Future Cities Laboratory, Singapore-ETH Centre is a Swiss research think-tank that focuses on on urban design & smart cities. I worked on an iPad app that would showcase researchers' work to exhibition visitors. The research existed in a variety of formats: geospatial & urban visualization, 3D models, point cloud etc.

Designing an Interactive Exhibition App for Geospatial Visualization

About the Company

Future Cities Laboratory, Singapore-ETH Centre is a Swiss research institute's satellite company in Singapore. Their research focuses on urban design, technology and smart cities. I was part of the 'Ecosystem Services in Urban Landscapes' project, which aimed to quantify the benefits of natural ecosystems on human cities.

What I did

I designed the UI/UX for an iPad app to showcase the team's work for a research exhibition. ‍

*Note: selected content in this project has been reimagined or redacted to comply with copyright. Unless otherwise stated, the information presented is my own & does not necessarily represent the views of Singapore-ETH Centre.

Role

UI/UX for iPad app
Video Presentation


Tools

Adobe Suite
Figma
Singapore Views
Unity/Vuforia AR SDK

Team members

Researchers:
Zuzana Drillet, Naika Meili, Song Xiao Ping
Angela Dissegna, Philipp Urech, Fung Tze Kuan, Rachel Leong, Ho Xin Ying (intern), Clifford Goh (intern)

‍Developers: 
Chi Zhang (iPad App)
Jan Perhac ('Singapore Views' tool, used to generate visualization images)

GOALS

An Intuitive iPad Experience for Exhibition Visitors

About the Exhibition:

My research team 'Ecosystem Services In Urban Landscapes' was given a 3x3m exhibition space consisting of physical models of buildings & landscape, printed explainer panels, a TV screen playing a video.

Design Goals

FCL exhibition space, showing 'Ecosystem Services' research work (iPad, laser-engraved model, explainer panels etc.)
PRELIMINARY RESEARCH

Precedent Studies

Due to the short duration I had to work on this project (<1 month, alongside other work responsibilities), my research was focused on precedent studies of existing geospatial tools.

Singapore Views

Singapore Views is proprietary geospatial visualization software developed in-house at FCL.

Because it was designed for experts by experts, the app functionality was more complex than needed for my purpose - an iPad exhibition app for laypeople.

Image: Singapore Views, Dense and Green Building Typologies.

ArcGIS CityEngine

CityEngine is a Geographic Information Systems tool that allows researchers to rapidly generate & view urban models in a 3D environment.

The many options intimidate & overwhelm the first-time user.

Image: Esri ArcGIS CityEngine
CHALLENGE

Visualizing Multiple Data Taxonomies

One of the challenges I faced was how to present the different types of research data visualizations. There were more than 10 datasets that were visualized in a wide range of formats, from 2D (vector, raster) to 3D (point cloud, building model...) to various media (image, video, text...)

A non-exhaustive list of datasets generated by the researchers:

Land Cover Map

Digital Terrain Model

Ecological Research Quadrats

Physical Landscape Design

Park Popularity & Visit Frequency

Recreational Value of Green Areas

Photo Density at Parks (Flickr)

3D Point Cloud Model

Surface Temperatures (DART) & Climate Data

3D / LoD3 Building Model

AR Vuforia Model


SOLUTION

2D-3D-AR Model

I classified them into 6 general categories; which greatly simplified how I would present them in the UI.

By categorizing them this way, the user simply needs to switch between 2D, 3D & AR modes rather than navigate a convoluted list of datasets.

CHALLENGE

Designing an Intuitive Navigation System

Exhibition visitors have the following characteristics

  • Transient
    They come and go, have short attention spans,
    generally don't stay more than 5-10 minutes
  • Layperson
    Other than educators & researchers,
    I assumed the user possessed zero knowledge about tools like GIS
  • First Time User
    One can assume that all users are first time users given this is a one-time exhibition

The profile of an average exhibition visitor necessitates the development of an intuitive, user-friendly navigation system that users can pick up immediately.

Storyboard of how I envisioned the iPad app to fit into the exhibition flow
SOLUTION

Visual Information-Seeking Mantra

“Overview first, zoom and filter, then details-on- demand”

When I was conceptualizing the app navigation, I thought it made sense to reference Shneiderman's Visual Information-Seeking Mantra for designing visualization systems.

1. Overview First: 

2. Zoom and Filter

3. Details on Demand

Too granular for layperson

However, I realized that this might not be the most suitable ordering principle for my use case. For an app that users will use for 5 min at most, I wanted to eliminate any semblance of a learning curve.

Wireframing

I tried several versions of the UI, all of which centre around a few principles

  • Let the map vizualization take centre stage, viz takes precedence over all else
  • UI elements should not cover more than 30% of iPad
  • UI elements sufficiently large enough (140px) to be easy to press
  • As far as possible, let user show/hide UI but avoid complicated filter mechanisms
SOLUTION

Create Signifiers, Emphasize Affordances

Given the profile of the exhibition visitor, I made sure users were handheld through every possible action

Guiding Texts & Instructions

User is treated like a complete beginner. All screens have large instructions & tutorial texts guiding the user exactly what to do.

Image: P. Urech [3D Point Cloud]
DESIGN

UI Design Principles

Styling

Kept to the existing visual identity of FCL; black/white solid colors

Visuals kept clean & simple, flat textures.

UI designed to be undistracting so that the visualizations stand out.

Icons & Glyphs Always Labelled

Nowadays, icon labels are rarely used as users are expected to learn & recognize what the icon does.

I made sure textual labels accompanied most icons or symbols

People understood Icons with Labels much better than those without
CONCLUSION

Limitations & Lessons Learnt

I was generally satisfied with the design of the app. Although it was meant to be 'simple', it was actually not that straightforward since I was used to complicated interfaces & had to unlearn my assumptions, think from a beginner's perspective

Unfortunately, due to the short timeline & other commitments, only a basic version with limited functionality was developed in the end.

People generally responded well. Ideally I would have liked to sit at the booth to observe and survey people.

Images: Singapore Masterplan 2014 [URA], DTM & Landcover [A Dissegna]

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