QBuddy

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  Here is our logo!

Inspiration

As teenagers, we were inspired by our own personal experiences with isolation during quarantine. We know millions of people around the world are struggling during this pandemic, and we think that a platform that can make meaningful connections, focused on self-improvement, can greatly boost one's mental health. Some type of social distancing or other restrictions will remain for some time, so we truly believe this platform can help people stay motivated.

What it does

Our platform connects people who have similar interests and goals in order to hold each other accountable during quarantine as well as offer some advice and motivation. It uses an augmented reality interface to add a social nuance to isolation and social distancing. In addition, it offers time for self-reflection by using a journalism and goal-setting mechanism. Also, QBuddy has an AR platform where users can mingle with each other to get a "social touch" while physically being distant. Lastly, something that's unique about our app is that we gamified the process and made the social distancing experience fun while staying at home!

How we built it

First, we outlined a plan of how we would like our project to progress. Then we split up the work and took turns working with various platforms. We created the user interface of our app using FIGMA and modeled various avatars using EchoAR.

Challenges we ran into

Our main challenge was integrating EchoAR. While there were some issues with the platform itself due to system overload, we were able to present our EchoAR idea during the demo.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are most proud of collaborating well while developing our idea and organizing our thoughts. In addition, we’re glad that we got past any hardships and challenges with ease. Some of our main milestones are developing user interface and incorporating augmented reality with EchoAR.

What we learned

When we were doing some background research and some market analysis we found several gaps and pitfalls that other platforms are experiencing. Then we build a collaborative and inclusive spirit to consider all ideas and successfully build our product. In a technical aspect, we learned how to design an app interface using FIGMA, interacting and utilizing EchoAR, and most importantly how to create an appealing project that connects multiple ideas.

What's next for QBuddy

The two main things we would like to expand with our idea is improving the augmented reality avatars. We truly believe that having AR incorporated into a social platform like this is truly unique and something we would like to add is an avatar builder where you can upgrade your profile and interact with other avatars. Going forward with QBuddy, we plan on partnering with organizations like Best Buddies, as well as health professionals which could give users of our app the best experience in keeping them healthy mentally. Finally, we would also need to develop the backend of the app, as we built the user interface.

Built With

• echoar
• figma