Amazon: XR Shopping

Context

New MxR browsers will unlock unique web capabilities to let websites be rendered as completely new experiences.

Amazon would like to create a Mixed Reality web experience that users can experience on an MxR device. While it isn’t feasible for Amazon to transform their entire website and full inventory into a mixed reality website within a few months, they have indicated an interest in creating a small micro experience within clothing and accessories. Amazon is open to ideas about what the experience may be.

Role

Lead Spatial UI/UX Designer

Techniques

UI/UX, 3D modeling, Concept design, Motion design, XR design

Framing

Problem:

How does Amazon take advantage of the unique benefits of Mixed Reality web browsing using a small sampling of their inventory, while appealing to a demographic that is likely unaware of the benefits of emerging technologies?

Solution:

A micro shopping experience that highlights new MR capabilities with a small subset of products that lend to contextual pre-visualization in the fashion category.

Scenario:

Who: Kaitlyn Adams | Age: 31 | Works in Management Consulting | Frequent Online Shopper | Not Tech Savvy

Where + When: Kaitlyn has heard about VR, AR, and MR technologies and is intrigued. However, she is not sure how it can be useful to her. She is interested in finding out more. Amazon is her go-to online shopping portal for specific items and general browsing. After seeing a pop-up MR event for a new Amazon experience in a mall, Kaitlyn decides to give it a go. After being fitted for the wearable and starting the preloaded Amazon experience, the header portion of the website that typically says ‘New and Interesting Finds...’ now says ‘Explore MR.’ A quick onboarding is initiated and Kaitlyn then selects the portion of this otherwise mostly traditional looking web interface. This launches the Amazon MR UI, a ‘native MR web experience.’

Discovery

The UI was based on the real-world metaphor of a clothing rack. Collections were based on themes and accompanied the main UI in a minimized state. Alexa was visualized as an AI companion that helps throughout the search, browse, and checkout process.

Details

3D Amazon branding, Alexa AI assistant, 3D affordances, scaled visualizations of paired outfits, and spatial interactions based on real-world scenarios.

Customizable Shoe UI

This customizable shoe UI utilized a rotating platform and diegetic paintbrushes, along with predefined color swatches. The concept was to show a scaled shoe in front of the user in MR that they can use brushes and swatches to customize.

Though the concept wasn’t fully flushed out - the next steps include: thinking through how the user interacts with the UI and shoe platform, how to switch between shoe styles, visualizing shoes on the user, and the checkout process.