Peer Pretty
Project overview
Peer pretty is an app that provides collaborative photo editing tools for users to optimize group photos simultaneously. I completed this project for one of my UX courses in my master program. My goal was to make the process of editing a group photo with friends easier by building a Google Drive version of facial-editing app.
Method
User Interview
User Journey Map
Competitor Analysis
Flowchart
Wireframing
Prototyping
Usability test
Tool
Sketch
Invision
Photoshop
Illustrator
Role
User researcher
UX designer
UI designer
Visual designer
Timeline
Sep - Dec, 18
Type
Solo project
Key Features
Clear welcome message
When launched the first time, Peer Pretty offers a visually appealing experience to let users understand the overall usage of the app.
Easy and direct access
All main sections are always visible can be easily reached from the button menu.
Collaborative experience
Users can edit photos simultaneously with others and gain instant feedback.
Community-based editor
Not only can users edit their photos, but they can also share their work with the community.
Design Process
Understand
Explore
Materialize
Research
To better understand the users of photo-editing apps, I focused on researching about who the users are and why they use photo-editing apps. What I found was that no matter it is as simple as just adding a filter, or it is as complicated as “creating” six-pack on a bikini photo, photo editing is trendy now, and it is still growing.
Age
16-24
14-16
14-16
Gender
Female
Male
Hours on social media daily
2-3
3+
0-2
Interview
I interviewed five people who spend more than 5 hours on social media per week and have more than two photo-editing apps on their phone. The interview questions focus on their experience of editing group photos via the existing photo-editing apps.
Takeaways:
-
Users care about how they look like in group photos, especially when posting on social media
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Users concern that other people editing their face may make them look unnatural
-
Users worry that their friends tend to spend more time editing themselves and even not to edit others
-
Users have to use multiple chat apps to communicate with their friends when editing a group photo
When I am editing a group photo, I don’t touch anyone’s face except mine. I don’t want to make someone else look unnatural.
"
"
It takes a longer time to edit a group picture compared a selfie because there is a lot of noise around myself in the picture.
"
My friends often ask me to do some facial edits to them, but I did have a couple of times where my friends disagreed the way I edited their face.
"
Photo-editing apps make me look nice on social media. It makes me feel like I can be in control of looking nice on a picture.
"
My friends sometimes just edit themselves or just choose the photos where they look great, so I just expect I won’t look great in a group photo.
User Journey Map
Competitor Analysis
In order to find similar offerings in the market place and studied competitors value proposition and limitations, I conducted a competitive analysis. From the analysis to the top six photo-editing apps, I found that syncing editing is the feature none of the competitors have.
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Facetune Meitu FaceU MakeupPlus PhotoWonder AirBrush
Photo gallery
Facial recognition
Multi face recognition
Gender recognition
Mirror mode
Filters
Make-up feature
Facial stickers
Tutorials
Auto editing
Manual editing
Paid upgrades
Color editing tools
Share on social media
Export quality options
Understand
Explore
Materialize
Identification
The challenge
Users want to edit group photos with their friends in order to make the photo visually appealing, but users have trouble collaborating and communicating with each other.
The solutions
-
A platform where users can invite friends to a project and edit the same photo at multiple ends
-
A way users can inform their friends when they are satisfied with the photo
-
Able to get the final photo within the app instead of using other chat apps
-
Connect with the photo-editing community and share photos
Workflow
Wireframes
The wireframe covers all the pages needed for the workflow. The goal of the design is to highlight the invitation process. The wireframes were used as a visual presentation to get feedback from stakeholders and a basis for prototyping. It contains the hierarchy of items on a screen, brand visual elements, and content strategy.
Prototype
There was extreme attention to detail when it came to interaction design. I have to think thoroughly about each click and the connection between each page.
Understand
Explore
Materialize
Usability test
After finishing the first version of the prototype, I also conducted a usability test. The usability was held with three “Gen Z” users since people aged from 14 to 23 are my target users. Each usability test lasted 20 minutes and each participant was asked 10-15 questions. The usability test allows me to identify the strengths and weaknesses of my app and find opportunities to improve.
Next steps
-
Add tutorials to explain the main workflows for first-time users
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On the explore page, give users layout options to decide how many photos they want to see in each row
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Add “save” function on the explore page, so users can save the photos they like into the collection center
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Reduce the space of each photo on the pre-editing page, and just show an overview of each photo
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Move the comment section to the editing page so users can chat with each other while editing the photo
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Add a title for the pre-editing page so users can understand its function
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