VR’s design process isn’t that far off from a typical user-centered design approach. It’s all about continuous discovery and iterative improvements. Here you’ll discover the key stages of the design process, how to define, make and learn, so that you can create successful experiences from the get-go.

Your VR design process is going to look a little different from what you’re used to if you have a background in user experience design—or UX design. But before we get into it, let’s get some more context on the VR landscape, some considerations to ponder, and learn what a renowned filmmaker, Steven Spielberg, has to say about the medium.

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Steven Spielberg famously once said that, "I think we're moving into a dangerous medium with virtual reality." He said, "The only reason I say this is because it gives the viewer a lot of latitude not to take direction from the storytellers but to make their own choices of where to look." And what he's talking about is the shift from third- person storytelling or third-person experiences
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to *first-person experiences*. Remember that word 'agency' – of giving the user *control*, of letting them choose their own adventure with the story. And at first when Steven Spielberg said this, I thought he was saying that VR was dangerous and that this was dangerous. But I think what he meant was that it's dangerous because you as the designer potentially might not do this well and the user can get lost or you don't guide them anymore;
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they might fall off the experience. So, it's important to do what we can to give our users that deliberate first-person experience and to design their agency appropriately, their control. I like to say where AR (Augmented Reality) offers a touch of magic, VR offers the potential for *deep magic*. And I say 'the potential' again because it depends how you use it.
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Remember, the enemy here is *boring* and we don't want to bore our users with such a cool technology.

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Ready Player One

The Iterative Design Process for VR

Let’s get into the VR design process. In this video, Frank Spillers, Founder of Experience Dynamics, gives a broad overview of what the VR design process looks like and what elements make up a VR experience.

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Let's look at these two scenarios for a minute: Adam starts his project. He has a great idea. He starts by diving into Unity or Unreal. He grabs some pre-built geometry. He starts testing his prototype; and he asks a colleague to check it out. That's a pretty general approach to creating VR worlds. I want you to think instead of this scenario: so, Peter starts his VR project.
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He starts with a great idea. Then he starts by interviewing users and getting ideas from their problem space, from their real-life experience. After looking at his data, he creates personas and story art, mapping out all the emotions the users will encounter. Next, he grabs some strings, some tape and paper and starts mocking up affordances for his experience. Then he starts testing his prototype and asks three to five users he interviewed to play with his concept.
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He refines the prototype and asks them to keep providing feedback throughout. That's the *new flow* that will yield you much better results. And that brings together the difference between what you may have started with before you took this class and where we are now. So, let me give you a *visual checklist*. Let's start out with as we begin to design. So, we did a little user research; we brought in
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some real-world ideas, and now we're sitting down, ready to design. So, the first thing is *scene approach*. It's that first 30 seconds that are crucial. Remember *presence* – feeling like you're there – and *immersion*, deepening in. So, that's the goal, that first 30 seconds – that's really what you want to do. In a movie, you get like 15-20 minutes, but hey, it's VR. So, we think of it, that *affordance canvas*.
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So, think of the affordances that you'll provide, the hints and tips that you may have around those. Think of the *point of view* that the user has to take. Will you give them first person or third person? Will you change that in order to change your story beat, your story flow – the emotion? Speaking of story beat and flow, remember that *story arc* – you know – where you start out introducing the scene, there's some conflict, there's some tension, and then there's the resolution.
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Think of playing with that as you develop a story flow, as the user goes through and as you develop a story beat, those kind of actions and reactions – the way that the story responds to the user. And finally there's the *menus*, so the menus, dialogues: are they going to be body-locked? Like, where the user can pull them out? Or is it going to be world-locked where the menus are out in the world?
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*Interactive visualizations* might go in this too where you've got a visualization, maybe you adjust it, turn it up, turn it down, reshuffle the data – whatever the case may be. Think about those *emotions, sound and movement* – ESM. So, the role of emotions and sound, and they build on each other. The sound can give you emotion, and movement, and movement can give you emotion as well. *Sound and movement together*, such as running away from a gremlin, can give you ESM.
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Remember if you're doing *social UIs*, you've got social signifiers, the focus point where you bring people together, shared behaviors and tasks and that feeling of being together in this virtual environment. The first thing I want you to do when you're designing *any* kind of VR experience is to *walk the scene*. What do I mean by that? I mean just get up and start physically walking around. Where is the user going to walk to? What is going to happen?
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Start imagining, and then you can even build in – you know – low-tech is totally fine: scissors, string, the kind of design thinking toolkit is what we use. But walking that scene is really critical. The physical space, the distance to objects and menus: what that's going to be like? Are they going to reach out? Is it going to be here? Is it going to be too weird? Are they going to be looking down while the menu is going to be down, down, down or the head looking down, down here, like I've seen in a lot of VR UIs.
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You can make a simulation of this, like a UI simulation. You can make a little video recording of all your flow sequences. Think of it like a *storyboard*, like a video storyboard, and *walking and doing improv*. So, with your fellow designers, your fellow team, your content people. And as you demo, think about what all that requires and because you're really looking for that *comfort level* as you deliver your content: you really want navigation and things like that to be secondary.
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So, let's start by doing a little – let's get hands-on with a hand-washing VR piece. So, remember during pandemics and things the importance of washing hands. It actually turns out that in hospitals hand washing is one of the most important sanitation methods. So, here I've got a hand washing – it's an illustration like an infographic. And this is the kind of thing you might find in a hospital. The goal of this –
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the users are med students who are just coming into medicine or existing healthcare practitioners who need to be reminded. Now, how would you bring this to life? What would you do here? Here's a scene. It's like a med operating room; here are some tools. What would you do? Think again about the affordances, think about that first 30 seconds, how to engage them. And maybe you show them that illustration, the one, the infographic, the step-by-step.
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And then it's like, do it now. So, their task is to do all those steps. So, first you have the first one: wet your hands and use the brush. So, they pick up the virtual brush, the affordance. But what can you do to make this more interesting? Because it's a basic task; it's serious, it's healthcare, it's not entertainment. But how could you make it a little better? You know – maybe there's sound you can introduce. Maybe there's movement you can introduce. And then finally how would you kind of *bring this story to life*?

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How to make an AR portal with Spatial Audio in Unity in 2 Hours

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Checking Out UltraWings 2 VR In The Meta Quest 2

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMTKU01cjdc&ab_channel=DanielYarmoluk

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OpenSpriter - paper prototype [2-2]

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Iterative design—or user-centered design—is a major approach, and a powerful “force,” that helps designers shape their efforts well, and what it revolves around is the philosophy of constant refinement and improvement. When you structure your design approach around it, it helps you make sure that what you produce as the end result aligns seamlessly with your users’ needs and expectations. How you get to that isn’t through a linear path, but it’s from taking a cycle of creation, testing, learning, and adjustment—with stages feeding into each other as you need until you get there with your design solution.

Another point about this methodology is that it draws from the understanding that user preferences and technology evolve over time, which is a vital truth about design, technology, and people’s expectations for sure. Feedback is what feeds the engine of your design efforts, and you can spot and rectify issues early on if you—on a repeated basis—seek out user feedback and integrate it into the design process, which makes for a more comfortable and engaging experience.

An illustration showing the iterative design process with the words 'define, learn, make'. — The Define, Make, and Learn process empowers you to embrace iteration, creating user-centric VR experiences that captivate.
© Interaction Design Foundation, CC BY-SA 4.0

Table of contents

Define, Make, and Learn

Define, Make, and Learn

The VR iterative design process consists of three key stages—Design, Make, and Learn—and they’re stages that form an interconnected cycle that ensures you’ve got a user-friendly and continuously improved VR design. Keep your users front of mind at all stages! Make a point of talking to them, conducting user research, and getting feedback every step of the way.

This process will vary from person to person and project to project. Some of the steps, points, and activities mentioned below may not occur in your first iteration, and some may only pop up in your third or fourth iteration. Don’t let idealism, perfectionism, or rigidity get in the way of making progress!

Define Stage

In the Define stage of VR design, you’re rather like a detective who’s gathering clues and picking up a trail that will lead you to your quarry. For the Define part, you’re going to have to determine what the core purpose is for your VR experience—and it could be, for example, entertainment, education, or training. Then, you’ll need to decide on what the focus of your VR experience is—for instance, is it narrative driven, about skills development, or about training users? And so, you move on to define the goals and objectives you’ll need to bring on board—and for that you’re going to have to consider both user needs as well as business objectives (as in, your brand’s).

Last—but definitely not least—you’ll show your prowess as a sleuth when you do UX research, or conduct user research, to determine needs, expectations, and capabilities that are related to VR experiences, and you’ll find that the research element is going to pay massive dividends when it comes to testing what you build, as it should embody what users need and expect.

Make Stage

Now you’re on to the fun part, and it’s here where you’ll get to design and build your VR experience and move on in earnest from the foundations you’ve laid with strong research—so, start with prototypes and develop your virtual world, objects, and interactions. Once you’ve got a prototype to test, test your VR experience as you make it using VR hardware—and get the testing in nice and early.

Do be sure to use existing frameworks and tools to simplify the process for yourself and your design team—as it’ll not just make things smoother as you go but make for better results in the long run too. Perform a task analysis so you define tasks and user actions, explore design specifications using sketches and diagrams, and—not least because you’ll be subject to the laws of the VR world you want to make—think hard about your VR system requirements, specifications, and limitations that you’re working with.

Once you’ve completed the first steps of the Make stage, you can—and should—begin prototyping!

Here is where you will:

Conceptualize and ideate: You’re going to generate ideas and concepts for your VR experience, and you’ll brainstorm innovative ways to leverage VR’s unique capabilities so you can enhance the user experience and get things optimized for your users. What’s more, this is where you’ll develop the tasks and interactions that your experience is going to have in it. Last—but not least—it’s here where you’ll map out your narrative for the VR experience.
Excel at spatial design and interaction design: Now it’s time to focus on spatial design and consider the virtual environment, object placement, and user movement within the VR experience you provide for users. You’ll need to design intuitive and natural interactions that run in line with the user’s physical movements and gestures—and think hard about comfort, safety, and what sorts of abilities users need to have to use controls, move, and do things (and we’ll look at accessible design—a vital thing to consider—in a moment, too). And then you’ll need to develop and implement user-friendly navigation and control mechanisms, ones that are both easy to learn and use for users within the VR environment.
Prototype and iterate: This is where the fun starts in earnest, and you get to create low-fidelity prototypes to test and iterate on design concepts—and do it fast. To get the results in, you’ll need to do usability testing sessions and then incorporate user feedback and observations from those so you can refine and improve the VR experience and keep things on course with good, solid data-driven design. Then, you can switch things up to create high-fidelity prototypes and so get the ultimate experience you’re going for across to the people you test it with—and usability tests with high-fidelity VR prototypes will give you even more precious insights because they’re so effective. Then, once you’ve got all the insights gathered up, you can—insightfully—iterate on the design and so be sure you make necessary adjustments that both enhance usability and user satisfaction to the highest levels you can get them to.

A man sitting in front of two computer monitors, designing a VR experience with VR application, Unreal Engine. — Once you’re further along in your design process, you can create high-fidelity prototypes with programs like Unreal or Unity.

Learn Stage

During the Learn stage, you’ll need to research, test, and collect feedback so you can make meaningful adjustments and iterate on your design to improve it. This is where it pays to learn from other VR projects and collaborate with experts so you can make your project the best it can be—and it’s best to prioritize feedback and refine your design in line with it so you can improve—if not optimize—the user experience.

Now, you’re learning about things in detail, so you’re going to conduct more in-depth research to understand more about your target audience, their needs, expectations, and capabilities—everything about them that’s relevant to what they need, can use, and can get delighted at. That is why you’ll test your experience with target users and get in further insights on their behaviors, expectations, and pain points of your VR experience—so you can smooth out kinks while you learn more about the exact nature of what users are after in a design, plus you’ll need to consider factors such as your users’ age, skill level, and familiarity with VR, whatever’s relevant. And it’s also at this stage of the process where you collaborate with Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) and other experts to get an accurate evaluation of your design and how well it can address what’s called for—like through heuristic evaluations.

Other Important Considerations for Your Design Process

User comfort: Always think about how comfortable users will be while experiencing your VR—not least because safety comes first!—and be sure to avoid things that might make them dizzy or uncomfortable.
Storytelling: If your VR has a story or a narrative element (which is best practice, anyway), think about how you’ll tell it through the experience—and it could be through visual cues, audio, or a combination of the two.
Visuals and audio: Pay attention to the visual and audio elements, not least because they’re the primary parts of catapulting users into your virtual reality so that it’s “real” to them. So, the sight and sound elements should match the theme and create an immersive experience for users to enter, stay in, and enjoy.
Feedback: Design ways for users to know what’s happening and so that they’re not just passive observers—like, for example, if they interact with an object, there should be a response that indicates the interaction such as their picking up a bunch of keys, complete with the sound of the metal clanking.
Testing: Continuously test your VR with real users—and their feedback is more than just valuable for you to improve your experience with; it’s nothing short of crucial!
Accessibility: Make sure you’ve got an accessible design by considering the needs of users with disabilities—because everyone should be able to enjoy your VR experience—so make sure you’ve put in appropriate accommodations within your VR experience.

The Take Away

The VR design process shows how important it is to engage in iterative design, and its interconnected stages of Define, Make, and Learn establish a dynamic cycle—not a linear step-by-step path—and it’s got refinement and user needs at its core. It’s something that doesn’t just highlight the power of spatial design and emphasize the creation of intuitive interactions and seamless navigation, but it reinforces how vital it is to do continual testing and adjustment so you can ramp up the user satisfaction factor, too.

Remember that crafting VR experiences with iterative design is a bit like making a sculpture in three dimensions—and you’ll find there’s an ongoing journey of learning, adjustments, and—ultimately—the point where you create extraordinary virtual worlds. How much users—and customers—will love those VR worlds and keep coming back to them for more delights is going to depend on how well you craft and implement strong VR best practices and fuse them with creative zest, but do it well and you can bring experiences home to the people who love being in them time after time after time.

References and Where to Learn More

Jason Jerald’s book, The VR Book: Human-Centered Design for Virtual Reality provides an in-depth exploration of the Define, Make and Learn process.

Read Adobe XD’s article about the intersection of UX and VR and what informs the design process.

This video from Google I/O 2016 discusses the VR design process, including the iterative design process.

The Journey of the UX Design Process in VR

The Iterative Design Process for VR

Define, Make, and Learn

Define Stage

Make Stage

Learn Stage

Other Important Considerations for Your Design Process

The Take Away

References and Where to Learn More

UX Design for Virtual Reality

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The Journey of the UX Design Process in VR

The Iterative Design Process for VR

Define, Make, and Learn

Define Stage

Make Stage

Learn Stage

Other Important Considerations for Your Design Process

The Take Away

References and Where to Learn More

UX Design for Virtual Reality

Get Weekly Design Insights

Topics in This Article

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