Dolby
Transform Dolby to speak directly to consumers through an experimental website redesign.
Transform Dolby. Dolby is the industry leader in sound and visual technology for movies, shows, and music. However, when you ask the public, they think Dolby has “something to do with sound.” They recall the Dolby button on their cassette players or incorrectly remember the THX sound cue from their theater goings. Since the company has traditionally been focused on licensing and technology, they were relying on others (tech forums, directors, news articles) to tell their story. Dolby needed our team to help them own their story and make the transition from B2B to B2C through an innovative website redesign.
I came on to this project when it was in its earliest phase of strategy and was able to see it through to the end of our engagement. My design work spanned blue-sky visionary work, specific tech detail pages, systems thinking, and editorial design work driven by current culture.
During the project, I found an opportunity to improve our design process by implementing and teaching a new (at the time) version control system with Abstract. With many teammates cycling on and off the project with parallel tasks, this new process was critical to keep all of us aligned and in tune with each other. It also helped me quickly onboard new teammates to our packed sprints.
One of the main design elements I tackled was the “Atmos Visualizer.” This feature needed to simply explain the complex technology and benefits for Dolby’s flagship offering, Dolby Atmos.
I am proud to say that this feature got the client to lean forward in his chair and say “Fuck yeah!”
As my design moved through the various phases of fidelity to sell it up the ladder, I collaborated and directed some incredible teammates to include 3D motion and final webGL development.
The visualizer was one of the first features we tackled in the detailed design phase of the project. So, while I was exploring the UX and experience of this visualizer, we were all also pushing the new look and feel simultaneously. This was a fun exercise to truly own and create a new experience through both UX and visual design.
The next big feature I handled was the “Experience Finder.” Dolby’s superior technology is used in hundreds of movies, shows, and games — new and old. However, Dolby had no way to showcase this, let alone help users find any of the content. We created the “Experience Finder” to help marry the users’ needs (find out what IP had Dolby in it and how to get the experience) and the business needs (teaching the value of the technology and understanding that Dolby is much more than just sound) in a modular and scalable experience.
A huge part of the strategy for transforming Dolby’s perception was to use “Passions” as an entry point into the site. These passion pages (Music, Gaming, Cinema) are meant to be constantly updated with new content and very editorial. Working with content strategy and UX we created a template that would work for each passion over time while creating a unique experience
The homepage and navigation elements were major challenges for many reasons. All of the designers on the team took a stab at it varying points with the client.
It needed to be variable and current, unique and experimental, introduce the new Dolby, respect IP legally, and be doable by a third party development team.
Here are the concepts that I was the most excited about.
Creative direction
— Chris Linden
— Dwayne Koh
— Bryan Le
Design partners
— Lamon Bethel
— Lacey Valentini
UX
— Jessica Stanell
— Noah Conk
— Shihwen Wang
Strategy
— Andi Davis
— Griffin Olmstead
Technology
— Julien Renau
— Genki Hagata
Account
— Darius Houshiarnejad
— Jaime Sena
— Daniel Olivieri
— Graham Humphreys