AR anatomy learning app
FaceReality
ROLE
Product Designer
EXPERTISE
UX/UI Design
YEAR
2023-2024
Making Anatomy Visible, Intuitive, and Local
For many health science students, learning facial musculature goes far beyond memorizing names and locations — it’s about being able to visualize these muscles on real faces, both their own and their patients’. Yet most anatomy resources rely on static diagrams, abstract models, or overly technical language, creating a gap between theory and practice.
This project emerged from the need to bridge that gap:
How can we help students truly see and understand facial muscles in action, not just on paper, but in context? How might we make anatomy feel more human, more interactive, and more intuitive?
Face Reality was built to meet this challenge. Using interactive design and Augmented Reality, it brings anatomy closer to students’ lived experiences, empowering them to recognize, understand, and engage with facial expressions through movement and context — not just memorization.
Note: This project was done in Portuguese and later translated to English by me.
Challenges
Problem overview
Reached over 500 installs on the App Store through organic growth and student referrals during its first two months live.
Increase in the number of downloads after a redesign based on usability tests
Early testers rated the app highly, with a Net Promoter Score above 80 reflecting strong user satisfaction.
The app achieved a System Usability Scale score of 87.5, indicating excellent usability based on student feedback.
Identifying problems
The main challenge this project seeks to address is the difficulty health science students face in visualizing and internalizing facial musculature beyond textbook memorization. Traditional anatomy education relies on static diagrams, technical language, and limited contextual application, making it hard for students to connect muscles with real human faces — their own or their patients’.
While textbooks provide theoretical knowledge, they often fail to support real-time recognition of muscles during facial expressions. This disconnect limits both retention and practical application in clinical settings.
Students in fields like speech therapy, aesthetics, and dentistry are predominantly visual and experiential learners. Without tools that offer expression-based interaction, many struggle to make sense of how facial muscles behave in real scenarios, leaving them with a fragmented and abstract understanding of anatomy.
These images illustrate innovative uses of body painting and 3D analysis as educational strategies to teach facial muscle anatomy. On the left, Alcântara et al. (2021) use painted hemifaces to help students visualize muscle structure during real facial expressions. On the right, Pradel et al. (2024) combine body painting with 3D stereophotogrammetry, enabling the dynamic analysis of skin displacement and facial asymmetries — reinforcing the value of visual and interactive methods in health education.
Alcântara, M. T. D., et al. (2021). Utilizando o body painting no processo de ensino e aprendizagem dos músculos da expressão facial. Brazilian Journal of Development, 7(3), 25625–25634. https://doi.org/10.34117/bjdv7n3-321
Pradel, R., Savoldelli, C., Rios, O., Kestemont, P., & Lerhe, B. (2024). Facial Painting and 3D Stereophotogrammetric Analysis of Facial Dynamics: A Reliable Anatomical Educational Method. Journal of Clinical Medicine, https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm13082304
Process Overview
The Face Reality design process was guided by a user-centered, agile methodology, emphasizing close collaboration between design and development. I led the design team, working directly with developers using agile practices, notably a structured Design Sprint. This approach allowed us to rapidly identify user needs, explore innovative solutions, build quick prototypes, and iteratively refine the design based on immediate feedback.
Our main priorities included visual clarity, interactive real-time muscle visualization, and facilitating contextual learning. The effectiveness of our iterative improvements was validated through usability evaluations and the System Usability Scale (SUS).
User Persona
Creating detailed personas, such as Maria Isabel, provided our team with deep insights into our users’ real challenges, motivations, and learning contexts. Maria Isabel’s difficulty connecting textbook anatomy to real facial movement, and her need for visual, interactive study material, informed our product strategy—guiding us toward real-time AR visualization and expression-based content. Additionally, by translating her key pain points into actionable user stories, we were able to precisely target interface solutions, ensuring our app addressed genuine student needs through clear, interactive, and supportive design features.
Isabel Alcantara | 20
Dentistry student learning facial anatomy
Goals
Understand the structure and function of facial muscles relevant to clinical practice
Visualize muscles in real contexts (on herself and others)
Build confidence for future application in aesthetic and functional procedures
Needs
A way to see each facial muscle working on a real face.
Short, interactive content in Portuguese she can study on her own.
Clear links between expressions and the muscles that produce them.
Pain Points
Difficulty associating textbook anatomy with real facial movement
Traditional methods feel abstract, passive, and disconnected from patient interaction
Lack of tools that allow her to see muscles on a live face or during expressions
Competitor analysis
I conducted a competitor analysis to understand the strengths and weaknesses of existing anatomy learning apps, focusing on how they show facial muscles, support beginners, and connect anatomy to real expressions. This helped identify opportunities for differentiation within Face Reality.
Face Reality
By analyzing competitors, we saw that most offer detailed but static 3D models aimed at advanced users and the whole body. Face Reality focuses on the facial expression muscles, overlays them on the user’s own face in real time, and is designed for beginner health students, with a freemium model.
Solution
Face Reality helps you learn facial anatomy by showing muscle structures directly on your own face. The app uses real-time visualization tied to your expressions, so you connect what you see with what you feel. Instead of static diagrams or complex terms, you practice with clear expressions that make muscles easier to recognize, memorize, and understand.
The app is designed for beginner students in speech therapy, aesthetics, and dentistry. It gives you a way to connect classroom learning with clinical observation.
Muscle Cards
Clear, accessible cards break down each facial muscle by name, function, and context. Designed to support quick understanding and long-term retention through emotion-based grouping.
3D Mode
Using real-time augmented reality, students can view a full muscle map projected onto their own face—making anatomy tangible, interactive, and easier to remember.
