Wormhole Labs
an experience in mixed reality applications
Wormhole is a mixed reality platform that merges the real world with the virtual world.
Wormhole Labs has developed a planet-scalable technology engine that allows people and businesses to teleport & zoom in and immerse themselves LIVE virtually anywhere in the world, to walk around and experience, interact, crowdsource, buy, and conduct commerce as if they are physically there. The integrated payment system makes these financial transactions very easy for users.
“Here Mode” and “There Mode”
While I have many projects I could showcase, I think my work on Wormhole’s “Here Mode” and “There Mode” accurately represents the type of imagination, creativity, and critical thinking that went into my time at this startup.
Wormhole’s primary goal was to allow users to be virtually anywhere in the world and interact in that location through augmented reality. Wormhole’s application followed two branches of experiences a user could have, interacting in the space you physically were located (Here Mode) and interacting in the space where you physically were not (There Mode). In both of these modes, users could use Wormhole to chat with other avatars, buy items, and access entertainment within that space.
360 Capture
One of the ways Wormhole planned to create these virtual environments, was by encouraging users to use our 360 capture feature to capture the physical space around them to then be added to the virtual world. This images show my initial planning around how this userflow could play out.
Mockups
To further demonstrate this concept, I came up with a storyline to help understand the process. In this storyline, Wormhole user Adam enters a coffee shop near his home in California called Coffee Bean. He decides to take a 360 capture of Coffee Bean, hoping it will be added to Wormhole’s virtual world. He takes a 360 panoramic photo and sends it to Wormhole to be verified and uploaded. Once Adam’s 360 capture of the shop is uploaded, it will be accessible to anyone on Wormhole.
There Mode
A month later, Adam’s roommate Kelly is currently on a trip to New York City. She opens her Wormhole app, searches Adam’s location, and sees in “There Mode” that he is at Coffee Bean. Through Wormhole, Kelly buys Adam a coffee as a way to say hello. This order will go through Coffee Bean’s ordering system and be delivered to Adam in person at his real-life location. Below are my high-fidelity concepts showing how this scenario might play out.
Next Steps
After designing these wireframes and presenting them to our design team and upper management, we decided that the next steps would be the following:
Create a list of criteria in which to approve 360 captures
Make in-depth plans as to how “There Mode” search will operate
Test 360 capture processes and search via user testing and focus groups