home shopping network on microsoft media center

Client

Home Shopping Network (through Schematic)

Challenge

The Home Shopping Network came to Schematic to help form a new image as an innovative company that caters to early adopters and stay-at-home moms alike. Having mastered one form of interavtive television (aka call and order) they were ready to take a step into the realm of emerging technology. With videos for all their products readily available in their databse, HSN was the perfect candidate to be the first consumer product shopping site on Microsoft Media Center.

Solution

A very new kind of shopping media format that utilizes spacial navigation in a 10-foot entertainement and shopping experience. Users can watch the HSN live feed, a themed channel or simply browse for products - all from the comfort of their living room couches.

The original demo movie is presented here. This demo was the vision for HSN for both me and the team, but was alterend due to technical contraints. You can view the actual implemention on any MCE Vista machine.

Process

As the sole User Experience Designer on the project, I worked with a team consisting of a Creative Director, Graphic Designer, Animator, Solutions Architect and a Project Manager. For the first two months, I lead the Discovery Phase of the project in which we met with the client to fully understand his needs and the needs and interests of the users. We explored a variety of interaction models before finalizing one. We then entered Architecture Phase which consisted of developing the work flow for a series of use cases, creating wireframes and then, finally the functional specifications. In order to ensure a smooth changeover to the Development Team, I spent an intense week in Costa Rica reviewing the project and affirming complete understanding amongst all parties involved. Here is a sample of some of the deliverables that came out of the various phases of the project.

Page from preliminary content audit:

Initial organization model:

An initial static interaciton model:

One of the many storyboards necessary to demonstrate the motion transitions required:

Page from functional spec:

 

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