Sherpa
By: Abhishek Ramanathan
Tags: Product Design, UX, User Experience, Product, Featured

Step 3: Embodiment Design

1. Product

Rapid prototyping was used to develop the product in stages.

Preliminary Prototype

A quick 30 minute exercise with craft materials helped in functional decomposition of the product. The essential components of the device were sensor, display, battery, and straps.

A quick preliminary prototype exercise in class

Alpha Prototype

A daylong exercise to build a more elaborate contraption to test ease of use. This helped us identify that our selected concept was not flexible enough to be mounted on different types of faucets. And thus, we iterated again to accommodate flexibility.

The alpha prototype

Beta Prototype

A functional prototype built with sensor, screen, arduino and 3D printed casing helped demonstrate and validate the product and experience.

Beta prototype functional demo

Final Product

After a proof of concept, we administered another survey to learn about product aesthetics and associated emotions. The major attributes we were looking to get an idea about were display shapes, finishes and associated perceived values of style vs practicality. The survey can be found here.

A Kansei analysis of the survey results helped us fix the final aesthetic design. We proceeded to develop the final product aesthetics using 3D modelling software (Rhino) and get realistic renders for presentation.

The final product bundle consists of a sensor ring mounted at the mouth of the faucet, a display mounted on the wall and a mobile application to control and coordinate the sensor and display settings.

Aesthetic renderings of the final product concept

2. User Experience design

The user experience comprised of two touch points of interactions — the display and the companion mobile app.

The Display Interface

The surveys conducted also elicited details about the information that users would like shown on the display. This led to a series of three major screens —

Home

Reflection

Education

Primary display “home” page

The layout of the home screen as pictured above, shows several methods of communicate the user’s water usage, including the projected water bill at the end of a specified time period, based on the water usage up to the current point in time in the billing cycle.

The display features the net water usage on the top left portion of the screen, as well as a breakdown of the amount of water being used at faucets equipped with sensors.

The small text, in either red or green, next to the water volume readouts conveys how much water a user has been using relative to an average time period. This time period could be since the user started using the device, the last month, or some other custom time window, as chosen by the user. This average is broken up into discrete time segments throughout the day to provide a water use “pace-line” that assists or coaches a user in real time. This element of the interface may also be configured to display red or green arrows depending on the usage target a consumer sets.

The small squares in the bottom left of the display represent the status or information-feed from the sensors paired with the primary display device. In the top right corner of these sensor information feeds are the battery status and the method of device connection, which in this situation is Bluetooth. As more sensors are paired with the primary display device, the home screen of the user interface can either be customized to display the additional information feeds or show just the aggregate information.

In the top center is a water droplet graphic that is used to show the user’s water usage pace as compared to other individuals, as a means of gamification.

The four dots in the bottom right corner of the display make up a real-time visual indicator. These dots will change color as water is actively being used. If a tap is left open for longer than a certain amount of time the dots will one-by-one illuminate yellow. If the water is left running even longer, the dots will start to change to a flashing red, indicated that the user should turn off the tap if possible.

2. Water Use Reflection Page

The device user can navigate through to the “reflection” page of the UI by pressing and holding the device screen for 2 seconds. The reflection page displays the water use history in gallons (or liters) of water over a customization time period. This page also shows an average water use line and a target line, to show the user how well they’ve been meeting their intended use target.

3. Water Use Education Page

Once the user is on the reflection page, they can navigate through to the “education” page of the interface by pressing and holding the device screen for 2 seconds. This page is intended primarily to provide general water conservation advice and information. Information or tips, such as discussing the merits of installing aerators or using more efficient toilets in one’s home, are pushed to the device over the user’s home WiFi network. The sub-pages, such as “tools”, can be accessed by pressing on the display for less than a second. The “tools” sub-page will include content about reducing water usage in specific areas of the home, including outdoor water use, laundry related water use, etc.

The second sub-page provides local water information, including news about water issues in your area, including boil-water advisories and water use restrictions. The last sub-page, “global news” will provide environmental and water use news from around the world to show the importance of water conservation and how they are making an impact on the larger community.

Companion mobile app

The Sherpa primary device only features a screen press as the sole means of navigation through menus. This was done as a means of cost reduction, to improve durability, and to reduce the chances of awkward or unpleasant interactions with a device mounted to a power outlet in the home. Most users will have access to a smartphone or tablet computer with a much more natural display position (not at various heights on the wall) and very good hardware that supports a more natural and interactive user interface.

To leverage these factors, Sherpa will have a companion smartphone application that will directly connect with the Sherpa devices through the user’s home WiFi network. Through this app, users will be able to customize the functionality of the primary display, change water use targets, and pair/manage water sensors to the primary display. We could also leverage this app to allow users to purchase just the water sensor devices and monitor their water use periodically through the smartphone app, without the need for a primary display, if they don’t desire an ever-present reminder of their water use.