Kevin Farnham (Mirra) on the Barrier to Creating AR/VR Experiences and the Challenge of UX Design
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The Guest
Kevin Farnham is an experience designer and design executive as well as a serial entrepreneur. In 1998, Kevin started Method, which became the leading design agency focused on brand, product, and service design. There he worked with Apple, Microsoft, Google, Adobe, Nike, and many others.
Over the course of his career, Kevin solved design challenges through each of the waves of personal computing: from the PC to the web to mobile. Now he’s focused on Augmented Reality.
His current startup is called Mirra. (Not to be confused with Mira Labs and their Prism headset - we chatted with Matt Stern at Mira Labs in an earlier episode.) Mirra is a tool that empowers anyone to create and share VR and AR experiences – without 3D expertise and without code.
The Conversation
In this conversation, Kevin and I talk about the underlying problem he’s tackling at Mirra, and how he’s solving it. We explore the lessons he’s learned building a highly successful and sought after design agency, and how he’s incorporating those lessons into his current startup.
We also get into the signals or events that will propel the AR market forward, the challenges of interaction design for AR tools, and where the good AR & VR designers will come from.
The Request
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Links From The Episode
- Method - design agency
- Sketch Fab - 3D model marketplace
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- Resilient: How to Grow an Unshakable Core of Calm, Strength, and Happiness by Rick Hanson
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- American Gods: A Novel by Neil Gaiman
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