ASH

Loss of habitat and species threatens all life on earth. Over 1 Million Species are now at risk of extinction. Preserving our Biodiversity is one of the major challenges future generations face today, but "Environmental education has failed to keep up with the rate of environmental degradation", and you can’t protect what you don’t know.

We wanted to create a tool that made learning about biodiversity possible through fun, active, discovery led play, as opposed to passive media consumption. In essence, we wanted to build a Pokedex for the real world.

ASH engages little players through a simple discovery led play mechanic, facilitated by a familiar, modern interaction: the point and click digital camera. Children are encouraged to take photos of the life-forms that surround them, and the AI turns their photos into instant, fact-filled animal cards. From house pets to plants to rare bugs, collecting them all is the adventure!

We developed a unique UI for each animal card, as well as a set of collectible badges to reward players that take discovery seriously. We also designed an experience for parents, giving them full control over the data collected by their children, keeping them informed and in the loop.

How does ASH work?

1/ Discover
Nature discovery is done through a familiar point and click interaction. Whether you are on a nature walk or strolling through town, look out for life forms, big and small, and take a picture with ASH. The Ai does the rest...

2/ Learn
ASH’s Machine Learning model recognises new species instantly, creating information rich entry cards inside the device, filled with important facts on habitat, population and lifecycle for the creature you find.

3/ Collect
From rare Insects to common house pets, from Fungi to Cacti, ASH is capable of collecting entries on millions of different life-forms. The world is filled with magical creatures worth preserving, but we can’t protect what we don’t know.

We led the project from ideation to prototype to launch in a 4 week sprint. The project was prototyped with open source technologies such as SLS 3D printing, a Google Coral development board and camera that runs the iNaturalist dataset for species recognition.