For the pilot Critical Practices course at UC Berkeley, my team's assignment was to design an interactive product for a specific community — in our case, AFX, the largest dance group at UC Berkeley. We observed practices and interviewed dancers to find that practices occasionally included freestyle circles as a learning method, but dancers felt intimidated or shy about dancing alone with a circle of up to a hundred peers watching.
Based on this user research, we designed Groovecube, an IoT device that facilitates freestyle circles without a crowd staring. The dancer presses the button, the LED light counts down five seconds as the dancer gets into position, and the speaker plays a segment of a song as the dancer freestyles. Groovecube stops automatically after the dancer's segment and is ready to be passed on to the next dancer. After all the different segments of a song are completed, Groovecube strings them together and posts the complete song on Youtube.
Based on this user research, we designed Groovecube, an IoT device that facilitates freestyle circles without a crowd staring. The dancer presses the button, the LED light counts down five seconds as the dancer gets into position, and the speaker plays a segment of a song as the dancer freestyles. Groovecube stops automatically after the dancer's segment and is ready to be passed on to the next dancer. After all the different segments of a song are completed, Groovecube strings them together and posts the complete song on Youtube.
I was responsible for the interaction design, product design, branding, and packaging. Our goals for Groovecube's casing were to make it lightweight and easy to pass to friends, protective of the hardware and resilient to being dropped or shoved in backpacks, simple and intuitive to use (there is only one button to start Groovecube, as no off button is necessary), and sleek to match the aesthetic of AFX.
The packaging shows three-step instructions on the back and a link to the Groovecube Youtube channel where completed songs are posted.
The packaging shows three-step instructions on the back and a link to the Groovecube Youtube channel where completed songs are posted.
Groovecube is shown here with unsealed seams so that our team could demonstrate the internal hardware, but in its completed form, all seams would be bonded with acrylic cement.
After presenting Groovecube to AFX, we received overwhelmingly positive feedback and suggestions to make multiple Groovecubes to build diverse freestyle communities around the world. One additional benefit we didn't foresee was that AFX would be able to use Groovecube to keep practicing together remotely during summer.
Credits to Mark Lam, Maya Hernandez, Ingrid Hong, Alice Pang, and Serena Chang. Special thanks to the best instructors we could ask for: Eric Paulos, Jill Miller, and Adam Hutz.
