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Paul is a 23-year-old graduate student in computer science at MIT. He enjoys travelling and taking photos along the way, and he also likes to share the photos he take with his family. One summer, he goes hiking at Joshua Tree, California, and takes hundreds of photos. To share his photos with his aunt Valentina, he signs up for an account at the PhotoTalk website, posts his photos, and calls Valentina to tell her to go online and see his photos
Valentina, 50, is a housewife with less-than-average computer skill. The day after she receives Paul's call, she goes to the PhotoTalk website and tries searching for Paul's photos. The two pieces of information that she has are the location, Joshua Tree, and Paul's name.
Colby, 36, is originally from California, but he now works in Boston for a sports equipment company. While he often takes photos, he rarely shares them with others. Being in Boston, he sometimes misses home and wants to see photos of his favorite spots in California. After getting to know PhotoTalk and browsing it for a while, he comes across Paul's photos of Joshua Tree and immediately wants to comment on them. He also feels that some of the information Paul provides is incorrect, and he wishes to correct them.
Paul then receives notifications from the website about Colby's comments. He replies to the comments, makes corrections as Colby suggests, and posts some more photos.
Storyboard Designs
(3 Designs here! Keep them simple but different from one another.
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- Analyze learnability, visibility, efficiency, and error prevention)
Design 1
Every page has a bar at the top and another one on the left. The top bar allows the user to sign in or sign up for a new account, and if the user is already logged in, it shows the name of the user. The left bar lets the user search for photos based on different criteria. It also has links back to the main page and to "My photos", the photo management page, and the notifications page. The main area shows the latest photos added by users as well as the most commented photos.
After signing up for an account, Paul clicks on the "Post new photo!" link on the left bar, which takes him to the "Add photo" page.
The "Add photo" page shows a preview of the image (before the image is uploaded, it just shows "No image yet.") Paul then browses the photo he wants from his folder, add the necessary information as well as some of the optional information, such as a caption saying "I took this photo when it was so hot!" He then clicks "Post!" He keeps adding photos until he was satisfied.
Valentina goes to the site to see the photos that Paul tells her about. She searches for Paul's photos with the location, Joshua Tree. Paul has just posted his photos the evening before, so she could find his photos not too far down. The search results show the pictures with location "Joshua Tree."
Colby would like to see some photos from his home state, California. He is looking at the most recent pictures on the site when he comes across Paul's photos. He clicks on one of them, and the site brings him to the "View photo" page. He notices the comments, and he sees the space where he can post his own comments. He could also use the "Prev" and "Next" links to see other pictures according to the posting time (because he came to this photo according to Most Recent, so the photos are sorted by time.) Colby also make another comment telling Paul that his information is wrong.
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Paul sees his own photos on the "My photos" page. He clicks on the one which Colby commented on, and the site takes him to the "View photo" page. Since he is the owner of the photo, there is an "Edit photo" link on the top-right corner. He clicks on it, and the next page allows him to change the information, which he does accordingly.
Analysis
Dimension | Pros | Cons |
|---|---|---|
Learnability | > There are several dimensions that the user can search based on, so the user can learn quickly what sorts of keywords to input. | > Since there are a few search boxes, the user may not know at first what types of keywords to use to get good results according to what he/she wants. |
Visibility | > Uploading photos and entering comments gives feedback right away. | > The "View photo" page does not show other pictures in the same search results or those made by the same poster. The user doesn't know where "Prev" and "Next" would take him/her. |
Efficiency | > The search boxes and some of the few useful pages of the website are always available on the left bar | > The user needs to upload one photo at a time and click "Add Photo" to add the next one. There is no way to upload photos in batches. |
Error Prevention | > Photo information can be corrected using the Edit Photo page | > Some people may supply incorrect photo information, which leads to contaminated search results. Since only the uploader can change the photo information, that error may persist for a long time. |
Design 2
The home page prominently features the four different search types that are available. Under each search bar there is a thumbnail of a photo and corresponding word or phrase that is representative of that search type (e.g. "Nature" for type of photography). Tiled below are randomly generated thumbnails of photos from the database that also fit the description of the larger photograph. On this page, viewers can search for photographs or simply click around if they aren't feeling imaginative. Anyone can register and log in via the link at the top right. Users, once registered, can comment on and post photos. Paul can tell right away that he will be happy posting his pictures here, so he clicks "POST A PHOTO", but he must register first, so this brings him to the Register page.
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