WorkResume
Osiris-rex.
Screen recording of the live web

 Project Overview PartnerYi-Chun Lan My RoleResearch
Design 
Development NASA conducted a mission called OSIRIS-REx, which aims to deliver an asteroid sample to Earth after a journey spanning nearly 2½ years through space. Instead of attempting a landing, the OSIRIS-REx mission will drop off the sample to Earth from space. 

This project showcases the process through which my groupmate and I attempted to visualize this space mission to narrate its story, exploring an innovative approach within journalism. The project is developed in a 3D interactive online environment, which can make the entire experience more immersive and easier to understand.

Live Web
   Github



Goal & 
Objective
  1. Our first goal is to visually represent NASA's space mission based on a 3D web environment;
  2. The more advanced goal is to broaden accessibility to this NASA mission, enabling audiences with varying levels of space knowledge to understand, enjoy, and derive fun from the experience; 
  3. Finally, we hope this project explores innovative and immersive storytelling approaches within journalism.

 User ResearchTo specify our objectives further, we held group interviews with people from diverse backgrounds, each with varying levels of space knowledge. We received feedback on which aspects of the mission we should highlight visually in our overall experience.

Here are the key findings from the interview:       
  • Most users expressed strong interests on the process of collecting samples from an asteroid, especially the interaction between spacecraft and the asteroid's surface and the storage of samples.
  • Users were highly curious about the spacecraft itself, emphasizing the questions about its propulsion, navigation, and structures.         
  • Users were intrigued by the spacecraft's journey from launch to arrival at the asteroid and back to earth. They wanted to visualize and understand the path it took through space.        



Ideation  After completing the research and summarizing our objectives, we began planning the site structure to help us map out the hierarchy of content more effectively.
 SITE STRUCTURE After consulting with experienced visual journalists, we have opted to maintain a simple site structure.

The entire mission journey will be displayed on a single page, providing a seamless and cohesive experience. More details about the spacecraft will be linked at the end of the main page, allowing the users to explore more without disrupting their main experience.


CONTENT &
VISUAL ELEMENTS Our content and visual element references include news reports and NASA's official website. As one of our goals is exploring visual journalism, we reviewed current reports of this mission to extract important information. For the more academic aspects of our project, such as spacecraft technology and the asteroid, we rely on NASA as our reference to ensure accuracy. We collected images, text, and models from those resources.

Storyboard with ContentDrawing from user research and reports, we crafted this storyboard as a mockup for our development stage, detailing both textual content and diagrams.


OutcomeAfter finishing the storyboard and collecting text and diagram contents, we moved to the development part. We used React.js and react-three-fiber to develop this fully interactive 3D online experience.

Main Journey of the Spacecraft
Spacecraft  Exploration  
Asteroid Exploration