Monday, January 28, 2013

Quickie TLV - The Movie




Quickie TLV is an innovative application for people who want to discover Tel-Aviv through the eyes of well-known opinion leaders residents of the city.
It was previewed while delivering our presentation at the end of the semester. 
Hope you’ll enjoy the movie…

Sunday, January 27, 2013

Final Presentation

This was the second time presenting our project. 

The first time was in front of our mentors and people who are also in the application business world. As written a few posts back, we got a lot of feedbacks. The main feedback at that time was about the actual use of "gems" as our main feature. We were told that it would be hard for us to compete with big companies who have a well-known name in the trip application business. 

The second time we presented was in front of mentors and people who work at the "Essence of Life" from the Arison business philanthropic group. The group is a non profit organization which strives to arouse awareness and to enable each and every one of us to listen to our unique voice, choose our path, be whole with our choices and live in peace within ourselves. 

After the second presentation we got some great feedbacks and some on how to improve our project and the main thing was about the name of our application - they thought the name doesn't suit the purpose and the need of the app. 

We're still trying to decide on a new name for the app, no great ideas yet, but we will update it as soon as possible. 















First draft of UI screens

These are two examples of the first UI app screens made by the product department.
Choose Your time...
You and the nearest gems in the city.
Choose one and see what hides behind each gem.


Checking out our competition


While brainstorming the idea, deciding on the main features, drawing rough sketches of the main concept screens, we had to check out our competition.

Today, it feels like everything was already invented and we have no chance of creating a new idea. That's what makes this stage of the progress so important. 

These are the main application competitions all over the world.
* Stray Boots - an application which discovers the coolest parts of the your city in a fun, interactive way with no reservations, no set schedule, and no Debbi Downers. Founded in New York City, using a mobile technology and smart clever content to explore the city. 
Available on the AppStore (not free).

* City Quest - Every city has its secrets. Imagine being given the key to unlock and discover them. Embarking on the CityQuest™ game experience will transform the player into a true adventurer discovering the city, its history and hidden mysteries.

* TripAdvisor - Plan and have your perfect trip with TripAdvisor. With over 75 million candid reviews and opinions by travelers, TripAdvisor makes it easy to find the best hotels, great restaurants, and fun things to do, wherever you go. Our robust flight search helps you find airfare deals, even on the go. And booking options for hotels, restaurants, and airfare are just a tap away. 

What makes us so unique is the fact that our application is in Hebrew and all of our data information will come directly from well-known opinion leaders who live in Tel-Aviv. These people will share with us and our future app users their secret places, the best attractions  to visit while staying in Tel-Aviv. Further more, the user will determine how much time he has to spend in the city, and the app will help the user to make the best of the time he has to spend.

First came the diamonds...


We started with diamonds or gems as our main feature for our app.
Behind each gem hides a secret place in TLV...








Making progress


Every week we met with our own mentor - Ofer Shani.
He helps us focus on the product ideas in every way possible!
Thanks Ofer!! :)

Some art work that inspires us...


You have to check out this site! Ron Shoshani took some photos in Tel-Aviv and they look really artistic and absolutely amazing.
Enjoy…


Map of Tel-Aviv divided into sections

For those who don’t know, this is the map of Tel-Aviv divided into different sections: North, South, Center, City Heart and Jaffa.




We used this information to discover the secret places in each section.

A group shot





This project was produced by a group of interactive communication and computer science students. 
Our goal for this project is to revive the city of Tel-Aviv in a whole new way, with a unique application which will help people all around Israel discover the secret places in the city.


Ups and Downs

We forgot to tell you the whole story behind our product.

Working on this project has been a roller coaster ride. We've had our ups and our downs...
You start with an idea, which you think is absolutely amazing, something that no one has thought of before. The next stage is talking about this idea with friends, co-workers, family and you find out what others think of this idea. 
You do a little bit of research and you find out that someone else has already thought of this idea, and now it's not so amazing anymore. 


We actually started with a different idea, which was all based on music and how we can connect people through music to the city.  After 2 months working on this music app (Geotunes) we understood that this project is heading towards a dead end.
We came up with a new idea, a data based location app (don’t have a perfect name for it yet) which will help people discover new places in TLV. 

The roller coaster continued when we got different feedbacks from the mentors on this new idea of ours, and the project was changed a little bit to an app which shows secret places in Tel-Aviv, we called these places "diamonds". 
Diamonds or the gems of the city was the first main features for the app. 
We wanted to discover these secret gems by ourselves, but got more feedbacks from different mentors. The main feedback was about the data that we decide on, meaning how will we make our application different from any other application which suggest unique places and sites around the city.
Thats how we came up with this solution - the data for the app will come from well-known opinion leaders who all live in Tel-Aviv. Each leader will be questioned about his favorite places in the city. Questions such as “what is TLV for you?”, “what makes this city special?” “where is the best place to eat? and which is your favorite dish?” and so and so…
So with all of our ups and downs, changes with our product ideas, after having many slices of pizza (we have to eat at some point)…our main product characterized screens are almost ready for the designing stage…



















Concept Visualization


So we started the characterization process with a few simple drawings in order to let our ideas come out on paper…








Tel-Aviv...


Tel-Aviv is the center of Israel and everything outside of the city is considered “less hip”.
The city offers different attractions - history, culture, restaurants, nightlife, sightseeing, shopping and more.
Many of us don’t really know these places, but we want to discover them and enjoy our visit in the city.
This is a new way to discover these places with the QuickieTLV application.

First Meeting as a team




So our journey begins…
We sat down together for the first time as a group and everyone told their ideas.
We decided that many people all over Israel don’t really know how unique the city of Tel-Aviv really is, and so we came up with a new application.

What do you love about Tel-Aviv?