#benchmark analysis

[designandsystems]

Benchmark Analysis - Corning Museum of Glass Candice Lin

Description

It is a mobile web app designed to function as a native iOS app. It provides basic information about the logistics of the museum, the collections, contact info, social media links, as well as an option to access the full web page. It is designed to be a companion piece to use while on site.

Analysis

Information architecture: There is a clear structure in how information is organized. The menus and content are framed in a box while navigations are accessible from the header and social media links in the footer. The main navigation buttons are "back" to bring he user to the previous level/screen and "home" to return to the home page with the main menu.

Visual design: Limited in colours, black and grey for text and blue, the only colour, for highlighting hyperlinks. There is a lot of text and very little images or videos which is not the most appropriate when a visitor may wish to view a preview of a collection before visiting. There is a clear hierarchy between body content and main page title. However, within the body content there is little usage if subheadings to distinguish long body text to titles such as event names and descriptions. This creates legibility issues and may result in a longer time for the user to find necessary information.

Usability: While buttons and menus are clearly labeled in most pages, there are too many levels embedded to navigate to access the necessary information. This can easily frustrate the user.

Content: Providing the schedule of the current date is convenient for visitors to access information quickly. Audio tours are also a useful feature to include as some visitors may be visually impaired. 

[designandsystems]

Benchmark Analysis – Château Ramezay Julie Barkun

Description

What it is: A website with information on Château Ramezay, a historic site and living museum in Montréal.

Who uses it: Potential and regular visitors to the museum, school groups and organizations

Why do they use it: For information on new activities and temporary exhibitions, or if looking for contact information, location and admission prices.

Analysis

Information architecture: Navigation is clear and easily located. All content is in the same section of the website so the user isn’t searching for the information. Heirarchy of information is well laid out.

Visual design: Color scheme is consistent and makes sense with the elements. The logo (especially text within the logo) looks a little squished where it is located.  

Usability:  The website is easily accessible on the computer, but there is no mobile version so viewing on a phone or tablet could be easier. Social media links (facebook, twitter and tripadvisor) are easily located on the home page. There are a lot of pages that could be condensed. The navigation banner, though nicely labeled and clean, has hover effects that take some getting used to in order to navigate properly.

Content: Detailed information about the museum, their collections, and current and upcoming exhibitions. There is a calendar of activities that is on the front page but could be made to be a little more relevant. There are social media links for more up-to-date information.

Final Verdict

The navigation effects really bothered me while looking through the site, and I think delaying the hover effect may be a problem for users who don’t know they have to hover and wait a second for the next dropdown to appear. Other than this and the slightly squished logo, the information is presented nicely and the whole website has a clean, modern feeling. It could benefit from a responsive layout for mobile sizes rather than a fixed layout.

[designandsystems]

Benchmark Analysis – Canadian Museum of Civilization Julie Barkun

Description

What it is: Companion iPhone app with audio tours, visuals and visitor information

Who uses it: Visitors while in the museum

Why do they use it: To have self-guided tours in various languages

Analysis

Information architecture: Simple and logical. Headings and navigation are larger than the body text, and elements (back button, page title and audio) are intuitively placed. The main image always comes after the top navigation elements and before audio guide content.

Visual design: Clean. There are no unnecessary elements. Colors are kept to a minimum outside of the main images so the user isn’t distracted from the content. Typography is all sans-serif, most likely Helvetica or Arial. Sufficient padding is given to the various elements; nothing is really switched together. There could be more padding on the top and bottom of the titles of locations within the museum.

Usability:  The user isn’t searching for anything. With little on the pages to distract from the content and with it’s clean design, the app is easy to navigate. Only downside I could see is that the user has to search for the section of the audio guide they want out of a list of locations. If they don’t know which part of the museum they’re in, it could be troublesome.

Content: Basic information on each location of the museum is presented in text form, while there is a more detailed audio guide available. The content is available in four languages: English, French, German and Mandarin. There is also ‘visitor information’ about the museum itself.

Final Verdict

The app is simple but effective for what it’s intended for. It’s a nice companion piece for a visitor in the museum if they want to have a self-guided tour, but aside from the audio guides it doesn’t offer much else.

[designandsystems]

Benchmark Analysis – Muskoka Heritage Place Yanchao Hao

1. Description

It is a website developed to provide important information of the village such as location, hours of operation, admission fees, and amenities. It caters to a wide audience, though mostly towards families. Includes attraction information as well as rental information for corporate or school events. For the purposes of this analysis, I will remain within the Museum tab at the top right of the page.

2. Analysis

Information architecture: Structure and hierarchy are not quite clear. There exist Four sets of navigation menus, one at the top right, top center, one underneath the first as a contextual nav based on which page you’re on. The last being the left-hand nav for sections within the second menu.

Visual design: Fairly clean and consistent. There is good contrast in colour and typography between different headings and body copy. The overall colour scheme consists of two colours: red and green, plus white, black and grey. It looks and feels like a standard run-of-the-mill website, with a more breathable layout: good use of white space. The images are sometimes squashed and stretched when in carousel widgets.

Usability: The multiple menus is a little confusing, but the larger grey menu lets the user easily know where the are, along with the location in word form. Most information is within one click.

Content: Information is mostly written form with few visuals and pictures here and there. It feels like the designers wanted to make sure the audience could get as much information before arriving as possible.

Conclusion

The overall look and feel is okay, with good use of white space, but too much of the information is in text format. It feels fine for an adult audience, but not necessarily interesting enough for families to view. Definitely needs better pictures.

[designandsystems]

Benchmark Analysis – Canadian War Museum Candice Lin

Description

It is a native iOS developed to provide important information of the museum such as location, hours of operation, admission fees, and amenities; help guide visitors through the museum via an interactive floor map; engage visitors to participate in trivia and quizzes to enhance the learning experience.

Analysis

Information architecture: Structure and hierarchy are clear. Titles and headings are clearly labeled. The main menu allows for four options: highlights tour and quiz, floor plans, visitor information, and about the application. Navigating to one level deeper, the user is allowed to either navigate to the main menu, view the floor plans/map, or enter barcode/code for interactive activities.

Visual design: Clean, consistent, and follows the iOS UI. There is good contrast in colour and typography between different headings and body copy. Limiting the colour palette to 3 colours (in addition to black, white, and grey for body text and headings) eliminates confusion and creates hierarchy; red as a highlight for headings and yellow as a highlight for the numbering system.

Usability: Easy to navigate to different pages.

Content: Information (both written and audio (?)) of different exhibitions and features are included to give insights to the viewer prior to or during their visit. Each page of the museum highlights allows the user to share its information, view related quiz questions, or locate in the museum.

[designandsystems]

Benchmark Analysis – American Museum of Natural History Dana Dinh

This mobile app (I am running this under iOS 7.0.4) is predominantly a wayfinding app to be used within the museum. This is designed for any patrons going to American Museum of Natural History. Instead of using a map or relying solely on the signages, the patrons can simply whip out their phone and press on whatever place they want to look for. This is not only very convenient but also quite compact considering the things that they might carry (cameras, children, etc.).

As soon as I opened the app, I was greeted by a gorgeous photo of a T-Rex skeleton. Then, right after, I was ask to either allow or disallow this app from using location services.

The contents are organized by four main categories: Direction (can be argued as a home page as it’s the first thing that shows up after the splash screen) Map Bookmarks Info

In terms of visual design, the typography is generally consistent with the use of the same font (a san-serif typeface) and weight. The colour scheme for this app is predominantly black, grey, and white with subtle gradients. They also used blue as an accent colour. As for the graphics, the photographs appear to be consistently high quality. However, the same cannot be said with the buttons and parts of the text as they have fuzzy edges. This in a sense can be pretty off-putting for those with better attention to detail. For non-designers, this is not the issue.

Usability is generally not a big issue as it has feedback (for instance, you can see that you are in a page based on the black link). It is also predictable as in if a user were to press a button, it will do what is expected. In regards to the audio tours,

I think the app is only effective at a specific location (in American Museum of Natural History). Since I am not at that place, I cannot give a fair evaluation of its accuracy. However, I find it quite easy to use the app since the functions does what it’s supposed to do.

It is also worth noting that there can be some limitations with using the location services as the users in question may or may not have access to cellular data. This is more prevalent to more travel savvy tourists who might want to save money from using cellular data.

[designandsystems]

Benchmark Analysis – Museum of Modern Art Dana Dinh

The MoMA app is used not just as an app to check on current MoMA events and its schedule, but it also acts as a personal tour guide when in the museum and also provide various information of the artist and their works. Users can buy tickets through this app too.

People who are interested in the arts use this app. They probably use it if they are curious about what information there is at the palm of their hands. This can be especially useful if they are not sure about what work they can check out or if they happened to plan things last second.

The content is divided into 5 main categories

Calendar It contains schedules to various events and the option to buy tickets. 

Tours One can select different languages for audio tours. However, you must have your earphones for it to work.

Art Contains an exhaustive amount of information pertaining to all the arts that are exhibited along with the artists who created them. 

Info Contains information pertaining to hours of operation, locations, floor plan, contact information, etc.

More  It contains miscellaneous things.

For the colour scheme, they are generally bright and saturated except for the last part. This can be much more off putting if they don’t have similar brightness and throw in warmer colours.

Typography is legible, consistent in its style (so bold san-serif typeface is used).

Oddly enough, the interface has a similar feel to the older iOS user interface design with its use of soft gradient, high contrast (black text on white background). Had it weren’t for the artworks and MoMA logo, one can simply dismiss this app as another iOS app.

Overall, the app works the way it is supposed to. However, what really ticks me off is how for certain things, they open another app externally. For instance, when I want to buy tickets, I cannot do it in app. Rather, it opens up my web browser (Safari mobile) to buy it.

I can understand that though an app like this is content-heavy, it can benefit from keeping it within the app.

Certain functions are not necessary such as the More page. I can only imagine art aficionados (or rather MoMA aficionados) using such a page.