I am Bjørn. Im 25 year old and an industrial design student on the 5th year! Im also a consultant, service designer and on good days I play piano, host music events and make visual expressions.
Currently I am writing my masters thesis in service design for St. Olavs Hospital Lung Cancer department.
This page will hopefully give you a good impression of who I am and what I do.
If there is anything more you’re wondering about, send me a mail at bjornrleira@gmail.com(or if you are near Bakklandet in Trondheim, just shout loudly and maybe ill hear you ;)
Cool Stuff
A collection of corners on the internet that I find amusing, so maybe you will to!
- ThisChairDoesNotExist - Autogenerated Chairs
- FoldnFly - Paper plane folding for everyone
- PlayPhrase - Find movies from quotes
- Spline - 3D-modelling in browser
- Neal - More and more complicated trolley problems
- EarthFM - Sounds of the earth
- Supershapes - Make crazy shapes
- Gridzzly - All types of grids, yeah!
- Fockups - Realistic Mockups
Ocean Matcher
The funding we need, for the ocean we want
Project for NoA Ignite, 2024
Mockup of platform lading page
As a part of my internship at Noa Ignite, I worked alongside three other interns, developing a pilot for the Ocean Matcher platform.
Ocean Matcher is a digital tool whose objective is to match philanthropists and other financial donors with projects aiming to protect and preserve the sea. We aim to elevate ocean funding and impact through smart matchmaking. The project is a part of the UNESCO Ocean Decade, is brought forward by Martin Moen at REV Ocean and will be a critical part of UNECSOs effort to preserve the ocean.
Task
To begin this process we were given a pre-developed algorithm by Robert Kolner, which matched projects and finical donors with each other. Our task was to apply this algorithm towards a project database and create the first usable version of OceanMatcher.
Result
The V0.5 is the result of comprehensive end-user involvement in a cross-functional team and angle way of working.
Process
We started the project with a week long Google Design Sprint. By mapping needs and pain points and quickly iterate over potential user paths, we were able to develop a good understanding of the problem we were facing. During the sprint, the whole team worked together, disregarding our different professions. This was rounded off by developing a quick Figma prototype and doing five user tests.
After getting a firm understanding of what was expected of us, we developed a platform and started implementing our initial designs and user flows there.
By using time to set up and prioritise tasks on GitHub we were able to constantly keep focus and work together. Throughout the process we did rapid prototyping on paper and then Figma and carried out user tests in Figma and live on platform, with actual end users.
Priorities
It’s important to note that we were developing a prototype which aimed to convince a board at the UNESCO to grant further funds to develop a full size platform. From the start the project was very big and during the first week we identified problems and possibilities way beyond our eight week project scope. Because of this, prioritisation was extremely important and almost every day decisions had to be made regarding features, flows, layout and what to include.
Team
The team consisted of four interns; two backend developers, one frontend developer and me as a UX designer. In practice the team has been truly cross-functional, with everyone contributing outside their respective field of expertise.
In addition, Alexander Schipper worked as a team lead, making sure we all were onboarded properly and weighting in when important decisions had to be made.
Going forward
The prototype will be presented by Morten Sand and Martin Moen at the UNESCO Conference in Rio in early September. Then further development will be made before presenting again at the next conference in Nice in March 2025.
Team: Carolina Gunnesdal, Peter Lawrence, Henrik Løvhaug, Bjørn Ravlo-Leira, Morten Sand, Alexander Schipper.
Thanks to: Martin Moen (REV Ocean), Robert Kilmer (Data Engineer, Noa Ignite), Gøril Julia (Senior Designer, Noa Ignite)
Website: oceanmatcher.com
"I am super impressed. Spot on! It’s really easy, intuitive and exactly what I have hoped this would be" - Martin Moen, Rev Ocean/HUB Ocean
"This is great! Incredible improvement! " – Steven Fox, Propeller VC
"This is Fabulous! It has advanced so much! Huge congratulation, excited to take this to Rio. I believe this will create a huge amount of enthusiasm there. Alison Clausen, UNESCO IOC
Well done! Absolute Fabulous – Olivia Swift, Lloyds Register Foundation