Study Tunes
A radio music app designed for the hard working students spending their late study nights in the quiet.
About this project
Role
Ideation, Visuals, Development
Tools Used
Java/Kotlin, Photoshop
Overview
May 2022
When I was tasked with learning about targeted audiences and demographics by developing a product, I decided to tackle a problem a lot of students, including myself at the time faced while stuck at home during the pandemic; trying to stay focused. Especially staying focused on our work and knowing when we should give ourselves a break. So I focused my efforts on testing my, at the time, limited skills in app development to develop an application that would aim to help students keep track of how long they’ve worked for, when they should take breaks, and overall help them focus on their assignments.
Ideation & Development
The main goal of this project was to research and understand your audience demographic to produce the best fitting product for them. When ideating what features and problem Study Tunes would try to address, I interviewed college students both on my own campus and those who attended outside colleges. After I had interviewed 30+ students, I had come up with a common trend amongst the students I had interviewed: They felt that because they couldn’t focus and/or didn’t remember to take necessary breaks, they would burn out leading to lesser work quality, less output, and more stress on their end. There was a general want for a tool that won’t need to constantly reset (such as a stopwatch) just to track how long they’ve been working for. Instead, they want something that could manage itself and automatically remind them to take a break or when to get back to work. When having discussed music and or genre students would listen to while they worked, that’s when a mix of answers were given. Some students had specific tastes, others preferred sounds such as white noise or nature sounds, and others didn’t know what types of music could help them concentrate. By the end, I had put together a first draft proposal.
The following features of Study Tunes would address these audience’s needs and wants:
Different selections of music genre stations that have been proven to help reduce stress and increase focus. These different stations could be switched between at anytime, and offers a choice of ambience for the user.
Starting the app would require a one time set up that would never need to be set up again (unless the user decides to change it in settings). This would include working and break intervals that would automatically send a notification telling the user when its time to take a break, as well as keeping track of their total work time.
The app would also be multi-purpose, getting it use just beyond studying, such as the ability for it to be used as a standard radio station app, and be set for sleep usage.
Project Type
Mobile App Pitch & Prototype
Date Completed
Design & Development
After identifying the needs and wants of my targeted audience, I went about designing the app and developing it. When asking students about the time they get the most work done, the majority answer for the early evening to late into the night. So I keep in mind making an application that would be sensitive on the eyes, yet still eye catching for night time settings. An ‘aesthetic’ or color theming that was popular during the time was the vaporwave and pixelwave trend, so I decided to incorporate that well. After some design ideation and simple wireframing, I had come up with the general color scheme of the app, as well as came up with different schemes for the different music or sound genres. As well, I took inspiration from some pixel wave artists at the time and tried my hand at animating pixel artwork. In terms of development, I utilized android studio to develop the application and test it on my own personal android devices.
The Final Deliverables
At the end of this project, Study Tunes is now a fully functional app that was available in the beta stage for download on android devices. As well, a short pitch deck was put together. I would like to completely overhaul Study Tunes one day, interview a bigger audience group for more accuracy, and come back to developing it. But for now, it exists as my first official mobile app.
