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National Park Service

  • ux/ui
  • app
  • accessibility

Designing a personalized digital experience

The National Park Service (NPS) was planning a new mobile app for two distinct audiences: the casual trip-planner exploring the organization's 420+ parks from home, and the in-person visitor looking for maps, things to do, and other information in real time. NPS selected Media Fusion to design the user interface of the app, and to help shape this complex user experience.

Using an iterative design process and regular stakeholder discussions, we created a set of 40+ static design files, an interactive prototype, and a style guide. The result is a seamless experience that drives engagement with the broader NPS brand and each of its iconic destinations.

Designs for the various UI states of the Find a Park view

The portrait tablet version of the Find a Park view

The landscape tablet version of the Find a Park view

Prototyping

Later in the process, we used web development tools to turn our static designs into an interactive prototype of the app. When designing a digital experience through static images, it can be difficult to define animations and navigation patterns unambiguously. The prototype gave NPS firsthand experience with the intended digital experience. We also conducted usability testing with the prototype, which provided valuable feedback before entering the app development stage.

The final static design for the park preview

An early mockup of the park preview animation
A later iteration of the park preview in our interactive prototype

Style guide

After building a prototype, we were able to reuse its stylesheet as the basis for a style guide directed at future designers and developers working with the app. The style guide documented branding and component styling and provided guidelines for layout.

Color information in the style guide

The documentation for button elements in the style guide

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