Projects
I co-founded Paper Giant
I started a consultancy with Chris Marmo in 2013, and led the company, initially as Design Director, and later as Managing Director, until I left in mid 2024.
Paper Giant helps organisations deliver better products, services and strategy. You can find out more about Paper Giant here.
During my 10 years leading Paper Giant, I worked as a service designer, UX designer, qualitative researcher, co-design facilitator, strategist, and project leader on many of our projects. My work focussed mostly on the justice, not-for-profit and public sectors.
These are some of the projects I’m most proud of, covering the breadth of work that I led at Paper Giant:
The Supporting Justice Project
Voluntary Assisted Dying Model of Care
Stepping Stones to Worker Wellbeing
Systems Mapping Adolescent Violence in the Home
Assemble Housing Financial Coaching
Qualitative and Systems Approaches to Energy System Risk
Systems Thinking for Innovation in the Australian Energy Sector
Wayfarer (2015)
Wayfarer was an experimental digital artwork and design probe that explored the ‘experience’ that digital devices such as smartphones have in the city, highlighting that even seemingly mundane objects embody a ‘knowledge’ of the world and their place in it.
Find out more about Wayfarer here.
The More-than Research Game (2015)
The More-Than Research Game was developed by myself and Chris Marmo at Paper Giant as a way to explore alternative approaches to research.
Find out more about the More-Than Research Game here.
Vault: The Non-Stop Performing History of Circus Oz (2014)
Vault was a video exhibition celebrating the 30 year history of Circus Oz that played at the Arts Centre Melbourne for the Melbourne International Arts Festival in 2014.
Developed as a follow-on from my PhD research, the exhibition aimed to bring the digital archive to life in creative, interactive, immersive, and playful ways to activate the foyer space of the Arts Centre and celebrate the diverse history of an important cultural institution.
Find out more about Vault here.
You can also read the essay I wrote for the Vault catalogue about digital materiality and making the exhibition.
PhD: ‘Acts of Design’ (2014)
I have a PhD in Interaction Design from RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia. My doctoral research was part of the Circus Oz Living Archive Project.
My research focussed on the process of making an online digital performance archive, and the subsequent implications for archive practice, software studies, and interaction design.
If you really want to read it, my PhD dissertation is open access here.
As part of my academic career, I also used to teach into the Design Futures studio as part of the Communication Design program at RMIT, and a Service Design subject as part of the Master in Design Innovation & Technology at RMIT’s Spatial Information Architecture Lab.
I’ve taught subjects and run studios on service design, interaction design, app design, web development, and design theory at undergraduate and masters level.
Time Flies (2011)
Time flies was an iOS app that I created in the early days of the iPhone. It was designed as a kind of ‘anti-todo list’ app: its sole function was to let you know how long it had been since you last did something.
It’s no longer for sale because I wasn’t able to maintain development along with my PhD commitments (though, based on the number of emails I got, loads of people still used it until it became obsolete with the release of iOS 14). I’ve left the original web page for it up here.
App a Week (2011)
“App a Week” was a series of mini-app projects that I ran for a while when I was teaching myself Objective-C and app development. The aim was to make a functional app each week, and document and reflect on the process on my blog. I only made 3 apps in the end, and the 4th app ended up becoming Time Flies.
Pool UX Redesign
I was heavily involved with the user-experience redesign of the (sadly defunct) ABC Pool, an experimental media sharing platform. The UX redesign was a run by the Australasian CRC for Interaction Design (ACID).
Pool is no longer live, but a functional version is archived here as part of the NLA’s Pandora Project.
Flash Development
Approximately an eternity ago, I worked as a front-end flash developer for many different design and advertising agencies. I’ve documented a little of that period of my life here. During that time I developed an open source AS3 Library for integrating WordPress and flash, you can still find it here.
Sounds Like Techno (2003)
Early in my design career, I worked as a motion designer and animator on an online documentary series – Sounds Like Techno.
Produced by Springtime Productions, and funded by the ABC and Film Victoria, the interactive series explored the history of techno music in Australia using sound, animation, and interactive elements. A non-linear, multimedia documentary, it was groundbreaking for its time, produced many years before streaming video or online documentaries were the norm.
The documentary won the 2004 Gold Hugo in the entertainment category at the Chicago International Film Festival, and was part of the official selection for Sundance 2004 and Real Life on Film 2004.
Illustration and Graphic Design
I have very little record or documentation of my former life as a graphic designer and illustrator, in the days before I got into programming, animation, and making digital things.
Something that is still floating around is this funny collaboration with Kevin Fanning, from the friendly days of the internet. Another is the album cover designs for my former band, Because of Ghosts, along with ~300 or so hand drawn limited edition covers for a Canadian tour.