Cinematic Thinking and Design

With every blink of an eye, we experience new things. These small fragments of experience add up to a greater sense of how we advance our story every day, and in turn what we decide to remember about them. For me Design has always been a tool to make sense of things. The action of designing involves making informed choices.

I have always had some type of innate connection with objects. Perhaps it started from my nomadic-like childhood where objects were a means to understanding various cultures that I lived in. More recently I would walk by a furniture store and imagined what each chair would tell me about their day in the store. A story about their boredom, or a story about an elderly couple debating on which chair to buy for their new home. It is the idea that story has voice, points-of-view, and action.

For objects it is an opportunity to contribute to our surroundings beyond the traditional form and function. Objects with cinematic qualities - objects with time and other story elements - reveal aspects that we could have never imagined to happen in their every day. Their testimony adds to ways in which we can better understand our surroundings. The design challenge is on framing an experiential system specific to an object that considers circumstance (who, what, where, when), and how they could decipher flashbacks that evoke emotions and meaning from experience.

Finally I would like to see these objects share their stories with other objects as well, and see how their stories evolve. Perhaps this is a step towards a better understanding on how we share our stories with others.

EDUCATION

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
Media Laboratory
Degrees: S.M., Ph.D.
Research Group: Interactive Cinema/Media Fabrics Group
Area Focus: Storied Objects: Designing Time in Objects

Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA
Degree: M.Des.
Major: Interaction Design, School of Design

Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI
Degrees: B.F.A., B.I.D.
Major: Industrial Design, Dept of Architectural Studies

EXPERIENCE

Assistant Professor of Communication
CRC Research Fellow
Boston University
2007-Current

Visiting Scientist
MIT Media Laboratory
Research Group: Interactive Cinema/Media Fabrics Group
2007

Research Assistant
MIT Media Laboratory
Research Group: Interactive Cinema/Media Fabrics Group
2000-2007

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