StepUp horse

Overview

StepUp Solutions is in the process of redesigning its entire platform for the first time, this implementation comes due to the necessity of showcasing the design / prototype to possible stakeholders. As part of this new transition, the whole company branding starts to grow and the target audience gets to enroll the training of their horses with the interactive prototype.

Background

StepUp Solutions is divided into branches, and one of them is StepUp Horse,  a wearable device made to continuously measure and monitor breathing, heart-rate, speed, and distance of the horse real-time during training, which helps trainers to know their horse’s physical condition better, leading to higher performance and lower risk of injuries.

I am the only UI | UX Designer in the team.

I joined the StartUp as Graphic and Web Content Designer, but when the goals of the project came alive, the position was instantly changed into UI | UX Designer.

My career path has been growing tremendously during this year, some of the key achievements are listed below:

Implement a design process: the team now knows more about the Design Thinking methodology and process, so they can estimate better times for future projects.

Improve usability among the website and app: with the implementation of the features the usability test came up with way better qualitative user acceptance.

Establishing design branding kit: the team is able to keep consistency across the app, website and even presentation decks.

My role

As the sole designer on this project, I was responsible for the entire design process, from the initial discovery, all the way through the prototyping development. I assisted directly with the CEO and Project Manager in writing the requirements, running discoverability and usability testing and defining branding guidelines.

What I learned...

I changed my position in the team, just by asking for the opportunity, communicating my ideas and start working on my deliverables to show what I am able to do. What I will never be forgetting about this project is that the opportunities are created by ourselves, and that team communication can make the difference even when a pandemic crisis gets in the way.

Clickable prototype

The process

The research phase was already started with the first prototype that the company launched, but taking into account the experts feedback and the stakeholder’s point of view, my design process started. We were implementing an agile process online and regardless of the pandemic situation, communication was never an issue. Constant feedback was the key function of our creative process.

Challenges

The app needed to give personal feedback about the horse to the trainer, besides the amount of horses and devices,? The challenge continue growing.

Data delivery was the most time consuming part because graphs are great friends when talking about visual design, but to make it interactive and easy to use, many options were tried before the result.

Real time training

Real time feedback was the key to horse trainers and owners. In order to meet the device’s goal, improve horse’s performance.

Configuration and Personalization

As the device is unique, the user will learn step by step how to use it, so they do not have to think about the process and keep usability flow.

After receiving feedback from the users, the personalization at the end of the training was created to be optional, so they would be able to get the info about the ground condition or an specific comment just if they want to, before saving the day’s data, depending on the trainers preferences.

Special calendar

The calendar’s personalization came from the user necessity of selecting date and horse training, so it kept the essence? Of the native calendar, but with a quick access to the horses instead? Of the classic events.

Before my intervention