Custom Greeting Cards with HP AI

Three questions to the project team

What was the particular challenge of the project from a UX point of view?
The greatest challenge of this project was not creating the flow or the UI, but designing the behavior and guardrails for the AI model. The generative limits of AI present a persistent and interesting design challenge that required our team to become experts in crafting advanced prompt instructions to achieve the best outcomes. We learned that too much instruction can be a bad thing, and as with most design challenges, creating something simple is a complex process. Ultimately, advocating for and switching to a stronger and more reliable AI model has helped address the most persistent output issues, but the lessons learned with the original model have informed how we write instructions for the new model.

What was your personal highlight in the development process? Was there an aha!-moment, was there a low point?
The high point of this process was influencing the strategic direction of the overall product. Originally, ‘Create a card’ was intended to be an AI-focused feature nested in the current photo printing experience in the HP app. Through foundational research of both the card creation process as well as AI understanding and sentiment in the broader market, we revealed that this approach did not reflect how people think about card creation or want to engage with AI features. We were able to convince the team and stakeholders that this feature should stand on its own, expanding beyond the photo-card focus and centering around a mental model for card creation, including editing and customization, not just generative AI capability.

Where do you see yourself and the project in the next five years?
'Create a card' will continue to improve and its feature set will continue to expand, particularly when it comes to giving users creative freedom. In addition to supporting more card sizes and dynamically suggested occasions, we’re working towards enabling traditional and AI-enabled editing of both the AI-generated card imagery and text; providing users the tools to further improve their card’s messaging and visual elements with the help of AI. Beyond ‘Create a card,’ our team is working hard on building other creative, educational, and productivity AI solutions to help consumers do their best work, grow, and express their creativity. AI capabilities are improving every day, and HP’s intelligent solutions are too.