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Octavus: Conversational User Interface for Music Learning
SUMMARY
Performing music is an activity that requires full immersion of the senses. Often, when we’re practicing, we’re pulled away from our instrument to turn the page, start or stop a metronome, or search for a new piece. Additionally, practicing by oneself can be lonely and frustrating without the guidance of a tutor who can help expand our repertoire and point out flaws in our technique.
This voice assistant will act as both a personal coach and an extra set of hands, helping you record, fine-tune, and energize your practice sessions as you continue along your musical journey.
ROLE
Interaction Designer
Illustrator
User Journey Mapper
TEAM
Shruti Prasanth, Gary Tang, Catherine Wang, Grace Li
TIMELINE
4 weeks
Researching Music Learners
Starting off the project, we researched music learners, specifically guitarists and their pain points while practicing new music. We looked into their relationships with in person tutor and app tutors, as well as existing music practicing tools. We wrote down our insights and new CUI (conversational user interface) ideas in the chart below.
Gathering Inspiration
The concept most intriguing to us and connected well with the idea of a music assistant, was an octopus. We researched octopus movement, and were drawn to the way sound waves, water waves, and an octopus wiggling it's arms all have a flowy nature. With solely the movement of squiggles and lines, there is lot of personality and emotional states that could be conveyed.
Designing the CUI States
Working collaboratively, I helped iterate on several ways of expressing a simple circle + a squiggle line to convey different CUI active or passive states. Some verbs were "listening", "speaking", "resting", and "processing". I also worked on sketching and incorporating brand colors into Octavus's logo and finding a balance between a literal octopus, versus something abstract.
Visual Assets and Illustrations
Moving forward to fleshing out the brand, I helped sketch and design several vector illustrated elements to make the final concept video for the Octavus CUI. Below are some explorations of strokes, fills, and color choices.
Storyboard Version 1
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Storyboard Version 2
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User Journey Map
To always keep in mind the emotional states, goals and intentions of the music learner, I wrote out and formatted the core ideas into a horizontal poster which maps the start-to-finish journey of a music student, as they are aided by Octavus while they play the guitar.
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