Snapshot of the concept video
Responsibilities
Initial concept brainstorming, user journey, and CUI state iteration
Team
Maddy Cha, Allissa Chan
Duration
4 weeks
Tools
After Effects, Illustrator
Abbi is a concept animation for a conversational user interface designed to simplify the process of checking in and out of Airbnb.
Abbi streamlines the the check-in/out process of Airbnb through providing an easy, comprehensible visual interface. Abbi has six states based on it's core functionality as a check-in assistant.
Approach
What are the current features of Airbnb that can potentially benefit from a CUI?
Our team decided to create a user journey to get a better understanding of the end-to-end experience and the pain points of the users. Here, we identified the check-in/out process of Airbnb as the problem space we wanted to explore.
Journey map of the current Airbnb experience
Problem space
An absence of a consistent check-in procedure was a cause of frustration for both hosts and guests.
An app loved by 150 million users around the world, Airbnb connects millions of guest with the perfect stay for their occasions. Among the myriads of features Airbnb offers, check-in process is one of the most crucial step of the Airbnb experience. However, both the hosts and guests experience difficulty communicating the check-in procedure due to a lack of a universal check-in guideline. This is a major pain point for guests as this would often require them to install a new app i.e. Google Drive, Box, Dropbox.
We started by familiarizing ourselves with the concept of CUI through a series of motion studies.
As a way to familiarize ourselves with the concept of CUI, we start off our process with three simple motion exercises.
Exercise 1. Working with a single shape and color
Exercise 2. Introducing new shapes and color
Exercise 3. Motion mapping according to two categories of our team's choice
Explorations
We iterated on the visual concept of the of the CUI and created a storyboard for the video.
As a point of reference, we looked at the Airbnb's branding guideline. Once we narrowed down our focus to the check-in process of Airbnb, we began brainstorming the core states of our CUI. Similar to the steps taken for the motion studies, our concepts evolved from a simpler circular shape to a finalized concept of a location pin, which we agreed was a whimsical representation of Airbnb’s identity.
CUI concept exploration
Screen mocks for the video
Storyboard
Assets for the video created on Illustrator
Final outcome
As a result of the project, we delivered a 1-min motion graphic highlighting the six different states of our CUI in the context of a traveler using Abbi to check-in to the Airbnb. Once we were finished with creating the video, we looked for a welcoming, upbeat background music to accompany our video.
The final six states for Abbi
1 minute concept video created on After Effects
Impact
This project reminded me the importance of small details and the subtleties of the visual variables through  novel experience of designing an interaction by employing a series of shapes, colors, and motions inspired by human gestures. If I were to tackle this problem again, I want to employ a 'body-storming' ideation session of how individuals would act out the six states of Abbi to inspire our CUI motion states.
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