Lil’ Gifts
An AR glasses application that tags “lil’ guy” avatars to physical gifts as reminders of significant people, objects, and moments.
THE CHALLENGE
Gifts are everywhere: on our desks, in our bags, slipped into pockets, or sitting quietly on shelves. We keep them because they meant something once.
But over time, even the best gifts can feel mundane. We forget who gave them to us, what they represented, and how they once made us feel.
RESEARCH
User Insights
To understand how people experience and revisit memories, we conducted interviews and online research on cognitive psychology, leading to the following insights:
01.
Positive memories fade fasterWhen asked to recall major life events, people often remembered the negative aspects more clearly than the positive ones. Research shows that gratitude exercises can help people recall positive memories.
02.
Memory sharing is often reactivePeople usually remember gifts only when triggered by something external. Few had a system for revisiting meaningful objects or reflecting on the people connected to them.
DESIGN ITERATIONS
Intial Explorations
Initially, we expanded the definition of “gifts” to include non-physical gifts. Our first idea was physical orbs that the user could engage with to relive gifts throughout the day. However, we realized it was “just another plastic thing” that didn’t integrate cleanly into existing everyday flows and decided to not go forward with this idea. Also, the scope of “gifts” was too broad, so we decided to focus squarely on physical gifts.
As we considered new forms, we were inspired by the folklore of will-o'-the-wisps, or mysterious lights that guide travelers to unexpected discoveries.
In the same spirit, we decided to have “little (lil’) guys” guide users towards moments of appreciation.
Final Iteration
We refined the design to make the experience more intuitive and connected to the user's daily life. The final version focuses on user agency and encourages meaningful interactions with everyday gifts.
Through gaze-activation, lil’ guys remain non-intrusive to the user’s day-to-day and only appear when the user looks at a gift for some time.
Unlike many modern voice user interfaces, lil’ guys have a virtual body, allowing users to put a face to the voice.
Lil’ guys act as virtual notes to physical gifts users can leave, transforming every object into an opportunity to connect.
A fun virtual paper airplane allows users to send messages to the person a gift is connect to. Recipients can receive the message through text, email, or their own glasses.
SOLUTION
Lil’ Gifts
NEXT STEPS
With more time, we would further explore the edge cases of this interaction model and user test the gaze-activation interaction. I’d be curious to explore how data is handled within this system and what friction may occur when trying to use Lil’ Gifts.
TAKEAWAYS
01.
Design is heavy.Besides craft, designers need to consider the weight of the decisions they make.
Working on Lil’ Gifts had us considering questions we hadn’t anticipated. Still, the multi-dimensional thinking necessary for responsible design isn’t meant to be easy and I’m glad to have flexed my thinking muscles during this project.
02.
Especially at the beginning of the design process, never discredit any idea, regardless of how improbable is may seem.
When we first had the idea of “little guys”, I was worried the idea was too immature. However, by embracing it, we made its cute-ness its charm.