Content topics

Works composed for, or directly relating to, my favorite medium: the World Wide Web. I was lucky enough to thank Sir Tim Berners-Lee for his invention in person at a 25th birthday party for the Web. There were countless pre-inventors before him, and infinitely more pioneers afterward, but Tim (and CERN) mark a special nexus in human history.

Projects, essays, or news items that feature topics or methods that I’ve taught myself, rather than received formal instruction on. These are often illustrations of my broad curiosity and tenacity. (In stark contrast to the times that I’m exhausted and hide behind the curtains.) See also, Quantum Computing (QC), Artificial Intelligence (AI/ML), Spatial Computing (XR), writing, and music.

Works that make particular use of my favorite widely-used programming language. I’ve been an enthusiastic fan since before Douglas Crockford wrote JavaScript: The Good Parts. It’s dirty and weirdly flexible; so flexible that cowards tried to graft classical inheritance onto it, and later invented TypeScript. (Disgusting.) It could only be better if it had been allowed to be Scheme as Brendan Eich had intended. (I strongly disagree with Eich’s early-2000s stance against gay marriage, but it would be wrong not to acknowledge him as the initial creator of JavaScript. We must contend with our history rather than ignore it.)

Works that are constructed around a particular piece of music (see also, music videos), are collaborations with musicians, interviews of musicians, facilitate the creation of music, consist of experimental audio performances, involve the distribution of music, or reflect on the experience of listening to music. I’ve worn all the hats.

Longtime collaborator and dear friend. See also Warning Office.

Works composed in service of my Master of Fine Arts (MFA) degree at Yale University’s graduate graphic design program in New Haven, Connecticut. See also art.yale.edu, Sheila Levrant de Bretteville, Christopher Pullman, Glen Cummings, Linda van Deursen & Armand Mevis, Jürg Lehni, Daniël van der Velden, Tobias Frere-Jones, Dan Michaelson, Sara Soskolne, Irma Boom, Karel Martens, Sigi Moeslinger & Masamichi Udagawa, and Laurenz Brunner.

“Spatial computing” is a broad term for technologies that facilitate interaction with digital information within a spatial, usually 3D, context. This includes virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and mixed reality or mediated reality (MR). Extended Reality(XR) is a similar catch-all term, but is limited to the goggle-mediated or “magic window” experiences of VR, AR, and MR—while spatial computing is a larger category encompassing both 3D and 2D; both with and without headsets. See also Simon Greenwold’s coinage of “spatial computing” in his 2003 MIT thesis.

Speaking engagements, talks, lectures, and slideshows.

Wikipedia: XR is a catch-all term to refer to augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), mixed reality or mediated reality (MR), using “X” be an arbitrary variable that can interpolate between these various realities or eXtrapolate (eXtend) beyond them. Time will tell. See also, spatial computing.

Works related to quantum computing, or engaging the topic of quantum physics in general. See also, Yale Quantum Institute.

Works that employ or are related to quantum computing. See also, Yale Quantum Institute.

Items related to UConn—as a student, as a recent graduate assisting with the computer labs to make ends meet, or the years beyond.

Larger undertakings that I’ve been involved in from the blue-sky concept phase, to launch / publication / broadcast to the masses. In the best of cases these projects started as a very small collective and then grew to include sizable teams of talented folks.

Realtime 3D animation framework created by myself and Robert Gerard Pietrusko specifically for sketching, proofing, and deploying 360˚ data animations intended for display on the walls of custom-built rotunda environments. (Later adapted for more general purpose use.) It was the key component of our collaboration with Diller Scofidio + Renfro on Exit (Terre Natale). Bronson was written in Java, used OpenGL for graphics rendering, and made use of the then-beta version of Processing. Named after Charles Bronson, a rugged man who will get the job done, no matter the ugliness required.

Browser-based virtual reality experiences.

Works that make particular use of special CSS features, such as 3D transforms or combinations of features that constitute a clever hack. For more on what style sheets are and how CSS came to exist, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSS.

Works composed in service of my Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) degree at the University of Connecticut’s graphic design program in Storrs, Connecticut at the turn of the century. This program was created by the heavily influential Edvin Yegir, along with Mark Zurolo, Randall Hoyt, and David Frisco. If I made anything halfway decent there it was because of their guidance.

Works that employ or are related to artificial intelligence. See also, machine learning.

There’s nothing quite like the vintage Atari arcade cabinets of the 1970s and 80s. The simple vector graphics, limited color palettes, and oscillator-driven audio; these things are beautiful. Games like Asteroids (1979), Tempest (1981), and Pong (1972) continue to inspire me decades after their creation.

For a few years Jürg Lehni and I shared a small studio space on Shacklewell Lane in London. In addition to Hektor and other artworks that I admire, Jürg’s also created fantastic software tools such as Scriptographer, and Paper.js. This collection of works makes use of Jürg’s software tools. (I miss our time together, Buddy!)

Works that employ or are related to machine learning. See also, artificial intelligence.

Items related to the Yale Quantum Institute at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. See also quantuminstitute.yale.edu.

Items that went viral without the weight of marketing behind them. In these cases it means hundreds of thousands of views, extensive reposting, and so on. If you know my personal work, it’s probably because of these.

Paper.js is an open source vector graphics scripting framework that runs on top of the HTML5 Canvas. It offers a clean Scene Graph / Document Object Model and a lot of powerful functionality to create and work with vector graphics and bezier curves, all neatly wrapped up in a well designed, consistent and clean programming interface. Developed by Jürg Lehni & Jonathan Puckey.