Verso
prototyping a reading app that prioritizes synthesis over completion
ROLE
Solo Designer
TIMELINE
24 hours
TOOLS
Figma Design
Figma Make
Claude Sonnet
OUTCOME
3rd Place
MVP
THE PROMPT
Find a digital experience that feels over-optimized (i.e. sterile, frictionless, forgettable).
Reimagine it so the interface changes through repeated use, introducing variation, wear, or adaptation over time.
Prototype interactions where the system evolves with use in ways that would be difficult to express in a static design.
PROBLEM
No reading app helps you understand what your annotations reveal about you.
Current reading platforms let you highlight. None of them synthesize. Your annotations sit disconnected, never building into anything bigger.
Verso
Kindle
Libby
Margin Annotations
In-App Reading Platform
Synthesize thoughts across books
Enhanced Recommendations
A QUICK READ ON TODAY'S READING TOOLS (pun intended)
Due to the 24hr time constraints, my project guidelines came from lived experience and frustration with how reading has been digitized. I focused on three patterns that felt fundamentally broken:
Against algorithmic discovery
Reading has become algorithmic. We default to ratings, lists, and “what everyone else thinks” – losing the experience of wandering and choosing for ourselves.
Annotation is flattened
Digital highlighting captures text, but not thought. It removes the friction that makes reflection meaningful.
Reflection is disconnected
Notes live in isolation. There’s no way to see patterns across what you’ve read – or what it reveals about you.
FIG 01
Kindle Reader App
FIG 02
Libby Reading App
SOLUTION
Synthesis over completion.
Verso turns your annotations into a living portrait of how you think — across every book you've ever read.
01 · Library
Book recommendations are presented as a spatial shelf - no search, no ratings.
Recommendations are generated from your own annotations.
02 · Currently Reading
A distraction-free reading experience with generous margins.
No progress bars. No completion metrics.
Highlight → annotate → reflect.
03 · Insights
Annotations evolve into a living canvas.
- Ideas cluster into emergent themes
- Connections form across books
- Reflection prompts appear contextually
Over time, your thinking becomes visible.
INTERACTION DESIGN
01 · Annotation → Canvas Pipeline
The moment you write something, it enters the Insights canvas, drifting into a larger system of ideas. Reading is no longer linear - it accumulates and transforms.
02 · Drawing Connections
Users can link annotations across books and moments.
This turns isolated thoughts into relationships - making meaning not just from what you read, but how ideas echo and evolve.
03 · Marking as Resonant
A single tap marks an idea as especially meaningful.
The brain icon isn't a typical "like", it's a signal of cognitive weight, helping the system understand what stays with you over time.
04 · Renaming Theme Clusters
Emerging clusters can be named by the user.
Instead of predefined categories, meaning is authored. The system suggests patterns - but you define what they represent.
05 · Timeline Scrubber
A draggable timeline reveals how thinking changes over time.
Older annotations fade as you move through time, allowing you to how your thought shifted over time.
06 · Ghost Prompts
Reflection prompts appear softly within the canvas over time.
They emerge without interrupting. Once answered, your words remain while the prompt fades, ensuring your voice outlasts the system.
AI TOOLS
I used Figma Make with Claude Sonnet to build the functional prototype. The annotation-to-canvas pipeline, staggered drift animations, ghost prompt triggering at exactly the 3rd annotation, and the timeline scrubber all required a live system - not a Figma Design frame.
What AI accelerated: component logic, animation timing, state management, design → live product.
What stayed mine: every design decision, interaction model, and design system choice.
AI didn't design Verso. It let me build fast enough to test whether my design decisions actually felt right in motion.
FIG 03
Canvas Figma Design Frame
FIG 04
Translated Canvas Prototype
OUTCOMES
CreateSC 2026 · 3rd Place · MVP
Verso was built in 24 hours for CreateSC, USC’s annual designathon focused on reimagining digital experiences.
The project placed 3rd overall in the Figma Make track out of over 50 submissions.