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Joanne Liu
EYEdentify: Eye Health Monitoring Software
UX Design
EYEdentify is a proactive eye health tracking concept designed to help digital creatives monitor, prevent, and manage eye strain and dryness through personalized feedback, real-time metrics, and guided care.
Context
Academic app concept - team of 2
9 months (Aug.2024 - Apr.2025)
“How do I know ahead of time that I’m going to get eye strain?” 💻
For digital creatives, hours of intense screen time can silently lead to discomfort—dryness, fatigue, and blurry vision that disrupt focus and creativity. Yet most tools only react after the damage is done. How might we help users detect and prevent eye strain before it sets in, empowering them to work smarter and protect their long-term eye health?
Meet our User 🎩
RESEARCH
What makes eye strain so hard to manage? 👀
With this question in mind, I conducted two rounds of user research to understand how digital creatives experience and respond to eye strain in their daily routines.
Our research revealed several key challenges:
Lack of Early Warning Systems ⏳: Most users don’t realize they’re straining their eyes until symptoms like dryness, headaches, or blurred vision have already begun.
Generic, Unhelpful Reminders 🚫: Existing solutions mostly rely on timers to prompt breaks. Users told us these reminders often feel arbitrary or easy to ignore.
Low Awareness of Eye Health Metrics 📉: Users weren’t sure what “eye health” even looked like in measurable terms.
Survey 📊
To gather broad insights, we launched an online survey targeting digital creatives and frequent screen users. We received responses from over 50 individuals ranging from college students to full-time designers.
Key insights from the survey:
Over 70% reported experiencing eye strain or dryness at least weekly.
Most users rely on vague self-checks (“I take a break when I feel tired”) rather than consistent habits or tools.
Nearly half had tried screen timers or eye-care apps, but found them too passive or disruptive.
User Interviews 📑
To dive deeper into behaviors and unmet needs, we conducted two rounds of in-depth semi-structured interviews—first with visually impaired artists, and later with screen-heavy users aged 20–65, including an optometrist for clinical perspective.
Pain points discovered through interviews:
User want real-time feedback about their eye condition, not just time-based nudges.
There's confusion around how to interpret or act on eye data, even if it's available.
Different age groups engage differently: younger users want data-driven feedback, while older users prefer simple guidance like "take a break now."
Round 1 User Interview Analysis - Targeting visually impaired artists
Round 2 User Interview Analysis - Targeting individuals with eye strain and eye dryness
DESIGN
From Insights to Design Requirements ✨
After synthesizing insights from both rounds of user interviews, I translated recurring pain points into clear design requirements to guide our solution development. These requirements became the foundation of EYEdentify’s user experience.
Exploring Eye-Tracking with Pupil Labs 👓
Through discussions with our team advisor, we learned about Pupil Labs, a company developing research-grade eye-tracking glasses used in scientific and UX studies. These sensors can monitor key indicators like blink rate, microsaccades, and pupil dilation—all of which correlate with eye fatigue and visual stress.
To bring this insight into our solution, we proposed using these glasses to collect real-time eye data, which would then be analyzed and visualized within the EYEdentify app to help users track and respond to early signs of eye strain.
Sketching and Wireframing ✒️
With the design requirements in place, I began by sketching rough interface concepts to address user pain points, and then developed these into wireframes.
User Testing & Prototype 🔦
After finalizing the wireframes, I conducted one round of usability testing to assess how effectively users could navigate the app. With feedback from usability testing, I refined the wireframes into prototype to address navigation challenges and improve information clarity.
The design outlined the user flows for 5 main functions
Home screen with live updates and customizable features.
Live data taken from sensors showcased in detailed graphs.
Popup notifications to remind users when to take breaks, use eye drops, etc.
Exercises, Resources, Imagery.
UI designed for lower visual load.
EYEdentify: See the Signs Before the Strain 👁️
Live Eye Health Tracking • Smart Alerts • Guided Breaks
EYEdentify helps digital creatives stay ahead of eye strain with real-time sensor data, personalized feedback, and calming, science-backed interventions.
Onboarding 🚀
New users are guided through a simple setup that introduces key features and explains how live eye tracking works.
Home Dashboard with Live Updated Data 🏠
Stay informed at a glance with live updates on metrics related to eye strain and eye dryness. Scroll to see your current eye moisture level, daily screen time trends, and curated news about eye health.
Data Visualization 📊
Dive into a monthly calendar that visualizes eye moisture levels using color-coded rings. Tap any day for detailed graphs tracking eye moisture, usage intensity, and blink rate. At the top of the page, a clear highlight section explains key trends and insights in plain language.
Browse 🔎
Recharge with guided eye exercises, calming music and visuals, and the built-in 20-20-20 rule timer. The Resources tab connects users to nearby eye doctors and curated articles, while the Exercises section offers step-by-step eye exercises.
Reminders ❗
Context-aware notifications like “Use eye drops,” “Take a break,” or “Lower screen brightness” are triggered by early signs of fatigue detected by the sensor.
"EYEdentify" 👁️
The name EYEdentify combines “eye” and “identify”—reflecting our core mission: to help users recognize early signs of eye strain before discomfort sets in. Just as heart rate monitors help us understand our physical health, EYEdentify makes invisible eye stress visible, measurable, and actionable.
We hope your eyes stay healthy, happy, and strain-free.
