RPI FIRSTS STORY SUBMISSIONS
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute is the oldest engineering school in America, and to celebrate their upcoming bicentennial, I worked with developers to create a website that was not only fun to interact with, but to record stories that are significant to the institutions history.
I worked on the page frames for every step of the user journey, from the hover states to the typography and branding. Working in unison with the developers, we collaborated on not just the aesthetics of the site, but also the functionality.
Homepage
User details
A big priority of this project was to collect user data in order to capture an understanding of who was uploading their stories. This information was going to prove useful to RPI as it continues to monitor users and school affiliate's level of enthusiasm for their bicentennial celebration.
This screen would also be where we could populate story details into the structured format of the homepage.
From the beginning, we knew that the star of the show needed to be the submissions that RPI alums were proud to share, particularly something they did for the first time while being a part of the RPI community.
In the early phases of brainstorming, we wanted to provide users with the opportunity to share those stories in as many formats as we could, particularly to increase site interaction. Once a user submitted their story, they would appear as a new hexagon on the homepage, and on hover, users could get the title of the story.
Submission
In order for users to tell their story, we provided them four avenues of doing so: to video record it, to speak it, to upload from their files, or to write it.
Record it
Users were able to record themselves on camera to capture their story. We designed a clean interface that also called back to the first bicentennial site for RPI with the use of the background pattern.
Upload it
Users could upload a prerecorded story from their own files, and play it back to make sure it's the right file before submitting.
Write it
Users could share a written story if they felt more comfortable off-camera.
Say it
Another off-camera option for users was to record an audio file.
Submitted
After users were happy with their recorded story, they would reach a confirmation page that captured the important details of their experience.