying to figure out what was happening but uncertain about the principles
  • I want to know what is happening here – what should i understand or not understand?
  • I wanted to drag the small white points but couldn’t
  • Have you considered looking at islamic geometry as related to these designs?
  • It would be interesting if there was some way to play with overlapping the shapes.
  • A touch screen might be a more engaging way to interact with the tool

The next day I was able to user test with three more people during our class session.    A few of the notes I got from this user testing were:

  • I found it hard to tell which elements are buttons
  • I wanted an option for full screen with controls off to the side
  • You might need to design the interface so that the available interactions are more self evident or provide separate info or intro to lead in
  • It might work better to let them explore and discover the magic on their own and then give the option for the explanation
  • I wanted to be able to export an image or maybe even record an animation

Additionally, from my general observation and their reactions, people seemed to find the core art-making process and experience to be a rewarding and interesting one to explore.  Once I explained the idea of the algorithm, people seemed much more comfortable with what was happening though still a little unsure.

Takeaways

  • There is something a little tricky about wanting to sequence what happens to help show the process involved but not wanting to start with a step-by-step explanation
  • I may want to have a few different examples of the algorithm with different constructions defining the cells to show what is consistent and to display the range of the visual output
  • Another tension is that some people seem to slip into ‘math mode’ where they need to try to explain everything using the kind of language that they learned in high school geometry when a more intuitive approach might suffice
  • On the one hand, I want people to feel like they have a grasp on the rule system that is generating the piece but on the other hand there is a genuine emergent pattern that is part of the magic and would be hard to foresee a priori.  How do you balance wanting to know some things without feeling like you have to understand ‘everything’?
  • The transparency option seems to be somewhat muted and limited in it’s contrast.  Will changing the background color, increasing contrast or saturation on a pixel-by-pixel basis or using some other algorithm help to provide better results.  The aspect of the design that allows for the generation of different palettes given the three core colors seems like a nice feature.
  • It could be interesting to try ‘pixelating’ an image that you load using the generated geometry

Moving forward, I want to focus mostly on refining the interface so that it is possible to dive right in and start tinkering without getting confused.  This might be through clear interface design, a very short primer, or pop-up tips/hints.  I also want to add in a small sample of the other content, though for the deadline associated with this class, that might just take the form of a write-up on an About/Info page.