Ruben Montanez

Mira is an AI-integrated innovative mirror technology that helps public speakers become more engaging and competent communicators.

Many people are afraid to speak in public. This is usually natural to everyone. The only way to overcome this fear is to gradually speak in front of a small group and then to a large group. However, sometimes it is not easy to find those groups.

This project was one of my favorite activities. It fits my philosophy of the educational product. I believe knowledge can be accessible everywhere and not be intrusive at the same time. It has to be visually accessible and present naturally in our daily activities. I think we will have smart mirrors in the near future in every home because it’s attractive to the eyes and present certain magic.

Mira helps by displaying different amounts of audiences in front of you. Then it records your speech and scans your body language and the tone of your voice. After that, Mira will give feedback on how to improve your speech.

Go Griffith provides crowd density information for the visitors of Griffith Park to make informed decisions and enjoy nature safely.

The COVID-19 pandemic may have brought many changes to how we live our lives, and with it, uncertainty, altered daily routines, financial pressures, and social isolation. We were worried about getting sick and how long the pandemic would last. Information overload, rumors, and misinformation can make our life feel out of control and make it unclear what to do. Even deciding to go to Griffith became complicated for fear of being in a massive crowd and possibly getting infected by Covid 19.

We learned that while people want to get outside, they consistently find themselves in situations where they don’t feel comfortable once they arrive. Visitors to Griffith Park expressed their concerns about getting outside safely. Several people told us stories of going somewhere and leaving right away because it was too crowded. Through secondary research, the more choices and control people have, the safer they feel. Our survey showed that almost 90% of people would be interested in knowing how crowded a place was before visiting. We try to figure out how best to show the crowd density data. We created a survey to test different types of visualizations to help us determine which ones would be most helpful to the users and why.

The first one we chose is the density heat map, which 90% of survey respondents found helpful because it clearly shows people's distribution. Many people are already familiar with this type of design. We also found that 93% of respondents thought still footage from security cameras was valuable because it is most accessible for people to understand and provides trust. After all, they showed real people in the actual space. Currently, people are using online searches and forums to gauge how safe or crowded outdoor areas are.

We wanted to create a nostalgic game that drew on our student experience.

This project doesn't represent a specific problem. Our teacher's challenge is to create a game and a game controller. Create a world and a story for the game, clearly outlining the players' goals and scoring system.

We rethink physical interaction with the controller to translate to the graphical representation of the movement on the screen. Rotating the potentiometer to the left or right makes the player move in two directions. Two buttons activate two main functions of the players: submit homework assignments or shield with CTRL C+V for a shortcut. The user mental model has some constraints/possibilities by submitting more homework assignments to score more class points. Missing the assignments will deduct points and count as a missing assignment.

We make a game where students can choose one of the three simple genres: ping-pong, runner, or shooter - or create your own. It needs to have a scoring system and a failure state. Win state is not required - it could be just a game for the score, but it's certainly a possibility. We made a custom controller for the game by thinking primarily about the layout of the game and the functions of the sensors.