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Overview

Virtually Live is an entertainment company enabling fans to virtually attend live events across multiple devices  and platforms, creating experiences for fans that are more immersive, personalized, and social than ever before.

Their patented media technology creates CGI experiences by tracking physical live events and transposing the action into a rendered virtual environment. It is platform agnostic and can be enjoyed via fully immersive VR, or on your mobile, PC or tablet. 

 
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Roles

UI/UX Design
Visual Design

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Deliverables

Research
Personas
User Flows
Wireframes
High Fidelity Screens

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Specs

5 days
Photoshop
Illustrator
Sketch
Invision

 

Defining the Problem

Since VR technology is still an emerging technology, UI patterns are not well established. When designing for virtual reality, there is the conflict between building a system that is accessible and easily understood, while being appropriate for the platform. Additionally, motion sickness is an important consideration when there is a lot of motion involved, such as sitting a moving race car.

Pain points:

  • Menu too large, need to look up to see 

  • Options are scattered around

  • Icons don’t have any labels and aren’t very clear

  • A lot of information to digest, some not easy to understand

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The Research

 

To start this project, I wanted to do some research on current UI/UX trends in VR. There are no set industry standards for UI/UX, but current best practices point to keeping the menu in a 1:1 ratio in the direct eye line.

  1. https://www.uxofvr.com/

  2. https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2017/02/getting-started-with-vr-interface-design/

  3. https://medium.com/startup-grind/4-things-i-learned-designing-user-interfaces-for-vr-cc08cac9e7ec

 
 

User Personas

From user testing I came up with 3 personas to represent the types of users that might use the app

 
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Lorenzo (29 yo)

Lorenzo is a big Formula E fan and loves following the season as closely as possible. He wants to see the race from all angles and to learn about the cars, drivers, and teams.

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Tim (19 yo)

Tim follows several car blogs and he’s interested in the race, but is looking to learn more about the cars and technology and to connect w people with similar interests to connect to.

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Linda( 23 yo)

An avid VR user and likes  the ability to experience new things. She’s mildly interested in racing but is primarily looking for a quality experience.

 

Information Architecture

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Sketches

 
 
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Wireframes

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Final Designs

 
 
 
 
 

What I Learned

This project was my first foray into the world of VR. While I’m a natural screen user, I had not had any experience in using VR systems before. This project was a matter of learning and designing at the same time.

Physical considerations were much more important since it was a fully immersive experience. Motion sickness was an important factor so understanding information as quickly as possible as key. Menu options were kept on one level as much as possible to allow for quick selection. 
 

VR is rife with possibilities for inclusive design. I would include options for people with limited mobility to still use the system such as the ability. I would tap into how mobile VR UX to create a blended experience.Additionally, I would consider more ways to mitigate motion sickness. Perhaps allowing the world to blur or slow when menus are activated.