Good day for
Astro Pics
Description
This will be a iOS application that uses weather, light pollution, and moon cycle information to provide recommendations on the best times and dates for astrophotography based on the user’s specific location. The app will provide a quick view that shows the relevant information for astrophotography and provide an easily viewable recommendation on whether or not conditions are good, as well as push notifications for optimal conditions.
There isn’t currently an app available that provides this information and recommendation in an easily viewable format for the current date. The app will also include a calendar feature that provides the same recommendations for future dates to allow for better planning. The app will help astrophotographers know when the optimal time is for photography and help improve their photos.
Since the app will be used primarily by astrophotographers, there will also be a social component that will allow users to upload and share their photographs with other astrophotography enthusiasts.
Vision Statement: Make an application that will allow people who own SLR or DSLR cameras to take pictures of the Milky Way.
Designing Elements
My favourite aspect of this project was designing the weather images and all the different design elements. Seeing as how I was the person who does astrophotography, I saw it fit to design the elements myself. All of the apps that I used to use were extremely hideous, they were extremely detailed, but there was so much information it didn’t quite make it clear if it was good to go out and shoot. So I designed everything to be where I needed it.
Mood Phases
Headers
This is actually an important aspect of the design, because it quickly tells you if the conditions are good to capture the milky way. Most astronomy apps use a really contrasted set of colours that seemed to harsh for me. I am likely not going to be looking at the app when I have arrived at the location, so it isn’t necessary to have a night safe mode. I kept the colours soft since you are only going to be looking at the app from your home and kept it to two colours to keep it beginner friendly. Just opening the app should tell you if it’s worth going out.
Misc Elements
To stick with the same style as the rest of the app, I designed the rest of the elements of the app. The gear is meant to mimic the camera mode changer that you find on most SLR/D-SLR cameras. The camera setting will appear next to it, so I saw it fitting to keep it camera related. The settings button was meant to also change colours with the header, but there wasn’t enough time to add it in for the project.
Class Report
Motivation:
The issue a lot of beginners and professionals have when attempting to take astrophotography is finding the right location and going on a good day. There are avaliable tools to assist photographers, but if you are a beginner you are not too sure what information is important to consider and it is possible to be overwhelmed with the information some sites provide. We want to make the whole process of learning astrophotography easier to get more people to go out and take photos of the milky way.
Risks:
Team members have limited experience with mobile app development and programming in Swift. Scheduling conflicts and limited availability for group work limit the time available for collaborative group work. The project will also require web hosting to support certain features, which will be an additional cost to the team.
Risk Mitigation Plan:
Team members will take time to learn mobile app development through online resources before beginning serious work on the project. A weekly meeting time and location will be established to stay up to date on what everyone is working on and work together.
Version Control:
Version control will be handled using GitHub. The repository for this project is https://github.com/nleut/astropics
Development Method: The development method used for this project will be Agile/Scrum. The weekly scrum meeting will be on Wednesday, during which the sprint backlog will be reviewed and the team will communicate their progress. After a sprint is completed every 1-4 weeks, consequent sprints and user stories will be planned.
Collaboration Tool: Team communication is handled using Slack in a workspace that has already been set up.
Proposed Architecture: Frontend: Objective-C or Swift (probably swift) Backend: Weather API Light Pollution API SQL database Location API
Members
Marco Ortiz Torres
Kylie Kim
Noah Leuthaeuser
Dennis Nguyen
Project Info
Client: CSCI 3308
Date: December 16, 2017
Role: Full Stack Developer
View site: https://github.com/nleut/astropics