Project Graveyard – Devlog 001

The development journey so far.

Note: I started development of Project Graveyard Long before Step Into Vision. This post is a recap of the development of the early versions. Going forward, I’ll post devlogs here as I work on the app. I have some more information about the early versions of the project on my personal site.

I’ve had an idea like Project Graveyard on my list for years. I made a prototype of it in A-Frame (WebXR) in 2020, but it has been in my project backlog since 2016. Leading up to the launch of Apple Vision Pro last year, I knew that I wanted to have an app on the store on day one. I had a lot of ideas, but as 2023 came to a close I started thinking more about this one. I started working on it in December 2023. We knew that Apple Vision Pro would release in “early 2024” and I incorrectly assumed that was “Apple speak” for April or May. We were barely a week into 2024 when Apple announced the release date. By that point, I had a few prototypes working in the Simulator. I still wanted to try to release something, so I had to scale back the scope. I decided to focus on a single Volume-based interface, instead of a fully immersive space. Over the next few weeks I managed to cobble together enough of the idea to ship to the App Store. It was approved without issue and version 1.0 was released on launch day with Apple Vision Pro.

It wasn’t great, but it was the best I could do at the time. Version 1.0 shipped with a single gravestone model. Users could add a record (project, product, idea, business) and a gravestone would appear in the middle of the volume. They could use the drag gesture to move them around the space, and add more gravestones. There was a flat ground, some dead trees, and a fence around three sides. Users could pick from three lighting modes, toggle on a rain particle effect, and show or hide the text of the gravestones. The entire app was contained inside a volume, including the UI to add and edit items. That caused some issues later.

As soon as I got my device and downloaded the app I knew I had a lot of work to do. I started work on version 1.1. This version was all about improving the gestures. It was very easy to accidentally move gravestones in version 1.0. I was using a drag gesture, but decided to switch to a combination of long-press + drag in version 1.1. I also add two handed gestures to rotate or scale the gravestones. I made a new app icon too. This was all that I had time for over the winter and spring. I didn’t get to work on the project again until summer.

Version 2.0 development: In July, I finally got back to work on this project. I opened a TestFlight for a few versions that targeted visionOS 2.0. In version 1.0 I used SwiftUI views in a ZStack to have some fake UI windows inside the volume. This had a lot of limitations and wasn’t very user friendly. In version 2.0 I moved all the UI out of the volume and into a utility window. The first TestFlight version had this new window but not much else.

Next I started working on customization. TestFlight version 1.3 brought a a way to change color and materials on the gravestones. We also have a larger preview of the selected item in the utility window.

Toward the end of the development cycle I added a new help card system. The idea was to show a few handy tips for how to use the app. The user can show or hide this at anytime from the toolbar. I also made several refinements to the customization and utility window. By this time I was as ready as I could be for visionOS 2.0. I took some new screenshots and started revamping the App Store page. I also added a landing page to my business website.

That is the story so far. I have a lot of ideas for Project Graveyard. I want to add more options to customize the gravestones. I want to let users decorate them with 3D models, particles, emoji, and sounds. I want to replace the flat “developer-art” version of the graveyard with something that looks better. Once that is done I’ll also work on ways to customize the entire scene. I also want to revisit the idea of viewing this in a fully immersive space. The scene files in Reality Composer Pro are all laid out at real-world scale. We just scale it down to fit in the volume. Everyone wants SharePlay too, so that is something to figure out.

I do have to be careful not to spend too much time on this project though. This is a free app and obviously a joke of an idea. I want to improve it over time, but it gets a lower priority then my work on Step Into Vision or Dark Spaces. My hope is that adding the devlogs here, I’ll be more motivated to work on it while sharing the development details.

You can get Project Graveyard on the App Store. Please check it out and let me know what you think.