A Visual Note of Emotion

Avnoe is a mindfulness project that reminds users to take a few moments to consider how they're feeling through three quick drawings a day. The practice of expression builds our ability to recognize and understand emotions in ourselves and other people.

Product goals

Provide the tools to allow users to express themselves. The expression itself should be a therapeutic activity like journalling.

Colors, language, and interactions are design decisions that have the power to influence emotions. Avnoe is purposefully designed not to pressure users to feel a certain way.

This tool helps users become mindful of their emotions and the emotions of others. By training users to be more aware of themselves they are enhancing their cognitive empathy skills. Cognitive empathy is the decision to actively recognize and understand another person’s emotional state, and the practice of identifying and understanding your own emotions makes it easier to recognize in other people.

Making a note

Avnoe is a tool that gives users the power to express themselves in their own style. Users are encouraged to make three sketches throughout the day that capture their current mood. The characteristics of a simple line, the weight, the movement and color all communicate meaning. The uniqueness of each sketch, and the collection as a whole will show the personality of the user.

HSL colors

Color has a strong connection to emotion that is different for everyone and is based on personal experience and associations. Giving the user access to the hue, saturation and lightness gives them an opportunity to be specific with the nuances of their connections between color and emotion.

Line weight

Giving users control over the weight of the line allows them to add simple, but meaningful, details.

Saving colors

Giving users the ability to save colors they like allows them to build a color scheme. If it suits the user's personality and expression, they can pick colors from a set of colors used in the past.

Taking lots of notes

One note tells the user how they felt in that moment, while a collection of notes tells the user how they felt over a period of time. Comparing the notes in a collection can reveal changes and patterns in the user’s life.

Expert interview

When dealing with the topic of mental health, it is important to be considerate and thoughtful. Working with Yesi has been invaluable to make sure what we're building is helpful.

"Art therapy is really important because it allows for expression of stories and emotions that cannot be expressed through words"

Yesi Deleon-Mettee

User testing along the process

Various stages of testing

• Idea testing I tested out my hypothesis that making quick sketches would record how my mood changed throughout the day. During this month I learned that the 3 times a day was a sweet spot of enough information, but not too much work.
• With different users I asked people to test Avnoe for a day, and even with just three drawings it is easy to see the different personalities in their drawings.
• Beta Testing There are three users testing it for a longer period of time. I'm looking for feedback on the data they collect within the month.