PICS NEAR YOU

Purpose

The purpose of this project was to identify technical opportunities to build interactive sytems, translating those ideas into application designs, and then build prototypes of those applications.

My Process

I first explored the uses of many different APIs and brainstormed how to mash these APIs to create an application. We brainstormed in groups on a whiteboard and then individually with quick wireframe sketches. After this I narrowed in on my individual project topics.

My idea was to build an interactive system that allow users to explore the space around them. Through this, the user can see what is happening near them and even join in on the events. Also, I wanted to create a way for users to see areas near them they might want to go and explore or gain inspiration for pictures they might want to take.

I created a web application for my one month long project called 'Pics Near You,' which I coded in Python, HTML, and CSS and hosted on Google App Engine. This application displayed a collage of Instagram pictures that were taken near the user. To create this, I did a mashup of two APIs - Telize API and Instagram API. I used Telize to retrieve the user's location (latitude and longitude) based on their IP address. Instagram was used to retrieve the pictures that were taken within a certain radius from the user.

Result